DailyDirt: Better Living Through Chemistry
from the urls-we-dig-up dept
Occasionally, we talk about problems with big pharma companies and how they sometimes hinder innovation. There are lots of ways to develop new drugs, and apparently plenty of people out there are willing to ingest experimental drugs for fun (and then maybe eat other people's faces). Here are just a few examples of some innovative folks doing some chemistry.- Underground chemists are making synthetic versions of recreational drugs that are technically legal to possess and sell. This has been going on for years, but recently, there have been increasing political efforts to make these "chemically-similar" drugs illegal. [url]
- Amateur scientists are working on all kinds of crazy biological experiments and ideas such as rewriting the DNA of an acorn so that it grows into the shape of oak furniture. The zombie apocalypse might not come from a megacorporation, but from biology experiment gone wrong in a garage... [url]
- Albert Hofmann discovered LSD had interesting effects in the 1940s, and he said that it spoke to him: "Don't give me to the pharmacologist, he won't find anything." And lots of people have tried LSD since, including Steve Jobs and Aldous Huxley. [url]
- To discover more interesting science-related stuff, check out what's currently floating around the StumbleUpon universe. [url]
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Filed Under: albert hofmann, biotech, chemistry, drugs, lsd, pharma
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"Similar" drugs
K2 was synthetic Weed and it got banned in Ohio.
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So no Worries :-)
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So no Worries :-)
You don't find impaired driving worrisome? That worries me.
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Anyone want to bet that there will be unintended consequences in the war on IP infringement too?
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Legal Highs
They exploit a loop hole that means that you can sell them as products that are not for human consumption. So plant food bathsalts and such. Every one knows exactly what they are but you are not allowed to say. People get thrown out of these shops if they do.
I also know a good few people who use them. Some like them better than the real thing but mostly they are willing to pay a premium (can often cost more than the real thing) because you can safely walk in to a shop and easily pick them up. There is also the argument that it's safe because you know it won't be cut with anything.
The sad thing is that it could be even safer, with the drugs tested and regulated for consumption. It's a small peek in to a world of legalisation and it's not actually all that bad.
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