back to article Snails on crystal meth: The facts

In a development whose importance it would be difficult to exaggerate, scientists have produced research answering one of the great questions facing humanity in the 21st century: what happens if you get snails hopped up on crystal meth and poke them with sticks? The drug-pushing scientists in question are Barbara Sorg of …

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  1. James 5

    You can easily spot their...

    ... laboratory - queues of snails waiting to get in to take part in the "experiments".

    Wonder what the Global Warming angle was to get funding for this ?

  2. The Fuzzy Wotnot
    Happy

    Great!

    Humanity takes one step up the evolutionary chain! I feel so proud of our species today!

    Dogs, cats and hamsters to name a few. Sit in your house all day while you round around them, cleaning and feeding them. Whose the more evolved species again?

  3. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    huh

    Paradoxically then, any snail smart enough to stay alive by continuing to breath, will be labeled stupid for forgetting that he will be poked with a stick.

    Also, maybe they didn't "remember" not to breath and were in fact already dead from the meth?

    1. Rex Alfie Lee
      Grenade

      or,,,

      being poked with a stick

  4. Anonymous Coward
    Happy

    Expermenting with drugs eh?

    "Sorg and Lukowiak have previously carried out similar studies involving snails on cocaine"

    I'm sure that I know a few people who, in their wild student days, carried out similar studies involving snails and beer, marijuana, ...

  5. madmattttt
    Pirate

    Cool...

    So you can destroy your life and remember every single bit of it all going wrong

  6. Code Monkey

    There's a mechanism for forgetting?

    I mean other than drinking to excess.

    1. Martin Owens

      Yes

      Incredible stress tends to release the chemical cortisol which has been implicated in disconnecting synapses and retarding the formation of new connections.

      It's all there on wikipedia ;-)

  7. Sir Runcible Spoon
    Boffin

    Sir

    What did they do with the resultant soup?

    Inquiring minds want to know.

  8. sabroni Silver badge
    Unhappy

    And people think PETA are mental?

    This sort of shit is why we have anti-vivisectionists. How many "scientists" are involved in this kind of pointless abuse?

    Still, it's only snails, serve 'em right for not being cute and furry....

    1. Nightkiller
      Happy

      Why, Yes I do.

      Yet they can redeem themselves if THEY donate their bodies to science.

    2. Steven Hunter
      WTF?

      Wow...

      Wow, really? *Really*? You're really upset that some scientists poked at some snails in a tub of water?

      I'm not advocating animal cruelty, but to paraphrase Denis Leary "If hooking up a monkey's brain to a car battery is going to help cure cancer, I've only got one thing to say: The red one's positive and the black one's negative."

  9. adnim

    There is a reason for forgetting.

    It is a survival mechanism.

    It is essential to those of us with less than impeccable social habits and a flexible (depending on alcohol/blood ratio) morality in order to maintain a level of self esteem that does not beg suicide.

  10. loopy lou
    Happy

    Cocaine...

    "Sorg and Lukowiak have previously carried out similar studies involving snails on cocaine."

    Ah, so that explains it. But the article doesn't mention what the two of them were on this time?

  11. Bill Neal
    Thumb Up

    Missing the point here

    Did the speed make them faster?

  12. Piers
    Unhappy

    Sick.

    ...very sick.

  13. Anonymous Coward
    Joke

    title

    Sloppy reporting... I think you got the name of the scientist wrong. Surely it was Professor Denzil Dexter of the University of Southern California off of The Fast Show?

  14. Robert Moore
    Pint

    Free drugs?

    Anyone else think maybe these guys are just doing these "studies" as a simple way of getting the public to pay for their drug habit?

  15. Anonymous Coward
    Black Helicopters

    slippery slope

    Next thing you know these people will be writing torture manuals for the CIA

    free the Lymnaea stagnalis 2 !

  16. Anonymous Coward
    Troll

    No officer I swear...

    ... those two snails REALLY DID go through all three kilos of crystal meth we made. Where else would it have gone? <innocent look>

  17. Gareth 28

    Well.

    Ignoble, anyone?

  18. tom 24
    Pint

    Career options?

    Am I the only one who thought "whoa cool, I could get paid for poking snails"?

  19. Anonymous Coward
    Coat

    Sexual pleasure?

    Really? Like snails need extra help. They've already got both set for organs, lucky bastards.

  20. Mike Plunkett
    Thumb Up

    Outstanding

    If this doesn't deserve an IgNoble then I don't know what does :-)

  21. David McMahon
    WTF?

    Economy??

    Will jobs like this exist soon? I mean with the economy etc?!? Will these guys have to start curing cancer instead??? Poor souls

    1. Blain Hamon
      Flame

      Aw, how cute.

      The idea that what you discover will always be what you're researching. He thinks science works that way.

      Especially amusing when you consider that radiation therapy, which is used to cure some cancers, was made possible because of some guy in Scotland was trying to recreate pretty rainbows on clouds, something even more loony than snails on drugs.

      http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ben_Nevis#Observatory

      While snails on drugs might be more likely to lead to a cure for Alzheimer's, it's also possible that they're on the path to curing cancer, and not even aware of it.

      1. Captain Save-a-ho
        Boffin

        @ Blain Hamon

        Excellent point! And that's what hundreds of years of the history of science teaches us (where's James Burke when you need him?!?) that seemingly unrelated research and discoveries lead the to some of the most amazing advances in medicine, technology, physics, etc. They don't test on humans because most people would get REALLY freaked out it. Instead, they test on snails, rats, fruit flies, and other assorted species because only PETA and other wackos (i.e. ALF) get upset about that.

        Medical science would not exist except for the decades of animal testing that has contributed to the quality of life we all now enjoy.

  22. Haku

    Hypnotoad

    The way those scientists are going it's only a matter of time (months? years?) before they accidentally create a hypnotoad. Then we're all doomed.

  23. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    "Where did all that crystal meth go?"

    "Er we ... We fed it to the snails"

    "OK"

    "Phew!"

    1. archengel46
      Thumb Up

      and then

      "Well, now write up a report on it then"

      and we have our Friday laugh of the week.

  24. Anonymous Coward
    Badgers

    Results

    ...after dog's third leg removed, ability to come when called further impaired. After dog's fourth leg removed, dog loses hearing...

    1. Bill Neal
      Joke

      lol

      i'm sure my ability to come when called would be greatly impaired if my third leg were removed!

  25. Ben Rosenthal

    I just want to see

    what happens when you introduce them to the cocaine bees from a couple of years back :D

    http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/12/23/bees_on_cocaine/

  26. Filippo Silver badge

    The way science works

    To cure cancer, the best way isn't to focus all research on cancer alone. You also research any stupid thing that catches your fancy. Because, historically, that sort of research can and does sometimes lead to major breakthroughs in unrelated fields. What if understanding the mechanism through which meth affects memory could lead to new drugs for Alzheimer's? Still think the poor dudes should have their funding cut?

  27. Anonymous Coward
    Coat

    Barbara Sorg and Ken Lukowiak

    Am I the only one who noticed the scientists are Barbie and Ken?

  28. Muscleguy
    Boffin

    Oh, I forgot about those . . .

    There are a number of people residing at her majesty's pleasure or on the sex offender's register who would love it if their hardware worked a bit more like pesky molluscan wetware and forgot about those embarrassing files.

    The way back machine is not always a good idea.

    If you remember the initial work on memory in simple beasties was done on planaria, which are flatworms. We learned that memory is chemical by grinding up learned worms and feeding them to other worms who got them some of that learnin'. Snails are a cut above flatworms in the neural dept (kin to those brainy cephalopods after all) so you can do more sophisticated experiments with them.

    Besides they are better behaved than junkies on crystal meth.

  29. skeptical i
    Pirate

    Alzheimers research? Gram and Gramps on meth?

    Oversimplification of course, but still.

    <-- as G'mum plays Captain Jack with the lawn tractor

  30. James Woods

    +1 for the druggies

    Gotta love the people saying not to cut funding for them on behalf of legitimate science. The 'cures' for cancer can be debated however the money made from treating it will always outweigh a cure.

    If a price tag could be put on a cure for it what would it be? Who could afford it? Why would corporate America and others want to stop reeling in the reoccurring money made from treatment?

    Unless your going to put cancer patients on dangerous narcotics to cure them funding for things like this is retarded.

    I drove stoned once as a teenager, I remembered almost every mile of the road. The 5 minute ride seemed to have taken 30. Now does that make me better off or smarter?

    No it just means I remembered things stoned.

  31. Paul Crawford Silver badge

    @Steven Hunter

    So its OK to lobotomise you and have your brains first then?

  32. Anonymous Coward
    Paris Hilton

    In the movie,

    the snails are played by Lindsay Lohan, and Paris Hilton

  33. Tom 35

    Spiders on drugs...

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=teeoTPSC6Rw

  34. The_Police!
    Coat

    Trip!

    Trip down to the street corner.

    "Scuse me mate, need more of those pills you sold me last time"

    Drug Dealer: "Whoa man, you are getting through those like there is no tomorrow"

    "Nah, mate, not for me. It is for my snails"

    DD: "Snails hey?"

    "Yup"

    DD: "I think you need to get into rehab! Seriously!"

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