Quote Originally Posted by Storm Crow
My bio prof (way back the first time I went to college) told us something interesting- if you take a single drop of nicotine and put it on the ear of a rabbit, that rabbit will be dead before 24 hours is up!
Interesting, isn't it? And its true! That's because the dose of nicotine from smoking one cigarette is about .9 mg. A drop of the purified chemical is substantially more than that, and for such a small organism, can be lethal, especially since it can absorb through the skin. If you handle quantities of tobacco leaves you can accidently overdose yourself on nicotine and white out, or worse. Similarly, eating a cigarette will make you sick because of the high dose of nicotine (and is an emergency for a child, as such a level could kill them). 90% of the nicotine in a cigarette burns up at the temperature the ember reaches, and this is why smoking does not deliver a lethal dose. I've read at least one case, even still, where two people had a non-stop smoking contest to see who could smoke the most cigarettes (dumb in so many ways). Both were hospitalized from nicotine overdose and the winner, after smoking 4 straight packs in a short time, did not survive.

The substance is a neurotoxin at high enough doses, that's why its used as a pesticide. Use nicotine at your own risk. Like I said, spliffs should only be for the people who know the risk and don't mind, or who smoke to begin with. (By the same token, many other substances are neurotoxins in their pure forms, including capsaicin from hot peppers. There's your pinch of salt, fellow smokers)