by 
Anonymous
ANSWERS: 5
-
"Truth serum," the chemical thiopental sodium, is a fast-acting barbituate that makes a person talkative, uninhibited, and extremely open to suggestion. It does not make a person "tell the truth," but they can be coaxed into saying things the interviewer wants them to say. The effect of this drug is similar to acute alcohol intoxication. Technically, thiopental sodium increases the permeability of the neural membrane to chloride ions. This results in general inhibition, starting with the cortex and progressing to other regions of the brain. Thiopental sodium is used now as an induction to anesthesia (generally given before nitrous oxide, as many people are apprehensive about inhaling the gas first), by itself for minor operations, as an anticonvulsant, as an animal tranquilizer, as a radioprotective agent, and as the first drug given in a lethal injection.
-
I am no expert. But I have read a book about common myths. There is no drug which will make a person freely tell nothing but the truth. An elder of the Greek community once said "In wine, there is truth" but alcohol makes it slightly difficult to tell one's delusions from their truths. In fact, some truth serums (like the one mentioned earlier) have made people admit to crimes they didn't commit, perhaps even the murder of a stepmother who they don't have. But the CIA are working on it!
-
To my knowledge, the real use of so-called "truth serums" is to make the subject so disorientated during questions that, once the serum wears off, they are unsure as to what they have already said. In that case, they do not pretend to hide their secrets any more as they think they have already given them up.
-
All the previous answers fairly well cover the answer. It's scary to think that we have all this stuff that we really want to say to people but we have these very complex "inhibitory" defences that prevent us from letting go with both barrels! Anything that removes this inhibitory safety net will encourage people to say what lines beneath! Sodium thiopental was the first agent to be used as a so called "truth serum". As an anaesthetist, I see all the time that people after being given other drugs such as short acting benzodiazepines such as midazolam becoome quite disinhibited in talk and behavioour. The bottom line is that the effectivness of these agents in getting people to tell State secrets is more likely in the realm of the movies than reality.
-
They only make the injectant tell the interrogator what they want to hear, so it doesn't work exactly as it should. If you've seen the movie "Meet the Fo«kers", after Jack Byrnes makes it known that he thinks Greg copulated with his family's maid and produced a son, Jorge, who coincidentially looks a LOT like Greg, he soon injects Sodium Pentothal into Greg, and falsely admits that Jorge is Greg's son, because that's only what Jack wanted to hear! Later, as Jack leaves in his Pace Arrow, back to New York, Foxtrot 1 calls him and reports that after analyzing the DNA of Greg and Jorge's hairs, they're not related and Jorge's dad was a Minor League baseball player (what happened to him, though?) so after Jack explains that Greg admitted it after injecting Sodium Pentothal, Foxtrot 1 says "I understand. We all make mistakes." Thus, this showed that sodium pentothal only makes the injectants tell what the interrogators want to hear.
RELATED QUESTIONS
Copyright 2023, Wired Ivy, LLC