An Academic Review

The following is an audio transcript of my meeting with the academic review board of my university and specifically my doctorate program, regarding the ethics and findings of my experiment. The date is of no consequence, but know that it was in the autumn.

[Dr. McGrath]: Mr. [Wolf (Remember, I'm redacting my name. Or perhaps I'm not.)], now that you have arrived we can begin this hearing of the Academic Review board. We will begin with an interrogatory period, so that the scope and nature of your experiment will be made clear to myself, Dr. Ortega, and Dr. Johnson.

[McGrath clears his throat.]

[McGrath]: Mr. [Wolf], did you or did you not, at the beginning of this semester, propose to your advisor, Dr. Ortega, your hypothesis regarding the unlocking of the race memory of a person via exposure to pharmaceuticals and electrical stimulus?

[Wolf]: I did, sir.

[McGrath]: I see. It is to my understanding that you intended to administer a combination of lysergic acid diethylamide number 27, otherwise known as LSD, salvia divinorum, an herbal hallucinogen, and 3,4,5-trimethoxyphenethylamine, otherwise known as mescaline, to ten specimens of Rattus norvegicus, and then submit them to electrical stimulus?

[Wolf]: That is correct.

[McGrath]: And tell me, Mr. [Wolf], why did you set up this particular experiment?

[Wolf]: To observe what happened to the specimens, Dr. McGrath.

[McGrath]: What did end up happening, Mr. [Wolf]?

[Wolf]: Subject #1, the control group, was not subjected to electrical stimulus. It fell asleep six minutes after I administered the psychoactive chemicals to it. It awoke thirteen hours afterward. Subjects 2-4 were subjected to the lowest amount of stimulus, and were sent into what I can only describe as a hallucinogenic coma that lasted thirteen minutes. Upon awakening, they exhibited the signs of hallucinogenic intoxication, which wore off after about six hours. Subjects 5-7 were stimulated with a medium electrical discharge. Their hallucinogenic experience lasted only 4 minutes, but was very intense.

[Dr. Johnson]: How could you determine this, Mr. [Wolf]?

[Wolf]: Easily, Dr. Johnson. Empirical evidence and the readings from micro-electroencephalography.

[Dr. Johnson nods, satisfied, and beckons for me to continue on.]

[Wolf]: Subjects 8-10 were subjected to the highest amount of electrical stimulus. Subjects 8 and 10 immediately went into tachycardia, and expired 44 seconds later. Subject 9 seized for one minute, and then expired.

[McGrath]: Indeed. This is all in our notes. Now tell me, Mr. [Wolf], what was to happen after your initial experiment.

[Wolf]: I was to present my results to Dr. Ortega, who would grant me permission to carry out the next phase of my experiment, which was to experiment with more intelligent animals. Pigs, to be specific.

[McGrath]: What species?

[Wolf]: Sus scrofa domestica, sir.

[McGrath]: Very well. You did not, however, file results with Dr. Ortega. You instead decided that it would be prudent to conduct your own, unsanctioned experiment, outside of the university's facilities, where you administered your chemical cocktail yourself, with an unpaid assistant overlooking the experiment. Is this not correct?

[Wolf]: That is correct, sir.

[McGrath]: Mr. [Wolf], do you not realize that this is a serious breach of the Code of Ethics set forth both by the university and by the program's handbook, a handbook that you signed off as having read and understood thoroughly?

[Wolf]: No, sir.

[McGrath]: No?

[Wolf]: No, sir. Per section 18, paragraph 3 of the Experimental Psychology doctorate program, it is unethical to coerce a subject into an unsanctioned scientific experiment, with the promise of reward. No coercion was involved, Dr. McGrath. I would be unable to coerce myself. I was more than willing.

[McGrath snorts.]

[McGrath]: Then do you realize, Mr. [Wolf], that, as a scientist, you have compromised your objectivity by subjecting yourself to your own inhumane test, thereby skewing the results of the experiment in favor of your hypothesis?

[Wolf]: No, sir.

[It is at this point that McGrath got rather angry with me.]

[McGrath]: No? Are you taking this seriously, Mr. [Wolf]?

[Wolf]: I am serious, Dr. McGrath. I must ask you a question now: have I filed the results of my unsanctioned experiment with Dr. Ortega, or with a scientific journal?

[McGrath sighs.]

[McGrath]: You did not.

[Wolf]: No, I did not. Ergo, the results of my unsanctioned experiment have no bearing on the results of my study as a whole. As such, this hearing is a completely unnecessary farce.

[McGrath went red at this point. Dr. Ortega, my advisor, smiled bemusedly, admiring my bold charm of baiting the head of the Academic Review board. Dr. Johnson, a historian, was completely nonplussed, remaining neutral.]

[McGrath]: Mr. [Wolf], my colleagues and I need time to deliberate regarding your case. It is now...11:18 am, please return at noon. That will be all.

[At this point, I stopped my personal tape recorder, as the following recollection of what happened during the interim. It is short, but I feel it to be pertinent.]

I stepped outside, the bright, clear yet cold autumn light causing me to squint, drawing my silver, mirrored aviator-knock-off sunglasses from my pocket. I get frequent headaches. Tension, the doctors say. It means I need to slam back Excedrin like it's going out of style. As I walked down the concrete steps leading to the building, I ruminated internally on the rather brief hearing I'd just been through. McGrath was gunning for me, I could feel it. I don't know why, but the man was so stuffy it was like the stick up his ass had a stick up its ass. Ortega was always in my corner. I was her protégé, her rising star. Johnson though...he was a wild card. I couldn't count on him one way or the other.

As if on instinct, I pulled my smartphone out of the right pocket of my pleated khaki pants. While checking it, I was assaulted with unpleasant feelings of self-consciousness, like everyone outside was watching me. My eyes darted around, but no one was. This did not alleviate the feeling, only heightened it. I could feel my pulse rise, blood pressure increasing, a tinge of sweat forming under my close-cropped hairline. But, I couldn't pull my eyes away from my smartphone. I woke up the screen, and was assaulted by distortion on the screen, the wallpaper spasming as if in a death throe. My eyebrow raised. I had flashed a custom OS that was completely stable on to it. I would know, too. I designed it.

I turned my phone around after trying to unlock the screen, and my feeling of being watched increased. I looked up, an under an impossible old beech tree, out of the corner of my eye, was an impossibly tall, impeccably dressed man, his gaze fixed on me intently. I turned my full attention to him, but he wasn't there.

Now, I'm not paranoid in the slightest. I'm quite the rational person, if I do say so myself. I dismissed it as my tension headache triggering a flashback. That was all it could be. No one could be that tall.

Could they?

[Following is the results of my hearing, transcribed from the same tape.]

[McGrath]: Mr. [Wolf], it is the ruling of this board that...no disciplinary action is to be taken. You dodged a bullet here, [Wolf]. However, in the interest of academic integrity, your study is hereby concluded. All records of it will be sealed. This ruling is final. Have a nice day, Mr. [Wolf]. I don't want to see you in this situation again, understood?

[Wolf]: Yes, Dr. McGrath. I thank the board for its judicious ruling.

[The tape ends.]

I stepped back outside, audibly sighing in relief. Johnson had pulled through. I fished a cigarette and the Bic from my pocket, stepping down onto the square before lighting up. Nicotine flooded through my nerves, and I felt an intense sense of relief rush through me, causing my hand to shake as I pulled it and the lit cigarette to my mouth.

I didn't know what I would have done had the board not ruled favorably. I have many skills, and two degrees in science, but more than anything, I want my doctorate. I had dreamed about it since high school. And for now, my dream was intact.

My gaze flicked to the beech tree. No impossibly tall people under it.

“Wolf,” a familiar voice said behind me. Dr. Johnson. I turned, and the amicable, fiftyish year old man waved to me, a smile flickering across his face.

“Dr. Johnson,” I replied, kicking my foot up to stub out my smoke. He raised a hand to stop me, and my foot planted itself squarely on the concrete. He regarded me kindly, several paces ahead of me, watery blue eyes set close together over a stubby nose. His black hair had gone to the tonsure-pattern of baldness. As he approached, my stomach felt like the bottom had fell. I felt a...wave of revulsion pass through me.

“Wolf, I'm very interested in the results of your little...incognito experiment, shall we call it? I was wondering if we could discuss it fully, just you and I.”

I took my sunglasses off slowly, folding them against myself, squinting at the man. As my eyes were exposed to the unfiltered light of him, my aversion to the man increased. It was as if all the unused parts of my lower brain were screaming for me to get away, to flee, a self-preservation instinct taking over my awakened consciousness.

“Um, now?” I said gauchely, realizing how utterly awkward I sounded.

“No, not now,” he replied kindly. To me, the words sounded to sweet, like they were covering up some sort of unctuous ooze that lingered just beneath the surface, if you could penetrate the diamond sugar coating them. “How does tomorrow sound, for lunch? At the Alumnus Club? Say...1:30?”

“I...uh, sure, I suppose. That sounds...nice.”

He smiled toothily. Frighteningly.

“Wonderful, Wolf. I look forward to it. I'll see you then. You have a pleasant day, young man.”

“Yeah. You too, Doctor.” The prospect of having lunch with this thoroughly unpleasant man made me want to vomit everywhere, and never stop. As I replayed the exchange in my mind, the images of Johnson were distorted, like he was leering at me unnaturally, his smile a cold rictus grin, his eyes like twinkling pits of blue, frozen flame, fixed on me. I couldn't help but shudder. It helped. I stopped thinking about it.

In retrospect, I shouldn't have dismissed it so casually.