In the summer of 1962, a young French geologist named Michel Siffre descended into a glacial cave in the French Alps with no clock, no calendar, and no contact with the outside world. When he emerged 63 days later, he didn’t know the date, couldn’t estimate how much time had passed, and described himself as feeling like a “half-crazed, disjointed marionette.”
What had started as a geological expedition became a pioneering experiment in human biology, laying the foundation for the scientific field of chronobiology—the study of the body’s internal clock. Siffre had originally planned to study a newly discovered glacier in Scarasson, a remote and icy cave system located 130 meters below the surface.
His initial goal was to spend just fifteen days underground. But after further reflection, he decided that two weeks would be insufficient for a meaningful investigation. He expanded the expedition to a full two months, designing what would become one of the most extreme self-experiments in scientific history.
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