Cyborg Cockroach Sparks Ethics Debate

sciencehabit writes "A do-it-yourself neuroscience experiment that allows students to create their own 'cyborg' insects is sparking controversy amongst scienitsts and ethicists. RoboRoach #12 is a real cockroach that a company called BackyardBrains ships to school students. The students fit the insect with a tiny backpack, which contains electrodes that feed into its antennae and receive signals by remote control — via the Bluetooth signals emitted by smartphones. A simple swipe of an iPhone can turn the insect left or right. Though some scientists say the small cyborg is a good educational tool, others say it's turning kids into psychopaths." Fitting the backpack requires poking a hole in the roach's thorax and clipping its antennae to insert electrodes.

Comments

Cockroach rights?

[Ralph Wiggam]

People who have never killed a roach in their life are free to throw the first stone.

Anyone?

Anyone?

Re:Cockroach rights?

[Anonymous Coward]

You don't see a difference between killing it and doing this?

Re:Cockroach rights?

[Anonymous Coward]

Agree. While I doubt this turns kids into psychopaths, I disapprove because it reinforces the notion that every other creature on the planet was put there to be our playthings and slaves.

Re:Cockroach rights?

[unrtst]

You don't see a difference between killing it and doing this?

I first took that to imply that killing it is obviously worse, then read Gort65's reply and realized the anonymous GP was probably implying that zapping the antennae of a roach is worse than smashing it to bits (which, if you have done often, you would know that parts of it keep moving for quite a while unles you keep smashing and grinding all of it).

So, my answer: yes, there is a big difference. IMO, this is more humane than smashing it.
If one were to attempt to stretch this analogy to testing things on animals, especially primates, not only would I find that silly (much too far a stretch), but I would also argue that the same comparison be made: what's worse: smashing a monkey with a large object repeatedly until all bits stop moving, or putting some electrodes on his head?

Please note, I'm not making a right or wrong judgement here, but the first post made a good point.

Re:Cockroach rights?

[s.petry]

You are mentally ill if you believe that torture is the same thing as gathering honey, which requires almost no interaction with the bees and does not cause them any harm.

I'm not a PETA member, and eat meat. I would not eat meat if I found the producer advocating or allowing inhumane treatment however. To believe that you must have one to get the other is idiocy. So I think you are a troll.

Re:Cockroach rights?

[Capsaicin]

This does seem a great deal more educational.

Exactly. This teaches that living creatures, and one would hope by extension other humans, are properly controlled at our whim.

As I'm teaching my boys, the point of life is to get other people to do stuff that is against their interests and in yours. All this talk of dignity, human rights, liberty &c. is, as Nietzsche pointed out, merely the pathetic cry of the weak, whom it is the right of my offspring to manipulate and exploit. I wonder where I can get this for them -given the great educational value.

And they call me a sociopath ...

Re:Cockroach rights?

[K. S. Kyosuke]

So roaches live everywhere on Earth except suburban London? Interesting.

Even cockroaches have standards.

Re:Cockroach rights?

[gsslay]

You've missed the point. No one cares about what's best for the roach. The roach is a insect without much of any brain and no conscious.

What makes it worse is the attitude it fosters within the child.

I'm not convinced it'll turn anyone into a psychopaths, but studies suggest this is how psychopaths start out; torturing insects and small animals. So this is one small step away from pulling wings off bees. Except this has educational approval!

Missing the reality of what kids do to insects

[SuperKendall]

If anyone is worried about these slight actions turning kids into psychopaths, they would be AGHAST at what kids normally do with insects when they catch or find them...

Fire, pliers, rocks, etc. All are involved.

Re:Missing the reality of what kids do to insects

[AlphaWolf_HK]

I remember when I was 5, I used to make paper balloons and stick as many crickets as I could find in them, and then I would set it on fire just to watch the hoppy action.

Re:Missing the reality of what kids do to insects

[artor3]

When I was a little kid and pulled the legs off a daddy longlegs, my scoutmaster told me not to do that, that it was cruel. Now we're encouraging kids to inflict pain on animals for their own amusement. Can you really not see a problem with that?

Re:Missing the reality of what kids do to insects

[artor3]

You scoutmaster was a douche. Did he care to explain why it was cruel? oh right, no.

Are you asking if my scoutmaster gave my ten year old self a lecture on consciousness and solipsism and morality?

Re:Missing the reality of what kids do to insects

[narcc]

Why?

Re:Missing the reality of what kids do to insects

[fuzzyfuzzyfungus]

"I guess they were still afraid of the wasps."

And fair enough: if you think humans are bad, 'parasitoids' are a class of organisms that would leave you crying for mommy. A class of organisms that a fair few wasp species belong to.

Oh how very subtle they are: the ones that parasitize caterpillars inject a venom that includes a specialized virus (found nowhere else but the wasp's oviduct, it's more part of the wasps' DNA than a free-living organism) that suppresses the caterpillar's immune response and increase the protein concentration in the hemolymph, perfect for the larvae.

Or the fascinating ones that prey on cockroaches. Those are too heavy to transport after paralysis, so they have specialized sensory capabilities on the tip of their stinger, ideally suited to locating the part of the cockroach brain to disable in order to halt voluntary movement, while leaving the victim otherwise functional and ready to be steered by its antennae back to the burrow where it will be devoured alive by wasp larvae.

And, finally, the ones that prey on spiders, the hunted become the hunter, using their impressive reflexes and even more impressive venom to paralyze spiders (nonlethally, to preserve freshness) so that their larvae can devour them, leaving the vital organs for last (again, to preserve freshness, the victim must live as long as possible while being eaten alive) and then emerge to hunt spiders for their own young.

Parasitoid wasps are badass motherfuckers. Not quite as badass as Cordyceps fungi (not that I'm biased); but pretty fucking badass.

Re:Missing the reality of what kids do to insects

[Bite The Pillow]

Yes. Roaches have survived billions of years, and would survive the nuclear zombie apocalypse. They have enough survival abilities.

Do you know what happens in nature? Every nasty bit of stuff eats these things, live without anesthetizing them. Sometimes they go down live and just get digested. Nature is cruel. And it hates you, and me, and roaches.

Should we be doing this in schools? That's the question here.

Re:Missing the reality of what kids do to insects

[Any Web Loco]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cruelty_to_animals#Psychological_disorders

Just saying...

Re:Missing the reality of what kids do to insects

[clarkkent09]

We kill 9 billion animals for food each year, in the USA alone. We still somehow manage to remember that killing humans is bad.

Cruel

[Nerdfest]

I completely agree. It's completely unacceptable to force innocent students to used something as restricted and crippled as iOS. For once could someone actually think of the children.

Re:Cruel

[Richy_T]

Forget psychopaths. It might turn them into... hipsters.

Re:Cruel

[fuzzyfuzzyfungus]

I completely agree. It's completely unacceptable to force innocent students to used something as restricted and crippled as iOS. For once could someone actually think of the children.

In version 2, the system will prevent the cockroach from having thoughts that aren't cryptographically signed by Apple. True Facts.

Makes sense

[WGFCrafty]

IPhones have been turning humans into mindless drones for years, now its the insects turn.

Imagine

[Anonymous Coward]

A beowulf cluster of those!

Too buggy

[Anonymous Coward]

I tried the app, but it was too buggy.

Gokiburi Gijinka Manga

[Guppy]

FYI: If you've ever doubted the ability of Japanese manga artists to make anything cute, take a look at Gokiburi Gijinka, which features the adventures of adorable little Gokicha-chan and her misunderstood struggle to make friends with humans -- who for some inexplicable reason she can't understand -- keep trying to squash her.

No way, totally wrong

[russotto]

It's not ethical to force an animal to move left and right by attaching electrodes to its head. Not at all. The ethical way is to put a metal bar in its mouth and pull on THAT to force it to move left and right.
 

Re:I certainly hope those protesting are vegetaria

[narcc]

Killing a pig or a cow to eat is very different from killing a pig or cow for pleasure -- and very different from mutilating them while they're alive for our amusement.

Re:What does this have to do with science?

[bitt3n]

What's the point of dissecting a frog? We already know what's in the frog. We're not going to find anything new. It just seems like you cut the frog open and look at the organs. What is to be learned from going through the motions?

Re:I certainly hope those protesting are vegetaria

[fuzzyfuzzyfungus]

I have a totally ethically consistent 'only torture delicious animals' policy in place!

Not killing is not the same as killing

[gnoshi]

First, because it should be obvious - doing something to an animal without killing it is not the same as killing it. For example, shooting a rabbit and thus killing it is not the same as breaking its legs kicking it around a football field. Thus, it could be argued that punching a hole in a cockroach thorax and clipping the antennae is not the same as stomping on the roach. So we should probably write off the "if you've ever killed or would ever kill a cockroach, then you have must accept this as ethical" arguments.
Second, just because kids burn ants with a magnifying glass doesn't mean we should be encouraging kids to burn ants with a magnifying glass. As artor3 posted in a previous comment:

When I was a little kid and pulled the legs off a daddy longlegs, my scoutmaster told me not to do that, that it was cruel. Now we're encouraging kids to inflict pain on animals for their own amusement. Can you really not see a problem with that?

That isn't to say that installing this on a cockroach is equivalent to burning ants; simply that just because children do do something doesn't mean they should be encouraged to do it.

Even if people do conclude this is ethical - and I'm not saying it is or is not - then the subsequent question is how you ensure children understand that while cutting half off the antennae of a cockroach is ethically acceptable, cutting half off the ears of a mouse is not. That is, assuming we consider that unethical.
There is also the question of when it becomes unethical, in terms of animals used. It wouldn't be too challenging to build a kit to allow mid-teenagers to install a similar device in a mouse (assuming they had a steady hand), including sterile implements and gloves, adhesive, etc. Would that be ethically acceptable?

Humans attack humans

[gd2shoe]

Because when a cat is "playing" with something smaller than itself, it's typically a bird, mouse, lizard, or small bug, etc. When a human adult is torturing something smaller than himself, it's often another human.

The leap from cockroach vivisection to psychopathy is a bit of a leap, but there kids out there that already lean that direction. It isn't a matter of whether we are going to encourage the average child to be a psychopath (a ridiculous notion), or be a bit more callous (perhaps worth discussing). But could this be a tiny step toward psychopathy for someone already headed in that direction? Probably.