CONSCIOUSNESS EXPERIMENT
Removing someone’s head almost instantly kills them. But when the guillotine was first used, scientists didn’t know for sure if consciousness was lost immediately. In 1879, an experiment was carried out to find out if people remained conscious after losing their head to the guillotine. A 23-year-old murderer named Theotime Prunier agreed to take part in the experiment during his execution on 13 November 1879.
Five minutes after Prunier was executed, doctors examined his separated head. They noted its pale appearance, still and sunken eyeballs, no blood in the face and an expression frozen in shock. As part of the test for consciousness, doctors continuously shouted Prunier’s name loudly, pinched his cheek and inserted an ammonia-covered brush into his nostril. A lit candle was then held next to the eyes and silver nitrate placed on the eyeball. No movement was recorded throughout the entire experiment, so consciousness in a severed head couldn’t be proven. This was used as an argument to continue using the guillotine as the most humane execution technique.