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Comment by pluma | Hacker News Reader

I was surprised the article didn't mention nutmeg, which is widely used despite its toxicity, so I tried to figure out how their LD50 compares (i.e. how much tonka nut you need to eat to have a 50% chance of death, and how nutmeg stacks up).

I couldn't find any clear answers for tonka beans and the exact dose of course depends on body weight but the lethal doses for nutmeg were an order of magnitude higher: for nutmeg the doses are given in thousands of milligrammes per kg body weight, for tonka beans they're in the hundreds.

So I guess it could be said that tonka beans are 10 times as deadly as nutmeg.

EDIT: g -> mg, sorry about mixing up the units

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> for nutmeg the doses are given in thousands of grammes per kg body weight

Is it really fair to call something toxic if the LD50 is more than your bodyweight? I suspect you might have your LD50 value off.

Oops, you're right. I meant to say milligrammes. I haven't had much sleep lately and my brain's not working right. I'll edit.

It turns out the LD50 of Anvils is way less than a typical persons body weight when applied topically to the cranium via a 20 foot drop.

Nutmeg is still dangerous in non-lethal doses. Eating just a couple nuts will put you in a fairly unpleasant delirious state for up to 2 full days.

I've heard it's much better fresh than dried

And the typical amount used in a dish is 1/100th of a nut or less. Literally a few strokes on a rasp is enough to flavour a dish.

Yep, it's a bit surprising at first if you do not cook very often just how little of a spice is required (at least it was for me). Just a tiny bit more than needed generally tastes awful.

Same with chilli's.

GF bought me a chilli set and while they where all delicious, the naga one was in a league of it's own.

They went mild, medium, I felt that and oh dear god, what have I wrought.

In hindsight I should have respected the reputation of the Naga chilli.

Take enough nutmeg, and you'll start hallucinating.

In a good way or a bad way?

well... put it this way: no one has bothered to make it illegal

You can read that for yourself: https://www.erowid.org/experiences/subs/exp_Nutmeg.shtml . The Datura page is also highly recommeded for another dose of "why would anyone do this?!".

Bad, nausea.

Some people enjoy it, but the vast majority of trip reports I’ve read are essentially “do not bother to try this, it’s not worth it”. Like DXM, it seems to have different “plateaus”, and the line between a pleasant dose and a multi-day hell of delirious anxiety is rather small.

Very bad. A floormate of mine tried it freshman year in college (of course) and finally emerged from his dorm room two full days later with giant bags under his eyes, and nothing good to say about the experience.

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