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lexlux's review against another edition
5.0
Think of the most outrageous question that you can. And then search for it in the contents of this book. I am sure you will find it! From vomit guzzling doctors to elephants on LSD, this guffaw inducing book has everything. Absolutely loved it!
atticmoth's review against another edition
1.0
Elephants on Acid was the text for a seminar class I took this semester that was pitched to me as being about scientific ethics. This was true of the course — I had a great time in class, because our discussions made up for the book’s deficiencies. But on its own, I don’t think I’d recommend this book to anyone but maybe an 8th grader who really likes Ripley’s Believe It or Not. Alex Boese’s compendium of “Bizarre Experiments” does little to examine the ethics behind what, more often than not, shouldn’t even qualify as science. This book follows the same format throughout: every chapter has an overarching theme (some examples including “Bathroom Reading” and “Mating Behavior”), and each chapter is made up of pagelong anecdotes about bizarre, disturbing, or otherwise unnecessarily gross scientific experiments, mostly from the early 20th century. Boese headlines each section with a witty title (“Horny Turkeys and Hypersexual Cats”) and bafflingly, a third-person fictionalization, before giving the most cursory, dumbed-down examination of the experiment, devoid of historical context or discussion on the ethics therein. Most of these anecdotes are then ended with some sort of offensive and not very funny joke. For example, after describing a follow-up to Stanley Milgram’s electroshock experiment which involved actually shocking real dogs, Boese writes “If the poor creature later shook with terror whenever it came to a traffic light while out on its walks, you could understand why.” Boese feels the need to undercut the gravity (and I mean ethical gravity, because most of these experiments contributed absolutely nothing to the scientific zeitgeist) of each experiment with some sort of stupid joke, which both delegitimizes the extensive research he did for this book and self-sabotages any chance of someone taking it seriously. In his introduction, Boese writes, wildly hypocritically:
“I have not included any Nazi research in this book. First, because I didn’t intend the book to be a catalog of atrocities. Second, because I wanted to explore actual scientific research — not sadistic torture designed as science, which is what I consider the Nazi ‘experiments’.”
This would be a fair point if in the introduction to any other book. Firstly, Elephants on Acid already seems like a “catalog of atrocities,” albeit to a lesser extent. Secondly, any true study of scientific ethics should not cover up the atrocities; discussing these are crucial for avoiding them in the future, and lastly, many of the “experiments” discussed were not science by any definition of the term in that they were not intended to generate new knowledge. If Boese attempted to explain how giving the titular elephants LSD or keeping a severed dog head alive is anything more than sadistic torture, I would maybe have a shred of respect for him, but he chose instead to write a tasteless and offensive book in the name of sensationalism and shock value.
“I have not included any Nazi research in this book. First, because I didn’t intend the book to be a catalog of atrocities. Second, because I wanted to explore actual scientific research — not sadistic torture designed as science, which is what I consider the Nazi ‘experiments’.”
This would be a fair point if in the introduction to any other book. Firstly, Elephants on Acid already seems like a “catalog of atrocities,” albeit to a lesser extent. Secondly, any true study of scientific ethics should not cover up the atrocities; discussing these are crucial for avoiding them in the future, and lastly, many of the “experiments” discussed were not science by any definition of the term in that they were not intended to generate new knowledge. If Boese attempted to explain how giving the titular elephants LSD or keeping a severed dog head alive is anything more than sadistic torture, I would maybe have a shred of respect for him, but he chose instead to write a tasteless and offensive book in the name of sensationalism and shock value.
emily_hartleyy's review against another edition
2.0
2.5 stars really. It's engaging as a pick-up/put-down read, whilst also reading something else. The book delivers what is promised, but I question how accurate the description of each experiment is. A lot of the time I took to Google to clarify pieces of information because it felt like it was lacking important details.
Overall, the book does the job. However, it's just not as engaging as I had hoped it was going to be.
Overall, the book does the job. However, it's just not as engaging as I had hoped it was going to be.
caitlin_duxbury's review against another edition
adventurous
challenging
funny
informative
inspiring
lighthearted
relaxing
medium-paced
5.0
songsaboutghosts's review
3.0
While lots of these experiments are really interesting and the writing style allows them to be accessible, Alex Boese's attempts at humour are embarrassing
erinngillespie's review against another edition
challenging
dark
informative
reflective
sad
tense
medium-paced
3.75
https://youtu.be/sGkACsTXazw my review on YouTube if you wanna see .
lannthacker's review against another edition
3.0
I was enjoying my coffee at work while reading a few pages of this amusing tome, when I got to the description of a scientist imbibing the bilious vomit of a yellow fever patient. Gross, but good, just like the book.
alexrobinsonsupergenius's review against another edition
4.0
A lot of strange "science" experiments, ranging from the morbid (how long can we keep a dog's head alive apart from its body? Answer: about three hours) to the amusing (can mothers pick out the smell of their baby's poop from a line up?). If you're squeamish about animal testing this book is definitely not for you but there's some interesting stuff.