Animal Experimentation

From a Science News piece on the anti-depressant properties of ketamine:

Mice receiving a single injection of ketamine showed fewer signs of depression just half an hour after the shot, and they continued to show multiple signs of reduced depression for a week, researchers at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center at Dallas found. For example, after one dose of ketamine, mice struggled longer to stay afloat in a beaker of water instead of giving up and sinking.

I now propose what we might call the Drowning Mouse Scale of depression, in which your degree of misery is measured by how long you would struggle to stay afloat before you give up and sink. Any number above 30 minutes would be considered normal. An ordinary bad day might come in at 20 minutes, a moderate depression at 10, and anything under 5 would be suicidal.