Update: After marking the post shared by the page TIA.ge as false on Facebook, the post has been updated.
On August 15th, the Facebook user Maia Mushkudiani shared a post claiming that there was an experiment conducted on a death-sentenced man in the US. During the experiment the man was blindfolded, and his hand was scratched, but was told that his vein was shattered. During the entire experiment, the man could hear the voice of drops pouring into a bowl, which he believed was the voice of his blood. According to the post, when the dropping stopped, the man’s heart also stopped. The author of the post links this experiment to the pandemic and argues that the most important precondition for overcoming it is predisposition.
The indicated information is groundless since the mentioned scientist Victor Repan cannot be found in any open source. Open sources also do not include any information regarding the aforementioned experiment, while the picture used in the post was taken in 1898, showcasing a man sentenced to death tied on an electric chair and not any kind of an experiment.
The post does not provide information on when the experiment was conducted and only indicates the US as the site of the experiment. Nonetheless, as mentioned, no record of such experiment could be found in the open sources.
Open source also does not reveal any information about the scientist Victor Repan, who, according to the author of the post, conducted the experiment.
The photo attached to the post depicts not an experiment but the death penalty on an electric chair in the US in 1898.
A text similar to a story spread on the Georgian social media was published on the website readthehook.com in 2004, where an interview includes a quote from Bernard Lown’s book “The Lost Art of Healing”. According to the quote, a similar experiment was carried out in India in 1936, except the man was placed on a bed, scratches were made on all four limbs, and cups in which water was dripping were placed at four corners of the bed. However, open-source information about a similar experiment conducted in India is also not detectable.
Information about similar types of experiments has been spread on the Internet before. One such myth was linked to a story in Russia, where a prisoner was allegedly told that as a form of punishment he would be bitten by a cobra. He was then blindfolded and stabbed with a needle. He immediately died of a heart attack. According to the same information, his body contained an excess of the substance usually spread as a result of cobra bites. Like the experiment in the US, this story is also without evidence.
A similar legend was spread in England as well. In this case, the person was about to be hanged, but shortly before the execution, his sentence was changed with cutting his throat with a knife. He was also blindfolded and the executioner used the blunt side of the knife instead of the sharp one. According to the story, the prisoner died of a heart attack. Nonetheless, this information is also false.
Identical content about the experiment in the US has been posted on numerous Facebook pages and groups.
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