Alex Boese
Elefanti in Acido

"Elephants on Acid and Other Bizarre Experiments" if you are curious to find out what some of the most absurd and insignificant research in the history of science has been, rush to the bookstore to buy this book (unhealthy and absurd) like its content.

The author reports with irony (to lighten the mood, after all) the tests conducted by mad scientists on animals and people from the dawn to the present day of medicine, surgery, and psychiatry.

If you have wondered if some lunatic really filled an elephant with LSD to study its effects, the answer is YES! The poor pachyderm was not happy at all given its unfortunate end: death by asphyxiation. This is just one of the few orthodox experiments. Not only that; many other essential questions are unveiled in this work of about 300 pages, for example: is a turkey sexually attracted to the head of a female turkey tied to a stick? Can a freshly guillotined human head be revived? What happens if a woman is impregnated by an orangutan? Does the behavior of a sheep change more if a man stares at it 24/7 or if a man circles around it without looking?

Additionally, there are very interesting psychiatric studies such as brainwashing, sleep deprivation, memory injections, the suggestion of sommeliers, and the difference between Coca Cola and Pepsi.

I almost forgot, there are excellent courtship experiments that can be useful to many: it has been found that a woman is almost never willing to have sex with a stranger immediately, but surprisingly half of the time she accepts an invitation to dinner. Moreover, people become more attractive to others at the end of the evening compared to the beginning, according to scientists, this can also be caused by alcohol...

This book, taken as it is, is as useless as the machine to revive the dead, but it possesses its decadent charm. A side of the reader is truly disgusted by the useless tests conducted but with more horror, we dare not imagine how many other unnecessary cruelties were executed in complete secrecy. You will be even more astonished when you discover who were the financiers of all these absurdities.

That of Alex Boese is an indictment all in all, an indictment that ultimately earned him a nice little sum. The book is interesting but as I have already said, of little cultural value; a mix between the "Guinness World Records" and "My Shocking Story".