Yes, SAR is an educated guess. Much better with modeling than in shulgins days, but still a guess. And adders document is fiction.
Parke Davis chose n-methyl for a reason. There was a guy at the hive with a bunch of the old documents, most just documenting chemical characteristics, but some with animal study info. Those fuckers ran through hundreds if not thousands of variations of the arylcyclohexylamine skeleton. My how I wish I could find him now. That was fascinating stuff, and back when other skeletons held my attention more, and I was still working.
Last I checked there was one commercial producer of pharmaceutical (in vials) of S-ketamine. And they charge royally for it, due to the extra work involved. And like Sekio said, the R is likely deaminated/aminated/ separated ad infinitum. I have never bought into the hullabaloo of vials with varying ratios of S-R. I don't know why pharmaceutical preparations of ketamine in vials vary like they do. I've tried literally dozens and dozens of preparations of such around the world, and some do seem quite different, maybe eye of beholder, maybe shit quality control, and maybe adulterants like xylazine, etc. Who knows. But I doubt it is the ratio of isomers, just doesn't make sense for several reasons. Powder ketamine, all bets are off.
First time I tried S-ketamine I ordered it from SA or Acros, and the had a bright red "NEW!" star next to it. Hahaha. Never tried R- ketamine.
Okay, way off topic
Oh and yes chirality in perfumery is fascinating stuff. . .