The definition of “wort” includes “used in names of plants and herbs, especially those used, especially formerly, as food or medicinally, e.g., butterwort, woundwort” ... so it sounds likely that some English speaking culture already realized that liverwort had medicinal value. (C.f. St John’s Wort, an herb with some evidence of antidepressant effects.)

that's a fascinating tidbit

Found someone who wrote about attempting to smoke this plant and an extract of it - they reported a weak effect.

http://www.bluelight.org/vb/archive/index.php/t-642032.html

You just gotta artificially select it the right way!

Kinda irritating that a nominally scientific magazine couldn't be bothered to articulate the molecular structures.

I can’t stress enough just how nominal their commitment to science is these days. An elderly relative bought me many years subscription to SciAm and it’s mostly useful as toilet roll. You get the occasional scholarly article, but the majority is either “science writers” gushing over something they don’t understand, or thinly veiled politics. Hell, I agree with most of their political leanings, but I’m not interested in reading them from that source.

It’s sad, but the majority of science in Scientific American is in the name.

You can reverse that curse. Look up American Scientist. Really.

I just visited the American Scientist website. The cover story:

“Selective inattention to women’s experiences in STEM leads to a chilly workplace climate for women, who pick up on even the subtlest cues.”

So, more thinly veiled politics. Pass.

...Marry me.

Yes, I stopped reading it regularly about 20 years ago. They got a new editorial board and went for a broader audience by diluting the content drastically in both quality and quantity. The final straw for me was when they adjusted the font size and spacing to reduce the amount of text by about 10% while maintaining page count.

Their transition from hard science to popularizing science was a deliberate response to the anti-intellectual tide. At the time, it felt like a loss, but I understood the motivation and supported their goals. Sadly, I don't know that their efforts have moved the needle.

That seems like exactly the wrong approach. Reading the old SciAm was an afternoon of hard mental work each month but I thought of it as cheap education, hitting a sweet spot between solid content and accessibility/cost compared to journals. Cannot help seeing this as a strategic own goal.

They link to it: http://cpb.pharm.or.jp/cpb/200210/c10_1390.pdf

Maybe this is weird in modern journals but from before ~1950 or so it was really common.

eh - no, it was never really common to credit incense sellers in journals. Stop using those lowly moss-like plants please.

Surely, I can’t be the only one that immediately flashes on the mold Hal ingests in Infinite Jest.

I've got that crap all over my house, trees, garden

CBD has incredible medicinal value, I wonder if PET (perrottetinene) will end up being a similarly powerful treatment.