What's Your Poison?

Image by: Seth Shostak

What's Your Poison?

Series: Big Picture Science
From: Big Picture Science
Length: 00:54:00

“Aspirin and Old Lace?” Okay, you’d need a bottle of pills in a cup of elderberry wine, but aspirin can be deadly – hear why dose is key in toxicology. Read the full description.

Piece Audio

Podcast Version

Promos

Playing: What's Your Poison?
From: Big Picture Science

Whatsyourpoisonmed_small "Aspirin and Old Lace?” Okay, it would take a bottle full of pills in a glass of elderberry wine to really harm you, but aspirin can be deadly. So can too much of anything, including water. Dose is key in toxicology, after all, but there are some poisons that can do deadly work in tiny amounts.

Hear about the chemistry of poisons … why Botox may freeze your emotions as well as your face… which animal is most lethal to humans… and how 19th-century poisoners got away with murder – until the birth of forensic science.

Guests:

Deborah Blum – Pulitzer Prize-winning science writer, author of The Poisoner’s Handbook: Murder and the Birth of Forensic Medicine in Jazz Age New York
Martyn Smith – Toxicologist, University of California, Berkeley
Joshua Ian Davis – Psychologist, Barnard College, New York
Jamie Seymour – Venom biologist, director of The Tropical Australian Stinger Research Unit, School of Marine Tropical Biology, James Cook University, Cairns, Australia

Playing: What's Your Poison?
From: Big Picture Science

Whatsyourpoisonmed_small "Aspirin and Old Lace?” Okay, it would take a bottle full of pills in a glass of elderberry wine to really harm you, but aspirin can be deadly. So can too much of anything, including water. Dose is key in toxicology, after all, but there are some poisons that can do deadly work in tiny amounts.

Hear about the chemistry of poisons … why Botox may freeze your emotions as well as your face… which animal is most lethal to humans… and how 19th-century poisoners got away with murder – until the birth of forensic science.

Guests:

Deborah Blum – Pulitzer Prize-winning science writer, author of The Poisoner’s Handbook: Murder and the Birth of Forensic Medicine in Jazz Age New York
Martyn Smith – Toxicologist, University of California, Berkeley
Joshua Ian Davis – Psychologist, Barnard College, New York
Jamie Seymour – Venom biologist, director of The Tropical Australian Stinger Research Unit, School of Marine Tropical Biology, James Cook University, Cairns, Australia

Playing: What's Your Poison?
From: Big Picture Science

Whatsyourpoisonmed_small "Aspirin and Old Lace?” Okay, it would take a bottle full of pills in a glass of elderberry wine to really harm you, but aspirin can be deadly. So can too much of anything, including water. Dose is key in toxicology, after all, but there are some poisons that can do deadly work in tiny amounts.

Hear about the chemistry of poisons … why Botox may freeze your emotions as well as your face… which animal is most lethal to humans… and how 19th-century poisoners got away with murder – until the birth of forensic science.

Guests:

Deborah Blum – Pulitzer Prize-winning science writer, author of The Poisoner’s Handbook: Murder and the Birth of Forensic Medicine in Jazz Age New York
Martyn Smith – Toxicologist, University of California, Berkeley
Joshua Ian Davis – Psychologist, Barnard College, New York
Jamie Seymour – Venom biologist, director of The Tropical Australian Stinger Research Unit, School of Marine Tropical Biology, James Cook University, Cairns, Australia

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Piece Description

"Aspirin and Old Lace?” Okay, it would take a bottle full of pills in a glass of elderberry wine to really harm you, but aspirin can be deadly. So can too much of anything, including water. Dose is key in toxicology, after all, but there are some poisons that can do deadly work in tiny amounts.

Hear about the chemistry of poisons … why Botox may freeze your emotions as well as your face… which animal is most lethal to humans… and how 19th-century poisoners got away with murder – until the birth of forensic science.

Guests:

Deborah Blum – Pulitzer Prize-winning science writer, author of The Poisoner’s Handbook: Murder and the Birth of Forensic Medicine in Jazz Age New York
Martyn Smith – Toxicologist, University of California, Berkeley
Joshua Ian Davis – Psychologist, Barnard College, New York
Jamie Seymour – Venom biologist, director of The Tropical Australian Stinger Research Unit, School of Marine Tropical Biology, James Cook University, Cairns, Australia

Broadcast History

first released 7/26/10

Additional Credits

Seth Shostak - Host and Producer
Molly Bentley - Co-Host and Executive Producer
Gary Niederhoff - Producer
Barbara Vance - Production Assistant
Jay Weiler - Assistant