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Human Mini-Brains Growing Inside Rat Bodies Are Starting To Integrate (inverse.com)
At the annual meeting of the Society for Neuroscience starting November 11 in Washington D.C., two teams of scientists plan to present previously unpublished research on the unexpected interaction between human mini-brains and their rat and mouse hosts. "In the new papers, according to STAT, scientists will report that the organoids survived for extended periods of time -- two months in one case -- and even connected to lab animals' circulatory and nervous systems, transferring blood and nerve signals between the host animal and the implanted human cells," reports Inverse. "This is an unprecedented advancement for mini-brain research." From the report: That mini-brains can even be grown in the lab is a huge advancement in the first place, as they have many of the same characteristics as living human brains that are in the early stages of development. Though they're not "alive" in the same sense that you and I are, they grow and are organized into different layers like our brains are. They even react in similar ways to stimuli like psychedelic drugs. Organoids are poised to revolutionize research on the human brain since scientists can perform tests on them that would be unethical to attempt on living humans. STAT also reports that a third lab, in addition to the two presenting at the Society for Neuroscience meeting, has successfully connected human brain organoids to blood vessels. This attempt veered into such challenging ethical territory, though, that the lab reportedly paused its efforts.
Ethical is informing someone of the risks, not misrepresent anything for the purpose of obtaining consent.
Moral is can't do it at all because of some taboo.
Mini brains in mice are a clever workaround. As long as we can pretrnd its like growing vegetables, its ok.
Scientists should be careful to ensure they can't communicate meaningfully with these minibrains, because the instant one of those things signals that it's hurting or wants the pain to stop, the ethics and morals will apply again and we will be having strange discussions about whether those mini brains come with souls or not.
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You are welcome on my lawn.
Pinky: Gee, Brain, what do you want to do tonight?
Brain: The same thing we do every night, Pinky - try to take over the world!
If it sounds like the intro to a horror movie / game, maybe you should think twice about proceeding....
That might have to do with who you hang out with and where you live.
I have found that the smartest Republicans are at least as smart as the smartest Democrats. And I have found that both Democrats and Republicans lie about the same.
But I have also found that the smarter the Republican is, the more likely he is to lie to the public and tell the truth to his allies, while the smarter the Democrat is, the more likely he is to lie to his allies and tell the truth to the public.
Personally, I would rather have someone lie to their ally and tell the public the truth.
excitingthingstodo.blogspot.com
Welcome our new hyper-intelligent pan-dimensional overlords.
Some days I get the sinking feeling Orwell was an optimist.
Please tell me one of the rats was named Nicodemus.
Corruption is convincing someone that the selfless ideal is the same as their selfish ideal.
All humans are swayed by illogical things. Though you can mitigate it, there's nothing you can do to prevent it.
Though they're not "alive" in the same sense that you and I are, they grow and are organized into different layers like our brains are. They even react in similar ways to stimuli like psychedelic drugs.
Who's to say what they experience or feel? That they're not alive? Seems to me they're making them as close to a live brain as possible, so...
This is horrifying. How could you go home and sleep at night after working on something like this?
Growing extra organs in or on animals is already pretty grotesque, but at least that has obvious and practical applications. But this? This is some shit, man...
Any brain can integrate; wake me up when they can find derivatives.
Why don't you guys have friends or journals?
And when the Internet is invented, I think it will be really cool if people on it misquote me.
-- Abraham Lincoln
This space unintentionally left blank.
The typical Political archetypes are psychopaths as the leaders with narcissists as the minions, willing to do anything for anyone for empty compliments about how great they are
For what we can see politics has become so dis-functional with the identity game that it is precisely what attracts psychopaths and narcissists. The image of competence. Meanwhile, the competent are subject to all of the games psychopaths and narcissists play, manipulating people.
Your example of Tesla and Edison is a good one, especially considering that when Einstein was asked, What's it like to be the smartest man in the world? he replied: "I don't know, you would have to ask Nicola Tesla." It's a good example of what this sickness costs our species.
I'm only pointing it out because I think that sickness overshadows politics and we have to fix politics to prevent psychopaths spreading their corruption throughout our society.
My ism, it's full of beliefs.
Current societal evolution does not favor kind, intelligent, thoughtful, passionate, respectful, people. The best we can hope for is that it never selects AGAINST these traits.
"Human Mini-Brains Growing Inside Rat Bodies Are Starting To Integrate"
Big deal. So they've invented vat-grown lawyers.
I've calculated my velocity with such exquisite precision that I have no idea where I am.
I do love how the author comes up with a lovely name like "mini brains" for something that can be compared to Frankenstein.
When you have to choose between two people trying to ruin your life, and one of em is very smart and talented and the other is a complete dumbass, i don't think you would choose the more capable one.
If you grew a brain twice as large as a persons brain would it be twice as intelligent?
Very serious answer :
size plays some role, but only in relation of other metrics.
- You need to compare the ratio between the size of the brain and the overall size of the body that said brain needs to control.
The more body you need to control, the more primary motor and sensory zone you need inside the brain to control it.
i.e.: the more you needs cells in the brain whose primary role is to be connected to part of the body.
A human has a brain of around a kilogram. An elephant's is a bit under 5kg, a whale is a bit 8 kg.
That doesn't mean that whales laugh at our "inability to come with a good theory of everything and struggle with string theory instead". It's just that whales have a lot more "whale" to move around and thus need the corresponding brain parts to control it.
- You need to compare the amount of neurons (the actual brain cells doing the work) to the amount of other cells (the support cells that help the whole thing work out). (It's an approximation but you got the thing).
Part of the reason why dolphins aren't winning Nobel prizes yet (apart from obvious specie-ism) is also because they have brain better adapted to their harsh environment (cold seas). Part of their brain size isn't due to neurons working to make them intelligent, but to all the other support cells making sure that the brain keeps working without any problem under circumstances where a human would have been frozen.
- You need to have a look at the brain surface. The more intelligent species (great apes, cetaceans, etc.) have found way to cram more brain power in tighter volumes by wrinkling and crumbling the surface : we tend to have deeper sulci.
"Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]
Nice word vomit. Did a fake research paper alogrithm write that for you?
Translation: I disagree with you but I can't be arsed to respond to your points so I'll throw out a general insult instead.
To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it
Or, perhaps instead you could give yourself an actual second brain down there. Then you can safely use the phrase "don't blame me, it has a mind of its own."
The horror movie script just writes itself, doesn't it?
Comforting: one lab paused it's efforts because someone somewhere raised ethical challenges. Excellent as it indicates someone is giving some thought to what is going on.
Discomforting: these things aren't 'alive' in the same sense as you and I so they can be experimented upon in ways that would be deemed unethical. Chilling that someone somewhere sees this as a loophole.
One of the most frightening developments to appear in /. in a while.
"Consensus" in science is _always_ a political construct.
They are integrating human brains in rats, but we should be scared of AI?
However, there is no denying there is *some* moral/ethical issue at play here, whether one likes it or not. I note you like C.Sagan's works too, so I'll go easy and not evoke the Nazis, but...
At some point, you do have ethical issues. You bring up alternatives like 'higher cephalic animals', but surely you're aware there already is an ethical/moral issue there as well? One can say: it's too small to be of any importance. But how small is too small? When does it become an issue? I'd like to note that there are handicapped people with severe (genetic) braindistortions - for instance, lacking the higher brains. They can never get the higher functions of a normal brain, and are bound to live a life that is in essence not much more than of a animal - less than of an ape, in fact.
So... is it now ok to experiment on such handicapped people? After all, they don't have most of the brainparts we have (theyre actually missing), and lack the capacity to think.
No bigger than an insect-brain, you say... Is that an objective measurement from when it does or doesn't become an ethical issue? What about if it was as big as a walnut? As big as the brain of a raven, one of the smartest birds around? As big as an orange? As big as the part that is left to the severally brain-handicapped people I spoke off?
Surely, you must see that there is not a defining border or limit to it. So, what it comes down to, is you - subjectively - finding no issue with it, because of it's size and lack of fully functional abilities like our brain. Another might find it's still no issue if it's as big as an orange. Or as big as a newborns'. Or as big as a toddlers'. Etc. and some might feel there is already an ethical issue when it's as big as an insects'.
Point is, if you can't set objective criteria for when it is and isn't (or shouldn't) be considered an ethical issue, you can't fault anyone for finding an issue with it - not even on logical arguments. Because your own defining criteria isn't inherently logical (being of a given, arbitrary size), unless one wants to argue that there is no issue with it until it has the size of a fully grown adult. But I think you'd left most people behind with that moral stance, by then.
I'm not saying I agree or disagree with you that testing this is a good or bad thing. I'm just acknowledging some people might have moral issues with it, and they might be valid. There is actual reason why one might see this being a moral/ethical issue; since your or mine (or doctor Mengele's ;-p) criteria for what constitutes a moral/ethical dilemma isn't the same. Unless you come up with clearly defined, objective criteria that define when there's a moral/ethical issue and when not, I don't think you can claim another's' ethical dilemma is wrong, per sé. Having a 'certain', arbitrary chosen size isn't a good criterion in this regard.
--- "To pee or not to pee, that is the question." ---
Are you sure about your IQ? Because you might want to get refund on the test.
You have to admit, he made the perfect example of the Dunning-Kruger effect
The shepherds did so well protecting the flock that the sheep no longer believed that wolves existed.
Funny you should mention that; as someone with too high of an IQ to be swayed by ideological (as opposed to logical) arguments, I've found that smartest Republicans I've never met tend to be measurably more intelligent than the smartest Democrats (of course, they're still all idiots to me).
Liberals and Conservatives are both equally likely to reject science when it doesn't fit with their ideals;
http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/1948550617731500
As a wildly reviled pragmatist, I can NetCraft level confirm that.
I would add however, that the liberal version of science denial provably pales in comparison to the crypto-conservative version.
But as a non-idealist, I'm willing to accept what science tells me. Whatever I "believe" or not "believe" is based on my support or lack of for various theories or hypotheses.
The shepherds did so well protecting the flock that the sheep no longer believed that wolves existed.
Seriously, the title is from the dystopianest of dystopias. I am sure it's much mlless sinister than this.
I do not believe in karma. "Funny"=-6. Do good and forbid evil. Yours, Oft-Offtopic Flamebaiting Troll.