When Humphry Got High (Part 1)
Long before Shulgin, Humphry Davy was a serious head who revolutionized chemistry
The following is an excerpt from p. 66-67 of Chapter 1, “Precious Crystals: What Salt Teaches Us About Drugs” from my book, Drugism (2022):
[Note: today’s excerpt picks up where “Crystal Connection” left off.]
Another figure in the history of salt played an important role for modern drug cultures. Humphry Davy (1778-1829) was a British chemist active in the late 18th and early 19th centuries whose discoveries are integral to our modern understandings of salt and drugs more broadly.
At the age of 20, as a pharmacist’s apprentice, Davy was offered a position at a scientific research center, the Pneumatic Institution of Bristol.[i] The new job was to research how various gases could be used medically, and the young aspiring chemist enthusiastically accepted. It was while at this position, researching gases, that Davy encountered nitrous oxide, or N2O, commonly known as laughing gas. Starting at 20 years old and continuing throughout his life, Davy developed a love for inhaling the gas. He shared the practice with many of his friends and wrote a 500-page book about it, titled Researches, Chemical and Philosophical, Chiefly Concerning Nitrous Oxide, or Dephlogisticated Nitrous Air, and its Respiration.
Years after Davy developed his fascination with N2O, he made several important chemical discoveries. Davy is credited with finding the molecular structures of sodium, potassium, magnesium, and chlorine.[ii] All of these elements are components of various natural salts, including sodium and chlorine, the two most relevant for our study of common salt. Davy’s understanding of these atomic structures enabled a plethora of meaningful advances in chemistry.
Davy’s understanding of sodium, for example, allowed the creation of new classes of sodium-based compounds, as well as synthetic salts, all of which figure prominently in today’s food and drug markets. We will see in Section IX how synthetic salt-based compounds are used today. Davy’s discovery of chlorine also led to the development of the practice of chlorination. This was soon enough applied to hydrocarbons (such as petroleum and its derivatives) to produce chlorinated hydrocarbons, such as DDT and Agent Orange. Chlorinated hydrocarbons have since wrought tremendous damage to our own health and that of our environment.
In learning about Davy’s life, and reflecting on my own experiences with drugs, I could not help but wonder if his experiences with N2O inspired or informed his later discovery of various atomic structures. As I read his tome on N2O, I found numerous passages which could support such an idea. He writes that his use of N2O inspired utterly new thoughts and concepts, and even taught him about the composition of the universe.
Davy’s N2O experiments also provide a fascinating example of recreational drug use in history. In addition to the new ideas that the drug inspired in Davy, it also produced profound euphoria, and motivated him to develop something of a ritual around its use for himself and his friends. A brief walk through Davy’s book on N2O shows us how the drug impacted him, and how it may have played a role in inspiring his later scientific discoveries.
Davy first experimented with N2O in April 1799 within months of getting the position at the research institution. He was 20 years old. He writes that he “was aware of the danger of this experiment” and paid close attention to the effects of the gas on his physical and mental health.[iii] He concluded that the gas was relatively safe.
Describing the effects of N2O, Davy wrote that it first produced a “gentle pressure on all the muscles” and felt “highly pleasurable.” Noting another early experience, he wrote that “the objects around me became dazzling and my hearing became more acute.”[iv] It seems that the N2O enhanced his perception, as many other drugs also do. He described the sensations generated by the gas as “feelings of intense intoxication” which inspired “highly vivid ideas.”[v]
Describing another early session with the gas, Davy recalled that “whenever its operation was carried to the highest extent...vivid ideas passed rapidly through the mind.”[vi] He was apparently quite enamored with the experience; “between May and July” of 1799, Davy “habitually breathed the gas, occasionally three or four times a day for a week together.”[vii] Even after this period of heavy experimentation, he “continued occasionally to breathe the gas, either for the sake of enjoyment, or with a view of ascertaining its operation under particular circumstances.”[viii] He explored using the gas to treat headaches and hangovers, with varying success.[ix]
The juxtaposition of alcohol and nitrous oxide inspired another experiment of Davy’s. He got the idea to see if he could get as high or higher from N2O as he could from alcohol or opium. Davy wrote, “I resolved to breathe the gas for such a time and in such quantities, as to produce excitement equal in duration and superior in intensity to that occasioned by high intoxication from opium or alcohol.”[x] Toward that end, he built an enormous box, large enough to fit a person inside, designed to submerge oneself in nitrous oxide—undoubtedly some of the most creative N2O paraphernalia ever designed, to this day.