Inedible Organs

Lozzer · Mar 6, 2009

Hello

I'm hoping somebody here can help me out.

I'm Laurence Wilson a British playwright. I have a play opening soon at the Liverpool Everyman and I'm working on a new draft. The play has a character with Aspergers syndrome as a central character. Which makes him very literal. In one scene his friend is dressed up, in a bee keeping suit, and pretends to be a monster who is going to eat him.

What I'd like to know is. Are there parts of the human body, organs for instance that are inedible to humans, or dangerous for us to eat. The reason being, I'd like my Apergous character to point this out as a defence. And I have a memory of someone telling mke that certain organs are inedible in humans to other humans.

Any help will be greatly apreciated.

Are any parts of the human body inedible, poisonous?

I'm not thinking of becoming a cannibal

gbwillner · Mar 6, 2009

This is going to be good....

Dr. McDreamy · Mar 6, 2009

I'm pretty sure polar bear liver is poisonous...

jrs1234 · Mar 6, 2009

djmd · Mar 6, 2009

Well, personally I have a symbiotic bacteria that produces Tetrodotoxin in me.. which cause parts of me to be very toxic...

Oh wait no I don't...

I'm not a puffer fish.

Gut Shot · Mar 6, 2009

Interesting question.

If it were me, the organs I would least like to consume are pancreas, thyroid, and unclean bowel from stomach to rectum (this includes the gallbladder). The pancreas is full of digestive enzymes, very nasty. The thyroid is loaded with thyroid hormone, which I assume would be like taking a whopping dose of Synthroid. The gallbladder is out, as bile is a very noxious substance. The bowel part should be self explanatory. Perhaps the adrenals would be unpleasant, as well. Then again, if you look up a recipe for sweetbreads (offal) my ideas might not hold water.

Eating brains could give you kuru. A bit fanciful, but still.

Heart, lungs, liver, spleen, kidneys, testes, ovaries, bladder, prostate, eyes: all completely edible. The uterus is essentially a steak in the shape of a bowl, so no worries there.

djmd · Mar 6, 2009

Gut Shot said:
Interesting question.

If it were me, the organs I would least like to consume are pancreas, thyroid, and unclean bowel from stomach to rectum (this includes the gallbladder). The pancreas is full of digestive enzymes, very nasty. The thyroid is loaded with thyroid hormone, which I assume would be like taking a whopping dose of Synthroid. The gallbladder is out, as bile is a very noxious substance. The bowel part should be self explanatory. Perhaps the adrenals would be unpleasant, as well. Then again, if you look up a recipe for sweetbreads (offal) my ideas might not hold water.

Eating brains could give you kuru. A bit fanciful, but still.

Heart, lungs, liver, spleen, kidneys, testes, ovaries, bladder, prostate, eyes: all completely edible. The uterus is essentially a steak in the shape of a bowl, so no worries there.

First off... Uterus = steak in the shape of a bowl?? :laugh:

I wonder if any place serves their salads in a steak bowl rather than a bread bowl.

Pancreas along with thymus is what makes up "Sweetbread".
So that is not only non toxic, but according to some people tastes good..
(yes they eat cow pancreas, not human, but still)...

The thyroid would be a bad idea for the thyroid hormone.. thyrotoxicosis.
There have been cases in people due to consuming hamburger made with tissue from the neck of the cow (thus including thyroid).

As for GI tract, if you wash it... ehh you 'could' eat it. If not gross.

gbwillner · Mar 6, 2009

djmd said:
First off... Uterus = steak in the shape of a bowl??

.....

As for GI tract, if you wash it... ehh you 'could' eat it. If not gross.

First off, the uterus is waaaayy too gamy. You'd have to marinade it dor months. Or so I've heard from my cannibal friends.

As far as the GI tract.... waht do you think sausages are made from?

/Soylent green anyone? 😀

djmd · Mar 6, 2009

gbwillner said:
First off, the uterus is waaaayy too gamy. You'd have to marinade it dor months. Or so I've heard from my cannibal friends.

As far as the GI tract.... waht do you think sausages are made from?

/Soylent green anyone? 😀

rirriri · Mar 6, 2009

well first of all, you should probably ask somebody doing the special Cannibalism Fellowship, a rare but deadly fellowship surely available somewhere in the world 😉

someone already mentioned Prions.....and that would be found in the human brain, which can cause death in the person eating the brain.

I'm trying to think of organs in animals we do eat (chicken, cows, etc..) that are not edible....and i can't really ever remember sinking my teeth into a nice bowl of pancreas or spleen...

but i'm still laughing at the idea of DJMD's bowl-shaped steak (uterus)! :laugh:

Gut Shot · Mar 6, 2009

djmd said:
Pancreas along with thymus is what makes up "Sweetbread".
So that is not only non toxic, but according to some people tastes good..
(yes they eat cow pancreas, not human, but still)...

I'm curious if the preparation of sweetbread might ameliorate any inherent toxicity of the pancreas. The mesentery certainly doesn't enjoy leaking pancreatic contents. Then again, depositing a hunk of fresh pancreas in the stomach might be no bother at all.

Pingu · Mar 6, 2009

As for GI tract, if you wash it... ehh you 'could' eat it. If not gross

Menudo and tripe are actually pretty good when correctly prepared.

If someone was trying to eat me, I'd definitely defend myself by saying that I'm old, gamey, and lack marbleing. But other than skin, hair, and bones(not including bone marrow as seen in osso buco), we are probably entirely edible.

yaah · Mar 6, 2009

I wouldn't eat anything with a lot of hair - humans can't really digest hair very well. My evidence for this was the football-sized trichobezoar I once had to "gross in" that a surgeon hacked out of a teenage mental patient's stomach.

horrendoma · Mar 7, 2009

Epic thread. Save this and make this into a sticky.

yaah · Mar 7, 2009

horrendoma said:
Epic thread. Save this and make this into a sticky.

You're just going to have to keep bumping it every month.

schrute · Mar 7, 2009

djmd said:

DocKodak · Mar 7, 2009

Pineal gland can be kind of gritty.

horrendoma · Mar 7, 2009

yaah said:
You're just going to have to keep bumping it every month.

Happily grossing his daily load of inedible organs, horrendoma BUMPS into a topic on SDN dealing with the very same subject. He rejoices. 😀

ForeignBody · Mar 9, 2009

Gut Shot said:
I'm curious if the preparation of sweetbread might ameliorate any inherent toxicity of the pancreas. The mesentery certainly doesn't enjoy leaking pancreatic contents. Then again, depositing a hunk of fresh pancreas in the stomach might be no bother at all.

If you consume a pancreas, the consumed pancreas is going to the exact place where said digestive enzymes would have ended up in the first place. I'm not sure why it would be 'toxic.'

MirkoCrocop · Mar 9, 2009

lol we dont get many funny threads around here.

i wish i had something to add but i just can;t think of anything that would be toxic in and of itself... you will have to make the victim have some kind of condition that makes his organs more dangerous...

Gut Shot · Mar 9, 2009

ForeignBody said:
If you consume a pancreas, the consumed pancreas is going to the exact place where said digestive enzymes would have ended up in the first place. I'm not sure why it would be 'toxic.'

I'm not saying it would be, at least not in the sense of cyanide or the like, I'm just tossing out a few ideas.

Incidentally, I don't think the gastric mucosa much enjoys activated pancreatic enzymes. Just Google "duodenal reflux" and you'll see what I mean.

Matte Kudesai · Mar 9, 2009

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fJTVKTubrt0&feature=related

TMZ2007 · Mar 10, 2009

Might the digestive enzymes in the pancreas be denatured by cooking?
Those crazy folks on that TV show Fear Factor ate boiled horse rectum several years ago.

Lozzer · Mar 11, 2009

Thank you to everyone who has answered my question so far. Hmmm. It's looking like I can't do what I want in the scene. Unless I give him a disease. My other angle was going to be all the toxic chemicals that build up in humans these days, could have been used as a deterrent. You can't eat me my tissues are drenched in over 500 toxins, sort of thing.

I also appreciate the humour. I could write a scene in something else where this topic id discussed and basically lift everything from here and it would be pure gold.

For any of you who live near Liverpool UK. The play will be on 22nd March to 13 June 2009 at The Liverpool Everyman Theatre. It's not about cannibals though. Just wanted to put in a bit where one character threatens to eat another in a a sort of game.

phospho · Mar 11, 2009

what about the liver and vitamin A toxicity?

I remember reading some factoid while i was studying for the MCAT about some indian tribes killing white people by feeding them animal livers. Turns out the tribes were used to the high levels of vitamin A, but the white people weren't - so they died.

Maybe that would also apply to human livers😀

djmd · Mar 12, 2009

phospho said:
what about the liver and vitamin A toxicity?

I remember reading some factoid while i was studying for the MCAT about some indian tribes killing white people by feeding them animal livers. Turns out the tribes were used to the high levels of vitamin A, but the white people weren't - so they died.

Maybe that would also apply to human livers😀

Liver and Onions...

It may not taste good, but it won't kill you.. (at least that what my mom said.. and I am still here..)

Polar bear liver is vitamin A toxic (other bears? I doubt it).

Foie gras anyone?

Ok I found this link (which I can't verify the information in it)
But it list human liver as having 575 IU/gm...
and polar bear liver has having 24,000-35,00 IU/gm (and needing 30-90 gm to be toxic).
So you would have to eat roughly 1830 - 3750 gm to be toxic...
I have seen livers over 1830 gm, but usually due to congestion (which I doubt would raise Vitamin A levels)..
But given the range I would think 1830 gm would be too low to be routinely fatal.

http://prof_anil_aggrawal.tripod.com/poiso032.html (Warning ANNOYING midi sound embedded)

Pingu · Mar 12, 2009

The polar bear liver/Vitamin A toxicity factoid has always amused me. Realistically, how many of us are ever going to encounter anyone who eats polar bears? It's like knowing that the most common species of dog associated with brucella canis is the beagle. Things like this are why I forget people's names.

Inedible Organs

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