Absinthe: Mind-Altering Effects Explained

American Chemical Society: Chemical Composition of Vintage Preban Absinthe with Special Reference to Thujone, Fenchone, Pinocamphone, Methanol, Copper, and Antimony Concentrations

Edgar Degas: L'absinthe (Musée d'Orsay, Paris)


Absinthe-related older threads on A2K: ABSINTHE QUESTION......

London A2Kers Can Tipple Absinthe Next Month!

When I was in school I bought a poster that Degas painting and (blushes) varnished it and framed it.

There's another article out today on the effects of alcohol on the brain, back with a link in a minute.

I'd just drop a tab of acid in a bottle of Jose cuervo..... cheaper....

Ah, here it is -

http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2008/apr/30/alcohol.brain


Scans pinpoint alcohol's effects on the human brain
Alok Jha, science correspondent
guardian.co.uk, Wednesday April 30 2008

Brain scans have confirmed that alcohol numbs the brain's ability to detect threats while stimulating the regions involved in feeling rewarded.

Jodi Gilman and Daniel Hommer at the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism in Maryland used functional magnetic resonance imaging to monitor the brain activity of 12 volunteers who had been injected with alcohol. During two 45-minute periods, the participants received either alcohol or a placebo while they were shown pictures of fearful facial expressions.

The researchers focused on brain regions that had previously been identified as being involved in processing threat signals.

They found that when the volunteers were given a placebo, the pictures elicited activity in the amygdala, insula and parahippocampal gyrus - brain regions involved in fear and avoidance - as well as in the brain's visual system. But these regions did not show much enhanced activity when the volunteers were given alcohol.

Gilman and Hommer also showed that the alcohol activated the striatal areas of the brain, which are important components of its reward system. The level of response here was linked to the amount of alcohol a volunteer was given.

"The key finding of this study is that after alcohol exposure, threat-detecting brain circuits can't tell the difference between a threatening and non-threatening social stimulus," said Marina Wolf at the Rosalind Franklin University of Medicine and Science in Chicago, who was not involved in the study.

"At one end of the spectrum, less anxiety might enable us to approach a new person at a party. But at the other end of the spectrum, we may fail to avoid an argument or a fight. By showing that alcohol exerts this effect in normal volunteers by acting on specific brain circuits, these study results make it harder for someone to believe that risky decision-making after alcohol 'doesn't apply to me'."

The findings are published today in the Journal of Neuroscience

osso says
I wish Id have had that bit of wisdom before that one night in Knoxville Tennessee.

Ja....

This will be a hanno-special-report. In my favorite drive through shop, which I walk to (I'm all about cars, but it's like how you don't use former-king's sword to peel potatoes) I sighted, on an unrefrigerated shelf, a bottle of a mid-range local screw-top high-octane white Catawba, going for $3.89 instead of the usual $5.99. Not my thing, would never pay $6 for it, but one sees it everywhere. The dust on the bottle explained the price discrepancy - inflation and all that - but nonetheless, hedging my bets with a mere quart of High-Life I took the bait.

In the glass the caramel-as-opposed-to-blush-color and warm, smoky texture were apparent. Yep, got me somekindof shelf-aged Catawba brandy here, and I don't want to make anyone jealous, but it is the most awesome thing imaginable. Warm, smooth, complex, dry, intoxicating - nothing ever said in favor of an alcoholic beverage is inapplicable to this bottle...

Poisonous?

Yeah, absinthe is no longer dangerous like it used to be. Still packs quite a punch though......

I know of a bar that serves absinthe. They burn the sugar cube over the glass, the whole bit. I've been thinking about trotting over there and trying a glass of the green fairy.

Just one glass couldn't hurt.

german RATZEPUTZ still packs quite a punch : 58 % alcohol !
really settles your digestive system after a big german meal

btw it used to be 65 % when i was still "a young one" , i believe .

I forgot to take a photo the last times I'd ben there. But two days ago, I remembered this thread and pictured the Absinthe shop in Erfurt (Thuringia/Germany).

They sell a great variety (like Cannibis Absinthe in the green [sic!] bottle, or Absinthe Parfume - see second photo). And you can taste/try before buying ....

I remember that the way we drank absinthe in some AFrican countries was to make a whole ceremony. The absinthe was poured over a sugar cube and then a small amount of very very cold spring water was somehow mixed in so that it had a milky green color. You got the flavor of a sweet cough medicine (IMHO). Enough of them and you become "Invincible" just like Jose gold

Exactly my memories (but from Switzerland), farmerman.