How To Grow a Head

Taco Cowboy writes "British scientists have found a mechanism within our gene sequence that allows the growing of a new head — with brains, etc. The gene is tentatively known as smed-prep, and the information contained in smed-prep also makes the new cells appear in the right place and organise themselves into working structures."

Comments

And for further reading

[kenp2002]

Science always advances faster then the moral and ethics of the society.

Science Fiction tends to serve as the cursory warning of the abuses of science. Please reply with suggetsions on reading that our fellow scientists should watch when they are not busy playing God (in the figurative sense.)

The Island comes to mind but even comic books like the Micronauts foretold the warnings of Body Bank abuses. The Repo Men is a recent film that from what I can gather might also make for a good reading.

Oh how I wish that science would first think:
"Ok if this works what are the ethics" rather then "do it first, then we'll worry about the ethics later."

I'm all for science, I just have the crippling burden of being a history buff, knowing how often science gives birth to atrocities. Comparing post-1600s science has made religion look tame.

Re:And for further reading

[drinkypoo]

Oh how I wish that science would first think:
"Ok if this works what are the ethics" rather then "do it first, then we'll worry about the ethics later."

Science doesn't think anything. It's a process. Plenty of scientists can be assumed to have chosen morality over science. You don't hear about them because they didn't do anything. All scientific progress can be put to ends both good and ill, there is therefore nothing ethical or unethical about science fact, only the actions of men.

Re:And for further reading

[nohelix]

This is very true. Just look at Nobel [Wikipedia]. When designed nitroglycerin, he was trying to make a safer explosive for miners. Instead he made a tool of war and was horrified by it. It was not his morality nor his invention that was flawed. It was the people who used it. I would think by now that our society had moved past the base point of science is evil and technology is amoral. That cell phone in your pocket could be used to make a bomb threat or call an ambulance for the guy having a heart attack. As for this research, it is quite a ways off from any useful/practical applications. But people hope that when it does come to fruition, it will be for things first like severe brain damage cause by an accident, a blood clot or other damage. And while yes, planarians have a cephalic ganglia (brain) and a complex nervous system for being a simple invertebrate, it is vastly less complex than even a mouse brain. As a case in point, their "eyes" are a photoreceptor not a lens, so while they can see and react to light, they do not have the capability to distinguish shapes. Disclaimer: I work in a research lab that uses S. mediterranea, the flatworm used in this paper.

Is it just me or....

[ProppaT]

Is it just me or is this the last body part we should actually care about regenerating? Once my brain is gone, I couldn't care less if you regenerated it for me to start over with a fresh, empty brain or not. I'd rather them find a way to regenerate my body on my existing head, thank you very much.

Re:Okay, that's it...

[Aceticon]

Only it's not a copy. It's your real head. You're the copy.

Re:Oh Sure

[FatdogHaiku]

Where's your head at?

And that's the key! If we can get these things to grow near the groin and with the proper orientation they could be really popular...

Re:getting ahead of myself

[Kirin Fenrir]

Basically the questions concern privacy (as individuals they have very little) and morality (do we want two men sharing them, or do we want them sharing one man).

It doesn't matter what we want. Only what they want. Society needs to stay out of the personal lives of consenting adults.