Electrified Sheep

April 9, 2012
Boese follows Elephants on Acid with another foray into the annals of scientific experiments whose major contribution to society may well be their highly entertaining recounting. Many of the experiments, by a group he calls “scientists gone wild,” revolve around animals, and readers sympathetic to PETA will be repulsed rather than amused. The 1903 execution by electrocution of Topsy, a rogue circus elephant, is funny, but blackly so. (Thomas Edison volunteered his electrification services.) There are chapters on experiments to test the effects of exposure to nuclear explosions, including a proposal to use an atom bomb to launch a space ship; on psychiatric experimenters, including two researchers who in 1938 sought to discover what Bryn Mawr co-eds talked about at night by hiding under their beds; and a chapter on the general lunacy of scientists who use themselves as guinea pigs, including a doctor who tried to remove his own appendix. While readers will often find Boese laugh out loud funny, they will also be left with a prickly feeling that all is not well on the frontiers, and certainly the fringes, of science.