Article

2006-06-28 -Short Attention Span Theater-

Infected crops and the Salem witch hunts

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Posted by Mike 2006-06-28 12:58|| || Front Page|| [4 views since 2007-05-07] Top

#1 Ergot = precursor to LSD. It would get into the crops, and then whole regions of people would eat bread and trip. From what I understand, ergot poisoning is a lot less pleasant than LSD intoxication.

Posted by gromky 2006-06-28 14:36|| 2006-06-28 14:36|| Front Page Top

#2 They had at least one such infection - maybe more - in Europe, too, several hundred years ago. In France, maybe? I remember reading about it a long time ago.

Mike: "Wonder if a similar "cocktail of interesting alkaloids" might explain things like Democratic Underground and Cindy Sheehan?"

Naaaahhhh, they're just nuts.

Posted by Barbara Skolaut">Barbara Skolaut 2006-06-28 14:44|| http://ariellestjohndesigns.com/page/15bk1/Home_Page.html]">[http://ariellestjohndesigns.com/page/15bk1/Home_Page.html] 2006-06-28 14:44|| Front Page Top

#3 I've wondered for a while if the ugly clothes, hair, and wacky ideas hatched in the 70's were partially a product of breathing in too much leaded gasoline exhaust. I remember my parents sitting in brutal hours-long traffic jams with all the windows open...

Posted by Seafarious">Seafarious 2006-06-28 14:47|| 2006-06-28 14:47|| Front Page Top

#4 I can remember reading that entire villages in Europe would be affected in a similar manner. St. Anthony's Fire is widely thought to have been caused by Rye Ergot, in which entire communities went stark raving mad.

Posted by bigjim-ky 2006-06-28 15:34|| 2006-06-28 15:34|| Front Page Top

#5 Or was it St. Elmo's Fire? Can't remember, one was an epidemic, the other a suckass 80's movie.
Either way it sucked.

Posted by bigjim-ky 2006-06-28 15:35|| 2006-06-28 15:35|| Front Page Top

#6 Ergot = precursor to LSD. It would get into the crops, and then whole regions of people would eat bread and trip. From what I understand, ergot poisoning is a lot less pleasant than LSD intoxication.

IIRC, it was called "danse de Saint-Guy" (Saint Guy's dance"), which in familiar language still designate a purposeless, frantic agitation; victims would be peasants forced to eat normally unedible, spoiled by mushrooms and moisture, crops in time of hunger; they would then get both devastating physical effects (with extremities painfully swelling, and litteraly rotting away, le "feu ardent/harsh fire" IIRC) and "bad trips" which led to convulsive mindless agitation, as the nervous system was attacked and destroyed by the mushroom's toxins... and this on the scale of whole families and villages.

Posted by anonymous5089 2006-06-28 15:42|| 2006-06-28 15:42|| Front Page Top

#7 The above applied to La Belle France, of course.

Posted by anonymous5089 2006-06-28 15:43|| 2006-06-28 15:43|| Front Page Top

#8 And I thought it was St. Vitus's Dance. There was a metal band with a name like that back in the 80's if memory serves.

Posted by eLarson 2006-06-28 16:06|| http://larsonian.blogspot.com]">[http://larsonian.blogspot.com] 2006-06-28 16:06|| Front Page Top

#9 The spasms caused by ergot poisoning are called St. Vitus Dance.

Posted by Darrell 2006-06-28 17:01|| 2006-06-28 17:01|| Front Page Top

#10 "beyond the power of Epileptic Fits or natural disease," including screams, strange contortions, and throwing objects.

I worked for a moonbat DIA GG-15 retiree once who exibited all those traits along with occasional whimpering.

Posted by Besoeker 2006-06-28 17:05|| 2006-06-28 17:05|| Front Page Top

#11 ...No, that was my last flight supervisor in USAF Recruiting.

Or my ex-wife, I always get them confused.

Mike

Posted by Mike Kozlowski 2006-06-28 21:11|| 2006-06-28 21:11|| Front Page Top

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