What happens if you give an elephant LSD?
Jason P
of Oklahoma City researchers decided to find out.
Warren Thomas, Director of the City Zoo, fired a cartridge-syringe
containing 297 milligrams of LSD into Tusko the Elephant's rump. With Thomas
were two scientific colleagues from the University of Oklahoma School of
Medicine, Louis Jolyon West and Chester M. Pierce.
297 milligrams is a lot of LSD - about 3000 times the level of a typical
human dose. In fact, it remains the largest dose of LSD ever given to a
living creature. The researchers figured that, if they were going to give an
elephant LSD, they better not give him too little.
Thomas, West, and Pierce later explained that the experiment was designed to
find out if LSD would induce musth in an elephant - musth being a kind of
temporary madness male elephants sometimes experience during which they
become highly aggressive and secrete a sticky fluid from their temporal
glands. But one suspects a small element of ghoulish curiosity might also
have been involved.
Whatever the reason for the experiment, it almost immediately went awry.
Tusko reacted to the shot as if a bee had stung him. He trumpeted around his
pen for a few minutes, and then keeled over on his side. Horrified, the
researchers tried to revive him, but about an hour later he was dead. The
three scientists sheepishly concluded that, "It appears that the elephant is
highly sensitive to the effects of LSD."
In the years that followed controversy lingered over whether it was the LSD
that killed Tusko, or the drugs used to revive him. So twenty years later,
Ronald Siegel of UCLA decided to settle the debate by giving two elephants a
dose similar to what Tusko received. Reportedly he had to sign an agreement
promising to replace the animals in the event of their deaths.
Instead of injecting the elephants with LSD, Siegel mixed the drug into
their water, and when it was administered in this way, the elephants not
only survived but didn't seem too upset at all. They acted sluggish, rocked
back and forth, and made some strange vocalizations such as chirping and
squeaking, but within a few hours they were back to normal. However, Siegel
noted that the dosage Tusko received may have exceeded some threshold of
toxicity, so he couldn't rule out that LSD was the cause of his death. The
controversy continues.
--
(c) Museum of Hoaxes
FriarTuck
I'd say we get an inkling of the ignorance and downright nastiness of
some scientists.
The fact they don't credit elephants (and many other animals) with being
sentient for starters and that they give drugs they know have strange and
what could be shocking effects to animals they cant possibly explain
their actions to as they dont understand how these animals communicate.
the difference between onset of the drug intravenously and orally must be
completely different I would imagine and I suspect the poor first
elephant died of shock....
I also suspect (assuming the subsequent two elephants were dosed together
within communications range) the two elephants dosed were able to comfort
each other and compare experiences. Otherwise it would simply imply a
huge difference between injecting and orally consuming the same dose...
also no detail of dose/weight ratios....
Jason P
"FriarTuck" <no...@invalid.com> wrote in message
news:_F4ej.22589$1j1....@newsfe7-gui.ntli.net...
Those were pretty close to my thoughts too. The first elephant was given a
massive dose of the substance intramuscularly (in the rump), and it must
have had almost immediate effects - obviously. The scientists were very
callous in their actions. I would think a far lesser dose would have been
far more reasonable in determining the effects of the drug on the poor
creature.
It seems to me a dose of less than 1 or 2 milligrams would have been the
weight-to-dose ratio equivalent of a typical human dose. Apparently they
gave the poor animal about 150-200 times the needed amount for their
"observations." ...Sick!