Pig Brains Brought Back to Life in Experiment

[Mysterion]

Article here: https://www.yahoo.com/news/pig-brai...rs-death-disturbing-experiment-185220323.html

Hmmm.... some disturbing implications here if the science of this is refined and expanded.

What happens when someone's brain is reanimated? If a personality is retained, what kind of live is possible for this being? Since the donor of the brain was dead, what rights does the reanimated brain have? Is reanimated brain sans body still a person? Who decides? What if the brain didn't want to be revived? Does the brain have a choice?

 

[Asbo Zaprudder]

Turn them into a cyborg policeman? The Major, Murphy...

This must already have been discussed by at least one ethical philosopher since the time of Mary Shelley. I might have look into that.

A brain without external sensors or actuators is helpless to protest its treatment whatever its internal mental state. It has to depend on the kindness of strangers.

A more modern SF TV treatment of the brain in a box scenario would be Dennis Potter's Cold Lazarus, although more accurately, that depicts a head in a box. The series is set a few hundred years in the future but our technology is catching up remarkably quickly. Unfortunately, the series hardly ever gets reshown nowadays. I won't spoil the ending.

 

[Verteron]

This story has been sensationalised by the media a little bit. While they were able to reanimate the cells, the brain showed no coordinated electrical activity that indicates higher level processing or conscious thought.

When a brain dies, within minutes, the axonal connections between neurons shrivel and the gaps become too wide for electrical signals to cross. So there's literally no chance this pig had any awareness of any kind, everything that made it a conscious intelligent orgasm was long gone by the time they tried this stuff.

So you probably don't need to worry about waking up as a disembodied brain inside a bell jar.

Probably.

 

[FreddyE]

When a brain dies, within minutes, the axonal connections between neurons shrivel and the gaps become too wide for electrical signals to cross..

What if those gaps where filled up somehow so that the signals could cross again?

 

[Verteron]

What if those gaps where filled up somehow so that the signals could cross again?

I suppose so, but that is the realm of science fantasy for now. Perhaps you could do it with nanobots or something. However, could take centuries before that's realistic.

 

[FreddyE]

I suppose so, but that is the realm of science fantasy for now. Perhaps you could do it with nanobots or something. However, could take centuries before that's realistic.

I was thinking into another direction. Something similar like myelin or a type of protein. You would need something you could use as a "transporter" though to find the gaps and put it there. I´m thinking gentically engineered t-cells or a virus or something similar?

 

[Verteron]

I was thinking into another direction. Something similar like myelin or a type of protein. You would need something you could use as a "transporter" though to find the gaps and put it there. I´m thinking gentically engineered t-cells or a virus or something similar?

Waaaay beyond my ability to realistically speculate!