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I'm a bit of an opposite opinion, in that the difficult ethics questions were with genetics and not necessarily much different with the brain per se. Henrietta

I'm a bit of an opposite opinion, in that the difficult ethics questions were with genetics and not necessarily much different with the brain per se. Henrietta's immortal cancer cells were necessary in a large number of modern medicines, including the testing of the mRNA vaccines (one of the cheapest ways to test for human compatibility is to use isolated human cells for tests). I don't see the brain as any more special of an organ than Henrietta's cells. I wouldn't call it a dystopian future: this is much preferred over say, Nazi experiments. But we as a society should strive for better ethics. Maybe not necessarily banning Henrietta cells, but maybe at least paying her family a bit more of the royalties? HeLa cells are really, really important test subjects after all. ------ The real world certainly has different moral questions. Fiction can be used to think about imaginary problems and maybe even provide the discussion material for some real world examples. But we must always ground ourselves back in reality as we make arguments. Lest we become like Don Quixote. (See what I did there? Lol)

edgyquant 5y ago
The only thing I can consider unethical about it, assuming you didn’t just steal a working brain and “imprison” it or something, is that you’re kind of right. What makes us human is more than just our brain but most of what makes up our consciousness (not the subconsciousness) is in the brain itself. So it sounds to me like giving birth to a total vegetable on purpose and not caring what the suffering of the internal brain is. Obviously it wouldn’t be this simple (probably) as the conscience depends on the body and it’s motor functions and outputs as a part of its subconscious. You’d replace those with whatever the wires were connected to and hope you were talking to the brain the way you thought. But assuming we could hand wave that it sounds like an ethical debate that could both be had at some point and allow me to sit out of. Then again when I tried college ethics is the one class I dropped. I like to build things and be able to base them on things it’s possible to infer. Ill leave the ultra nuanced philosophy of what people should do in situations when there are no true answers up to better people than me.

edgyquant 5y ago

The only thing I can consider unethical about it, assuming you didn’t just steal a working brain and “imprison” it or something, is that you’re kind of right. What makes us human is more than just our brain but most of what makes up our consciousness (not the subconsciousness) is in the brain itself. So it sounds to me like giving birth to a total vegetable on purpose and not caring what the suffering of the internal brain is. Obviously it wouldn’t be this simple (probably) as the conscience depends on the body and it’s motor functions and outputs as a part of its subconscious. You’d replace those with whatever the wires were connected to and hope you were talking to the brain the way you thought. But assuming we could hand wave that it sounds like an ethical debate that could both be had at some point and allow me to sit out of. Then again when I tried college ethics is the one class I dropped. I like to build things and be able to base them on things it’s possible to infer. Ill leave the ultra nuanced philosophy of what people should do in situations when there are no true answers up to better people than me.