3 Responses to “What spider webs can teach us about caffeine’s effect on the brain”

1. 
   Tom Kox | Guest February 27th, 2007 - 8:21 am
   
   

   I’ve always had trouble accepting the conclusions drawn from these “spiders-on-drugs” pictures you can find on various sites on the internet. I find it hard to believe that spiders would be neurologically similar enough to humans that human drugs would produce similar effects in them. If they did, we probably wouldn’t carry out pharmaceutical experiments on bunnies and mice. These two photos come from a series, “Spiders on LSD”, “Spiders on Marijuana” and so on. Since both LSD and THC affect higher brainfunctions situated in the neocortex, an area of the brain which spiders lack, it is highly unlikely that they would react to these (and probably any other) drugs in the way people would. Of course, administring any kind of concentrated chemicals to animals will probably have severe impacts on their behaviour, but I find it hard to believe we could draw any sensible conclusions regarding our own behaviour under the influence of the same drugs from these experiments.

   
   
2. 
   ethan frost | Guest July 22nd, 2007 - 4:23 am
   
   

   Agreed. However the test does show drastic change in the construct & general behavior in the spiders.

   
   
3. 
   Jorge Luis | Guest October 30th, 2007 - 12:46 pm
   
   

   I believe this intended to aid identify drugs themselves, not to portray effects. Real messed up caffeine, nevertheless. I always thought the LSD spider would be more creative…

   
   

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