Basic Trope: Pursuing the advancement of knowledge, scientific or not, for itself, usually in unethical or actively malevolent ways.
- Straight: Dr. Acula is a hematologist, and is researching how to make self-regenerating blood cells in humans. Not to save lives, just because he wants to discover how to do it. Dr. Acula is at odds with Dr. Eamy because his experiments have drained the hospital's entire blood bank. Now, how to get more blood...?
- Exaggerated: Dr. Acula decides to get more blood by killing patients by pumping CO₂ into the hospital's oxygen feed, kidnapping people to use as blood factories, and finally experimenting on people with the prototype serum which turns them into vampires. When confronted, he doesn't see any problems with his methods.
- Downplayed:
- Dr. Acula's motivations are certainly tinged with Pride, but he argues with Dr. Eamy that the transfusion blood used will serve the greater good.
- Dr. Acula's doesn't do anything evil, and his experiments never cross any ethical lines. Nonetheless, he regards any positive benefits of his research as incidental to sating his curiosity, and doesn't particularly worry about the consequences of his discoveries as long as he, personally, isn't the one who crossed those lines.
- Justified: Truth in Television, discovery for the sake of it is the entire purpose of basic research. This version is simply research without ethics or for outright evil purposes.
- Inverted: Half-way through telling him of the risks, test subject Mr. Renfield shushes Dr. Acula and goes on an exuberant monologue about how he's always dreamed of being a guinea pig and possibly even dying for science, the more abstract and un-helpful the research, the better!
- Subverted: Mrs. Acula is suffering from a rare blood disease, and Dr. Acula is keenly aware that his research could save thousands of lives, hers included, and that she'd die of grief if he found said cure by hurting others.
- Double Subverted: ... and when Dr. Eamy confronts Dr. Acula over using human guinea pigs to save his wife, Dr. Acula laughs at Dr. Eamy for believing he did it for her. In fact he infected her in the first place to use as a guinea pig, smoke screen for his true motives, and to collect the insurance.
- Parodied: When Dr. Eamy thanks Dr. Acula for his research, stating it's already being implemented and has saved thousands of lives, Dr. Acula gasps, shocked and appalled that his "beautiful, pure" research has been "sullied" by having been put to use with real-world applications. He vows to double his efforts (and body count) researching how best to un-bend paper-clips.
- The doors to Dr. Acula's lab are covered with court summons, Cease-And-Desist orders, police tape and chains to keep him from doing his unethical research. Dr. Acula casually uses a blowtorch to cut through the chains and walk in, then burning letters stating his research funding is being denied for his research having no clear aim or purpose.
- Zig Zagged: Dr. Acula researches topics he likes but have no real practical use. Except that's a convenient lie he uses to avoid the military from weaponizing his research. Except he's also lying to the ethics board of the hospital, because the test subjects are dying at an alarming rate and he only cares about continuing his research, not the test-subjects lives.
- Averted: Dr. Acula swore by the Hypocratic oath, and has bills to pay, so his research and methodology are both ethical and have real-world applications.
- Enforced: The project is run by a shadowy megacorp, and they specifically hired Dr. Acula because he's obsessive enough not to get discouraged at "pointless" research, and sociopathic enough not to care about the body count.
- Lampshaded:Dr. Eamy: *Sigh* "We really need to get a better HR department, we always seem to hire amoral sociopaths instead of caring doctors."
- Invoked: Mad scientists are given free reign and a blank check by a benefactor to achieve scientific advancement no matter the cost.
- Exploited: Knowing that Dr. Acula is easily infatuated into researching for its own sake, Dr. Eamy casually dismisses profitable projects as "useless" to goad Dr. Acula into taking them to spite her.
- Defied: When in doubt, Dr. Acula makes a point of reciting the Hypocratic oath to remind himself of what his priorities should be.
- Discussed:Dr. Acula: "Relax. Do I look like one of those doctors who does mad science and straps people to operating tables?"Lab Assistant Harker: "No... but you have gotten a lot paler, and I don't remember you having such pronounced canines..."
- Conversed:"Hospitals and universities need to have HR, a psychologist and security on hand whenever they cut funding to one of these guys. It'd save a whole lot of lives if they can't get into their research and inject themselves or others with it."
- Deconstructed: Dr. Acula's willingness to throw ethics and practicality out the window cause so much outrage that as a response academia and even the military make it progressively harder for other scientists, mad or not, to get grants. Dr. Jekyll, Dr. Frankenstein and Dr. Griffin are forced to fund their work independently, and even when successful can never publish their research.
- Reconstructed: Then, of course, the intelligentsia produce tons of essays sent to the governments which point out the necessity of basic research and everything goes back to normal.
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