5 ms·
From the article: > The brains are already almost devoid of the coordinated neural firing necessary even for minimal consciousness, says Brendan Parent, a bioe
by garethsprice 5mo ago
From the article:
> The brains are already almost devoid of the coordinated neural firing necessary even for minimal consciousness, says Brendan Parent, a bioethicist at New York University Langone Health and one of six ethicists on Bexorg’s advisory board. But the company also forestalls any electrical activity with the anesthetic propofol, among other measures.
- 1234letshaveatw 5mo agoI could've done without reading the word almost
- hypfer 5mo ago[flagged]
- wewtyflakes 5mo ago> I think it is safe to say that those brains are having a blast How could you possibly say that? You are positing that the brains are both conscious and happy. Both of those are leaps. > It just invokes a strong emotional response because it's so "abnormal" You are making an assumption about why people find this horrifying, and the assumption you made was uncharitable. > OTOH, this is HN, I guess. Having empathy for real people would be harmful to the business model of most people's employers. I do not see how people on HN being horrified by human brain experiments means they do not have empathy.
- pavel_lishin 5mo agoThat's before they apply the anaesthetic.
- deleted 5mo ago[deleted]
- Barbing 5mo agoI recognized that anesthetic from its famous irresponsible use- "Attention to the risks of off-label use of propofol increased in August 2009, after the release of the Los Angeles County coroner's report that musician Michael Jackson was killed by a mixture of propofol and the benzodiazepine drugs lorazepam, midazolam, and diazepam on 25 June 2009." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Propofol https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Propofol Used properly, however: "To induce general anesthesia, propofol is the drug used almost exclusively, having largely replaced sodium thiopental."
- stavros 5mo agoApparently MJ was taking propofol to sleep, which another commenter said was akin to "getting a haircut by undergoing chemo".
- hungryhobbit 5mo agoBetween what he did to children, and what his parents did to him, it's hard to really blame the guy for having extreme sleep problems though.
- applfanboysbgon 5mo ago> what he did to children The media and the people who bought into their shameless attention-grabbing lies are the reason he had sleep problems. He was unanimously acquitted of all counts, but the media made his life into a living hell by consistently portraying him as a pedophile because it drove incredible engagement numbers. A justice system should be "innocent until proven guilty", and yet MJ was deemed guilty even after proven innocent. Longform read from an actually good journalist, if you care to learn for yourself: https://www.huffpost.com/entry/one-of-the-most-shameful_b_610258 https://www.huffpost.com/entry/one-of-the-most-shameful_b_61...
- iwontberude 5mo agoI mean, he may have never done a sexual thing but his pedophilia was quite obvious and the degeneracy of parents to allow their children to spend the night in the bed of a grown man is not really good for society.
- raffael_de 5mo agooh, look, seems like we found the guy who can define what consciousness is! and not just that ... he even knows the lower boundary of it, too.
- trklausss 5mo agoI think there is worlds between definitely defining what consciousness is, and what are some of the scenarios and conditions under which consciousness cannot ever happen. And on top of that, they put a sedative, just in case.
- raffael_de 5mo agomy comment was meant a little bit humorous.
- joegibbs 5mo agoI don't trust them to always give the brain propofol. The subject has no way of reacting because they have no body, so what are they going to do?
- BalinKing 5mo agoTowards the end of the article: "the company plans to eventually remove the anesthesia from some brain slices" Here's hoping the idea is that the slices will be really small, or something, because frankly the whole thing is utterly horrifying enough as-is.