. . .Hooking monkeys on coke definitely falls into the “more egregious” category. Unfortunately, the idiotic study is just a drop in the proverbial crack pipe. Other mind-bogglingly absurd addiction studies on animals include the following:

* National Institutes of Health–funded experimenter Michael Weed trained monkeys in a basic motor task, infected them with simian immunodeficiency virus, and then checked how they performed the task—while on cocaine. So now we know … what? That you shouldn’t hire monkeys with STDs who are high on drugs to mow your lawn?

* Yale professor Marina Picciotto wasted taxpayer money to feed monkeys Kool-Aid laced with huge amounts of liquid nicotine (the equivalent of 17 packs of cigarettes a day in one case!) and addicted rats and mice to cocaine, morphine, and alcohol before decapitating them. Anyone with a head on their shoulders would realize that this is cruel—and pointless.

* Oregon National Primate Research Center experimenter Eliot Spindel impregnates monkeys and injects them with dangerous levels of nicotine. He then kills and dissects their preterm babies after cutting them out of their mothers. Yeah, pregnant women shouldn’t smoke—we know that already.

* Another frequent rider of the NIH gravy train, Stephen Suomi, separates baby monkeys from their mothers and gives them access to alcohol to see how stress and maternal deprivation affect their desire to drown their sorrows. Just reading about this makes me want to head to the nearest bar.