Transcript of Did a Psych Experiment Turn Ted Kaczynski into the Unabomber?

He's been prepped for this moment. He's been told what to expect, and he's done his homework. He thinks he's simply going to have a healthy debate with one of his peers, and they'll be going head-to-head about their personal philosophies, something Laughle enjoys doing anyway. Then, when today's experiment is over, he'll walk away with a few bucks in his hand. That's why he's doing this paid research project. It's easy money. Only he's about to find out that he's been lied to.

In reality, the researchers are throwing him into a lion's den unprepared. He's not talking to another young peer. He's talking to a plant, an accomplice, a highly skilled professional whose job is to rip this teenager to shreds and tear down his sense of self. Also, the researchers can watch how Laughle responds to stress. They want to see what happens when he's forced to defend his deepest beliefs.

We don't know exactly what happens to Laughle that day. His files detailing the unpleasant experience are sealed indefinitely. They may never see the light of day unless Harvard changes its mind, which might never happen. In hindsight, the experiment from 1960 was unethical. The students weren't informed of what they were getting into, and it doesn't look great that the whole thing was run by Henry Murray, the father of personality testing, a former employee of the OSS, and a fanatic on the subject of brainwashing.

But even more shocking than who was running the study is the identity of one of its participants: Laughle. That's the codename handpicked by Dr. Murray for a boy named Ted Kaczynski. A few years later, he'll be better known as the Unabomber. Welcome to Conspiracy Theories, a Spotify podcast. I'm Carter Roy.

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Not to mention the trauma he's inflicted on witnesses, investigators, his victims' loved ones, as well as most of the nation who has no idea where the serial bomber may strike next. Ted has no intention of coming forward, but he does think it's time to make something perfectly clear. He wants everybody to know why he did what he did, as if that will justify the fear and the bloodshed. That June, he sends his manifesto to both The New York Times and The Washington Post.

In an anonymous letter, he lays out his demand. If they don't publish all 35,000 words within 90 days, he will kill again. Behind closed doors, the papers debate over what to do. Should they publish the manifesto and capitulate to a terrorist? What if, by doing so, they unwittingly inspire copycats? On the other hand, this could be the FBI's best shot at catching him, which would be a huge deal.

Since 1979, the task force has been tracking the Unabomb case, a reference to his university and airline bomb targets. Over time, his devices grew more sophisticated, and he always covers his tracks, sometimes by planting red herrings to distract the FBI. In the eyes of the bureau, any help cracking the case would be a good thing. After all, this guy has sent homemade bombs through the mail to college campuses: Northwestern, Vanderbilt, UC Berkeley, University of Utah, University of Michigan, places packed with students working toward a brighter future.

Of all places, he targeted computer science schools, engineering departments. At times, this MO felt completely random. He seemed to have it out for the airlines as well, but it was hard to say exactly who he was going after or why. Back in 1979, he sent a mail bomb destined for the cargo hold of a commercial plane. It was rigged to detonate only after reaching a certain altitude. He had designed a mass casualty event.

But again, investigators couldn't find a connection between Woods and any persons of interest or between Woods and previous victims. Sometimes the Unabomber left devices in parking lots for practically anybody to happen upon. In 1987, a Salt Lake City computer store manager named Gary Wright picked up what looked like an ordinary piece of wood, just a piece of wood on the asphalt. A split second later, it detonated in his hand, sending more than 200 projectiles into his body.

Thankfully, Gary survived, but other victims did not. In 1985, at another computer store, owner Hugh Scruton was stepping out the back door. Seconds later, a blast went off that sent him flying 10 feet through the air. He later died of his injuries. In 1994, another fatality. Advertising executive Thomas Moser was sorting through the mail in his New Jersey kitchen. One of the Unabomber's explosives had just been delivered.

Just as Thomas's wife left the room, the bomb exploded, killing Thomas instantly. A few months later, the newly sworn-in president of the California Forestry Association becomes the third death attributed to the Unabomber. So for the FBI, The New York Times, and The Washington Post, the answer seems clear. They agree to publish the manifesto. It's not an easy decision to make, but they think maybe it will save one life, perhaps even more.

If the right person reads this manifesto and they recognize the writing, that could help take down the Unabomber once and for all. In September 1995, The Washington Post releases a special section dedicated to the manifesto. The New York Times helps with the funding. The world still doesn't know it was written by Ted Kaczynski, but now they know what he's thinking. The reason, he says, he's been terrorizing the country for nearly two decades: industrial society and its future.

The manifesto begins with a line, "The industrial revolution and its consequences have been a disaster for the human race." Ted rails against what he refers to as the industrial technological system. He blames it for all of society's ills: psychological suffering, social disruption. He says humans have been reduced to, quote, "cogs in the social machine." In short, he does not believe that the system can be fixed.

It can only be broken. And that, he claims, can only happen through a revolution. It goes on and on and on. 35,000 words, by the way, is a long manifesto. The great Gatsby comes in at around 47,000 words. The papers aren't expecting everybody to read the whole thing. In fact, they probably hope nobody does. They don't want to incite further violence. They're just holding up their end of the bargain.

But one woman does look through it. Her name is Linda. She's never met Ted Kaczynski, although she's heard plenty about him, because Linda is married to David Kaczynski, Ted's little brother. Linda vaguely knows about Ted's ideology. She knows he's highly educated and uses $5 words, kind of like the writer of the manifesto. But she also knows her husband David grew up idolizing Ted.

One day, she gets up the courage to ask David, "Do you think it's possible your brother could be the Unabomber?" David doesn't want to believe what Linda's suggesting to him, but the more he thinks about it, the harder it is to shrug off the thought. Whoever wrote this manifesto uses unique phrases like "cool-headed logicians." David has heard his brother say those exact words before. The Unabomber clearly has a strong vocabulary, just like Ted.

He is, after all, a Harvard man. But even Ivy Leaguers mix up their figures of speech every now and then. David knows Ted often says, "Eat their cake and have it too," confusing the famous phrase "have their cake and eat it too." And so does the Unabomber. The parallels keep piling up until David can no longer ignore them. And that's how the case begins to close in around Ted Kaczynski. The following year, on April 3, 1996, federal agents corner him in his cabin.

Ted is taken into custody. His belongings are bagged as evidence, including materials for building bombs, one completed bomb waiting and ready to be mailed. They find what appears to be an early draft of the manifesto, dang, and journal entries written in code describing his crimes. Once the code is broken, it reads like a confession, tying Ted to nearly every crime he's been accused of. The break in the case is front-page news, and now the world knows the Unabomber's real identity.

But that only raises more questions. Was he an antisocial hermit who lost his grip on reality, a product of the turbulent 1960s, or was he a brilliant but troubled mind? Ted had once been a dedicated and promising student. He seemingly came from a stable home. He went to Harvard on a scholarship at 16. He got his PhD in mathematics and taught at UC Berkeley. On paper, he'd been a valuable member of society, right up until the point he decided to turn his back on the world.

How do we make sense of his violence? Well, according to his brother David, there is no singular answer. It took a perfect storm, in his words, to create the Unabomber. But one conspiracy theory suggests there is a turning point, a specific time and place in the life of Ted Kaczynski that sent him down the path of becoming a terrorist, a serial killer, the Unabomber.

It happened in 1960 at a place called the Annex on the campus of Harvard University, where a teenage Ted walked into a room one day and allegedly walked out changed forever. When Ted Kaczynski, the Unabomber, is apprehended from his cabin in 1996, the U.S. breathes a collective sigh of relief. His 17-year nationwide terror campaign against people and places that often seem random is finally over.

As information comes out about Ted's history, an author and philosophy professor takes notice. His name is Austin Chase. The way he tells it, Austin has been working on an academic book that he just can't seem to get off the ground. For years, he's wanted to write about how the 1960s shaped life on college campuses. Only he's never found an angle that intrigued him until Ted Kaczynski comes along, and Austin is drawn to his story. Not because he's a serial killer.

They both obtained their doctorates. They both got jobs as assistant professors. Austin even lived in a cabin in Montana, just like Ted, and also just like Ted. Austin did it because he wanted to leave civilization behind for a while. After that, their lives diverged pretty sharply, of course. And the more Austin reflects on these bizarre coincidences, the more he wonders, could his book idea, the one about the 1960s and college campuses, apply to Ted's story?

I mean, there have already been think pieces suggesting Ted's radical thinking could have been provoked while he was at UC Berkeley, which was famously the home base for West Coast activists. Could that be where Ted transformed into the Unabomber? Austin thinks the theory has legs. So he reaches out to the best source he can think of. He writes Ted Kaczynski a letter. In 1998, Ted is sitting behind bars, where he'll stay for the rest of his life.

Earlier that year, he pleaded guilty to 13 charges. With all that time on his hands, the Unabomber is an eager pen palle, which is maybe not so surprising given what we know about his journal and his manifesto. From his cell, Ted writes Austin page after page. Sometimes he sends letters faster than Austin can reply. Since they both went to Harvard, naturally, they talk about their time there. And pretty soon, Austin comes to a realization.

His premise is entirely wrong. The Unabomber wasn't created during his time at Berkeley. Austin had been off an entire decade and looking at the wrong coast. The Unabomber, says Austin, could have been born while Ted Kaczynski was attending Harvard. It's 1958 when Ted sets out for Cambridge, Massachusetts. He moves halfway across the country on his own from the suburbs of Chicago.

It's a big change for any kid, but Ted was only 16 years old as an incoming freshman. In middle school, he'd skipped a grade after testing at a genius IQ level. Then he completed high school a year early, so he graduated two years ahead. None of that had helped Ted fit in with his peers. In fact, he would later call this time in his life a disaster. When he gets to Harvard, Ted is housed in a special dormitory. It's actually a converted three-story Victorian home.

At this time, it's where Harvard places all of their youngest and brightest students. So Ted's surrounded by other kids like him, kids who skipped grades and went to college early, which you might think is a good thing. All of the kids get their own rooms, meaning no roommates. Would have been a good thing for my roommates. Sorry, Julio and Greg. Luckily, still friends. Getting your own room is great for privacy, and Ted seems content. He relishes being able to throw himself at his work.

Austin writes that in his early days at Harvard, Ted's not quite the antisocial loner the media makes him out to be years later. He goes out for sports and makes a few buddies. But overall, the setup at his dormitory keeps him sequestered most of the time. Ted is a kid who likes to study nonstop, and now he's surrounded by other kids who study nonstop. And that fact stands out to Austin when he's doing his research. Austin also happens to have insight on what Ted must have been learning in his GE classes, specifically when it comes to his reading assignments, because Austin took those classes too.

And if they were reading all the same authors, then Ted would have probably been studying Dostoevsky, Camus, and Karl Marx, to name a few, authors who, as Austin puts it, wrote about society losing its values sometimes at the hands of science, perhaps sowing the seeds of Ted's ideology. Austin vividly recalls learning about Norbert Wiener, the father of cybernetics. His ideas laid some of the groundwork for AI, but he also warned about how we would someday use it.

He cautioned that if we aren't careful, we will render ourselves obsolete. Wiener famously said, "The machine's danger to society is not from the machine itself, but from what man makes of it." Quick side note. Austin is assuming here that Ted Kaczynski had the same coursework he did five years earlier. We don't know for sure what he read. But it does seem possible that Ted was coming across ideas at this early age that would later shape the Unabomber's ideology.

On the other hand, how many thousands of Harvard freshmen followed the same syllabus and did not become a dangerous serial bomber? Well, there is one other specific part of Ted's college days that interests Austin Chase, something that does set Ted's time apart from most of his peers. Going into sophomore year, Ted is mostly enjoying his college experience. Then, in the fall of 1959, he gets an invitation.

It reads, "Would you be willing to contribute to the solution of certain psychological problems by serving as a subject in a series of experiments or taking a number of tests?" It's an opportunity to take part in a paid research project, one that's supposedly assessing personality development among gifted college men. The study is open to students enrolled in a psychology course that Ted happens to be taking.

It's to be run on campus through the school's Department of Social Relations. And they're only asking for about two hours of his time per week, mostly in the form of tests. Sounds like an easy way to make money, right? Ted signs up, and so do about 70 other students, and they're all vying for just 22 spots. But for whatever reason, Ted is chosen. At the time, it probably feels like winning a lottery. Later, though, during the Unabomber trial, he tells one of his attorneys that he was pressured into taking part in the study against his better judgment.

Because in 1959, there is a lot the researchers haven't told their subjects yet, like the fact that this study is meant to last three years, or that the students will be secretly divided into groups, one for average students, another for popular, well-adjusted students, and one for extremely antisocial students. We don't know for sure which group Ted belonged to, although I have my suspicions.

Oh, and there's one more important detail Ted hasn't been told yet about the experiment. The name of the man who's behind it, who designed the whole concept, whose team of psychologists will report to him, Dr. Henry A. Murray. Dr. Murray has a stellar reputation at this time. Like both Ted and Austin, he attended Harvard, class of 1915. He returned to Cambridge years later to run the university's psychological clinic.

Well, the TAT is kind of like that, except in Murray's test, the pictures aren't of amorphous inkblots. They show people in the middle of doing something. What that something is, well, that's up to the subject to interpret. They're encouraged to make up a story about what's going on in the photo, what the person in the image is thinking and feeling. And that story, Murray says, reveals the personality within.

After the TAT was a hit, Murray was hired by the government during World War II. He came on as a captain for the OSS, the Office of Strategic Services, the predecessor to the CIA. It was wartime. The country needed agents and spies. So Murray was tapped to set up psychological assessments for incoming recruits. How does this candidate stand up to pressure? How will that trainee react if they're caught by the enemy?

What will they say under interrogation? Murray's tests are meant to find out. Sometimes he'd put trainees through simulated interrogations. He'd bring them down to a stark basement with a cold metal chair, a harsh light beaming in their faces, and he'd test how they withstood intense questioning. And the whole time he's examining the recruits, he's also working the other side. Murray's involved in devising the interrogation techniques.

So before any one of these experiments took place, he had coached the interrogator to put the OSS hopefuls through the ringer. For all of his contributions, Murray was awarded the Legion of Merit. And when the war ended, he resumed his post at Harvard, where he had a whole crop of students to invite to take part in his studies, like Ted Kaczynski. Murray himself personally comes up with Ted's codename in the experiment, Lawful.

We don't know why. It could either suggest he used to be a rule follower, or maybe the name was meant to be ironic. Most of the time, the Harvard study doesn't ask much of Ted. They meet up about once a week. They have written assignments. They take personality tests. It's just this one specific experiment carried out in March 1960 that makes some people wonder, was the Unabomber born at Harvard?

Here's the experiment Murray comes up with. All 22 subjects are told to write a personal essay. He wants to know their philosophy of life, or as he puts it, the major guiding principles in accord with which you live or hope to live. Once they complete that task, students are told they'll take part in a little debate. They are told they'll have a discussion with another student about their respective philosophies.

In reality, Murray brings in a talented young lawyer straight from Harvard Law School. He's coached this lawyer to attack the subjects on their foundational beliefs. And the whole idea is to get them as upset as possible. By Murray's own admission, he wants this interrogation to be, quote, "vehement, sweeping, and personally abusive." He wants to see how people hold up under stress, which makes sense for OSS recruits, but for young college students?

There is a lot we don't know about Ted's performance or his participation in the three-year study. Because once he's unmasked as the Unabomber, reporters figure out that he's the subject codenamed Lawful. In response, Harvard University seals all of these files indefinitely, citing privacy concerns. Austin Chase is able to read the recollections of other subjects, the ones whose real names haven't been connected to their codenames.

When they're interviewed about the experiment afterward, they describe terrible discomfort, anger, and feeling trapped. 40 years later, in 2000, Austin Chase writes an article for The Atlantic. Based on his research, he thinks Ted's disdain for technology and his desire for revolution and revenge were solidified at Harvard. And he suspects the Murray experiments only made matters worse.

It could have intensified a distrust in authority that was already simmering. It might have made him more stubborn in his beliefs. According to his brother David, Ted once explained that he stayed in the study because he wanted to prove that he could not be broken down. His family has even alleged that the study could have aggravated his existing mental illness. Not everyone agrees, of course. 21 other students came out of the same experiment, upset, maybe even traumatized, but they didn't become serial killers.

Was Henry Murray a monster who wanted to push young men beyond what they could handle? Most would say, no, definitely not. Would his study be considered unethical by today's standards? Most certainly, yes. Did Henry Murray continue his work with the CIA long after World War II? And did he have a personal interest in brainwashing and using drugs to enhance interrogation techniques?

Well, according to some people, maybe he did. The type of experiments Henry Murray carried out on Harvard students back in the 1950s and 60s wouldn't happen today. Even Murray's biographer will admit they'd be considered unethical by modern standards. And kind of by the standards of the time too. The Nuremberg Code was already well in effect. None of the students knew they were in for what Murray called stressful disputation, or that he'd planned to subject them to an ambush that was, as he put it, vehement, sweeping, and personally abusive.

He was ignoring the rule of informed consent. Presumably, he was trying to catch his subjects off guard. He was studying human responses to stress. But interrogations are stressful enough as is. Why the element of surprise? The lie. Well, some think it's possible that Murray's work with the OSS and then the CIA never really ended. In 1958, he toured the Soviet Union on the CIA's dime.

He reportedly traveled with a fellow psychologist who was definitely consulting for the agency. During that time, hundreds of college professors and their research projects were getting bankrolled by the CIA. And lastly, we know that the CIA based some of their enhanced interrogation or torture techniques on Murray's early work. Some have suggested Murray could have in some way been involved in Project MK-Ultra, the government's clandestine research into brainwashing techniques.

The question isn't, did Murray intentionally create the Unabomber? That doesn't seem to line up with any of his goals. But Austin Chase isn't the only person, or even the first person, to suspect that this experiment had an adverse effect on Ted Kaczynski. His defense team uncovers the Murray study when they're gearing up for the Unabomber trial. At one point, the lawyers consider entering an insanity defense. Realistically, it would be hard to prove in court.

There's extensive evidence that Ted knew what he was doing was wrong. Moreover, Ted's insistent that he is sane, and he doesn't want to plead insanity. By court order, Ted is examined by a forensic psychiatrist, Sally Johnson. She concludes that he's competent to stand trial and even to defend himself, which doesn't end up happening. But she also gives a provisional diagnosis, paranoid schizophrenia.

And so Ted's lawyers end up working the Murray angle. They hope it will be a mitigating factor. If they can't go for the insanity defense, they can try to present as much evidence as possible in the hopes of swaying a jury away from the death penalty. When Sally Johnson looks into Ted's past, she reveals that during Ted's college years, he fantasized about revolutionary violence. And it was during this time in his life, she believes, that he started to plan his exit from normal society.

If you ask Ted's friends from Harvard, because he did have friends, they noticed a change in him as an undergrad. He became more withdrawn by the time he left Cambridge, which coincided with his exit from the study. Later, Ted writes to Austin Chase about the Murray experiment. He doesn't say much, only that when his defense team tried to elicit more information and files from Harvard, the school wasn't very cooperative.

According to Austin, Ted felt that they were acting like they had something to hide. But here's the kicker. Ted Kaczynski also writes a letter in response to the 2017 TV series Manhunt: Unabomber. It's a fictionalized version of events that plays up the theory that Dr. Murray tortured a young Ted, perhaps as part of Project MK-Ultra, and created the Unabomber. And Ted says the show got it all wrong.

There was no torture. Yes, that one interrogation in 1960 was unpleasant, but he doesn't seem to believe the study had any lasting effect on him. So, well, maybe Harvard isn't the reason we end up with the Unabomber. Perhaps that just happens to be where Ted Kaczynski is when the ideas start to solidify. Maybe it could have happened anywhere. Maybe he's telling the truth, the study was simply unpleasant, and the Unabomber's origins could have come from many different places.

Sally Johnson, the forensic psychiatrist, suggested that Ted held onto intense anger toward his family, as well as anybody who'd ever wronged him, and toward society as a whole. Eventually, Ted names some of his inspirations for writing his manifesto, such as French philosopher Jacques Ellul. He even says that when he initially read Ellul, it was the first time he came across such an anti-technology author, which seems to debunk some of Austin Chase's research into Ted's old Harvard syllabus.

Which leaves us with another possibility, that this is a case of looking for catharsis where there is none to be had. For some, the Unabomber's ideas are too uncomfortable. He's questioning the basis of our society and challenging our ability to be happy inside the system. For others, the Unabomber's ideas hit too close to home. His manifesto presents a lot of dangerous and dark ideas, yes. And his actions are indefensible 100%.

But some readers also agree with portions of his ideology, like this thought, "If we're not careful, technology will destroy nature and overpower humanity." If that philosophy resonates with you at all, the entire Unabomber story becomes exponentially more unsettling. I agree with those ideas, but not the harm and killing. It's natural then to want an explanation for what pushed him that far, to want a specific place, time, and experiment to blame.

So, where was the Unabomber born? If there is an answer out there, it could remain under lock and key at Harvard University. Even after Ted Kaczynski's death in 2023, the files on Lawful remain sealed. Perhaps forever. Thank you for listening to Conspiracy Theories. We're here with a new episode every Wednesday.

Be sure to check us out on Instagram at The Conspiracy Pod. If you're watching on Spotify, swipe up and give us your thoughts. Our sources for today's episode include Harvard and the Unabomber, The Education of an American Terrorist by Austin Chase, and the Netflix docuseries Unabomber in his own words. Until next time, remember, the truth isn't always the best story. And the official story isn't always the truth.

This episode was written and researched by Mickey Taylor, edited by Justin Sales, fact-checked by Sophie Kemp, and engineered, video edited, and sound designed by Alex Button. I'm your host, Carter Roy.