A closer look
Lazzaro Spallanzani spent the 1770s casually electrocuting himself with torpedo fish to see how bioelectricity worked. While most people avoid creatures that can jump-start a heart, Spallanzani dissected them alive, noting that the shock only happened when the fish's brain was connected to its electric organs. He essentially mapped the neurological basis of animal electricity by letting wet, angry sea pancakes zap him repeatedly, entirely for the sake of an academic flex against his rivals.
