Thursday, June 02, 2005
Look Out!
This story is either another one of those cases of poor metrics, or it is the basis for what will have to be the most tightly controlled drug in history.
Trust in a bottle? It sounds like a marketer's fantasy, like the fabled fountain of youth or the wild claims of fad diets. Yet that's what Swiss and American scientists demonstrate in new experiments with a nasal spray containing the hormone oxytocin.I am unsure if willingness to invest is a good metric here, after all, scam artists make this happen without benefit of hormones everyday, but the ramifications of this, if true, and terrifying.
After a few squirts, human subjects were significantly more trusting and willing to invest money with no ironclad promise of a profit.
The researchers acknowledged their findings could be abused by con artists or even sleazy politicians who might sway an election, provided they could squirt enough voters on their way to the polls.They ignore the most potent misuse -- this would be the ultimate "date rape" drug. Trust is more than half way to seduction. In fact, I would not be surprised if some enterprising grad student was synthesizing or isolating this stuff and selling it out the back door already.
