The Horrifying Study That Predicted Human Extinction
A sparse, gray landscape and ash slowly flowing down from the sky. Smoke everywhere. Sounds of multiple explosions. Perhaps an asteroid strike, or a nuclear war.
This may be how the hypothetical end of the human race is often put on display in post-apocalyptic films but what if human extinction was less a cinematic scene, and instead, a looming reality?
“Universe 25” was a study carried out from 1954 to 1972 by John B. Calhoun, an American ethologist and behavioral researcher who claimed bleak effects of overpopulation on rodents were a grim model for the future of the human race.
Working with NIMH ( National Institute of Mental Health ), Calhoun created the perfect Mouse Universe to conduct his study. What looked like a rat utopia and mouse paradise — unlimited food and water, multiple levels and private nesting areas— quickly spiraled into turbulent congestion that lead to a population subside followed by disturbing and pathological behaviors of the members.
Calhoun spent years perfecting his methods and repeated his experiment 25 times — hence “Universe 25" — in different scales and noted ominously identical results every time.
