
Pig brains partially revived four hours after death - sjcsjc
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-47960874
======
fmihaila
This is from the Nature article on the same subject [1]:

> _[...] Nevertheless, the development of technology with the potential to
> support sentient, disembodied organs has broad ethical implications for the
> welfare of animals and people. “There isn’t really an oversight mechanism in
> place for worrying about the possible ethical consequences of creating
> consciousness in something that isn’t a living animal,” says Stephen Latham,
> a bioethicist at Yale who worked with Sestan’s team. He says that doing so
> might be ethically justifiable in some cases — for instance, if it enable
> scientists to test drugs for degenerative brain diseases on the organs,
> rather than people.

Gauging awareness in a brain outside a body would probably be difficult, given
that the organ’s surroundings would differ so radically from its natural
environment. “We could imagine that brain could be capable of consciousness,”
says George Mashour, a neuroscientist at the University of Michigan in Ann
Arbor who studies near-death experiences. “But it’s very interesting to think
about what kind of consciousness, in the absence of organs and peripheral
stimulation. [...]”_

It's also 'very interesting to think' how many more dimensions this could add
to torture. This is the end of the article:

> _[...] In the meantime, scientists and governments are left to confront the
> legal and ethical quandaries related to the possibility of creating a
> conscious brain without a body. “This really is a no-man’s land,” says Koch.
> “The law will probably have to evolve to keep up.”

Koch wants a broader ethical discussion to take place before any researcher
tries to induce awareness in a disembodied brain. “It is a big, big step,” he
says. “And once we do it, it’s impossible to reverse it.”_

Sobering.

[1]
[https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-019-01216-4](https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-019-01216-4)

------
equalunique
>a specially designed liquid round the brain, which contained a synthetic
blood to carry oxygen and drugs to slow or reverse the death of brain cells.

I had no idea humanity achieved synthetic blood. This is from the study:

>a haemoglobin-based, acellular, non-coagulative, echogenic, and
cytoprotective perfusate that promotes recovery from anoxia

Am I the only one excited by what viable synthetic blood might mean for blood
banks?

Study is here:
[https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-019-1099-1](https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-019-1099-1)

~~~
dguest
Don't get your hopes up. I worked in a neurology lab where they used something
similar years ago. You could keep a pig / rat brain running for a few hours
like this, but it would start to fall apart in other ways pretty fast.

~~~
sebazzz
Is this study then representative with this synthetic blood?

------
nabla9
Imagine donating your body to science and then waking up in a lab as a brain
in a vat.

"A Living Soul" by P. C. Jersild is amazing sci-fi book exploring this.
[https://www.amazon.com/Living-Norvik-Press-English-
Swedish/d...](https://www.amazon.com/Living-Norvik-Press-English-
Swedish/dp/1870041097/)

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/P._C._Jersild](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/P._C._Jersild)

~~~
saulrh
It'd actually be fantastic. If I've donated my brain to anything like the
modern research apparatus, I can be relatively sure of one of two
possibilities: Either my brain was chosen as a test, in which case the project
is on the news literally worldwide and the ethics have had the crap argued out
of them and I can be sure that any limitations of the environment are due to
technological shortcomings and I get to participate in fixing it, or I'm part
of a follow-up trial or large-scale roll-out, in which case they'll have fixed
up the rest of the issues. In the first case I get to be a grad student again,
albeit with a bit of a disability. In the second case, I'm catching a rez from
a reasonably reliable medical procedure and the major issues have already been
worked out. In both cases I'm no longer dead, and these scenarios are nowhere
near having enough downsides to outweigh that.

~~~
jhomedall
Option 3: the experience of being disconnected from your body is so
distressing that you can do nothing but attempt (and fail) to scream. The
scientists have no idea you are in distress. This goes on for months or years.
By the time technology develops to a point where they can communicate with
you, you are irreparably broken.

~~~
Darkphibre
Couldn't they monitor brain activity for common pain modalities?

~~~
SkyBelow
They currently ignore them. Not talking fantasy.

When beating heart corpses (technically brain dead but body is alive) have
their organs removed, in some cases the bodies go through symptoms of a live
human being killed by vivisection. These are generally ignored.

Let's hope our understanding of brain death is fully and completely correct.

~~~
DoreenMichele
Years ago, I saw a TV interview of the first recipient of a heart-lung
transplant.

When asked some question post surgery, she blurted "I could really use a
beer!" She didn't drink, but the young male donor of her organs who died in a
motorcycle crash did.

She wrote a book about her experience. Initially, she had bizarre dreams, as
if tapping into the psyche of her organ donor. Over time, those stopped.

Mention of this tends to not go over well on HN, though it would be easy
enough to google who got the first heart-lung transplant, find her book and
read it to confirm if I'm making this up or misremembering it or if it's a
true story (at least insofar as me remembering that she claimed such things).

~~~
ben_w
Given how much my personality shifts from relatively minor things like
switching between high/low carb diets, or medium things like whatever was in
my drip when I went under general anaesthetic, I totally believe that her
personality was changed by having a transplant, or separately by her anti-
rejection meds.

I’d be surprised if most such changes have statistically strong correlation
with organ donor personalities.

~~~
DoreenMichele
_I totally believe that her personality was changed by having a transplant, or
separately by her anti-rejection meds._

Thanks.

 _I’d be surprised if most such changes have statistically strong correlation
with organ donor personalities._

So would I.

I'm not talking about _most such changes_ or statistical significance. I'm
talking about one specific case that was unusually well documented and highly
scrutinized that potentially supports the idea that "souls" \-- or something
we might describe with that word -- might actually be real.

A high percentage of people go to church or otherwise have some kind of
spiritual belief. But some kind of scientific affirmation that this isn't
simply adult thumb sucking and there may be something to it seems pretty
uncommon.

I found her story interesting from that angle.

But, I mean, if your mind is made up that souls are nonsense, then you are
probably not the target audience for my comment.

~~~
dragonwriter
Personality transfer by transfer of parts of the body other than the brain,
even if it was clear from h evidence, isn't scientific affirmation of the
soul, it's scientific reinforcement that the “self” is contained in the body
not some separate soul. It contradicts the understanding that the seat of the
self in the body is solely and exclusively the brain, but that doesn't support
the idea of the soul.

~~~
DoreenMichele
Not enough qualifiers for you? Putting _souls_ in quotation marks and adding
_or something we might describe with that word_ wasn't adequate?

~~~
ben_w
I’m going to have to say “no”; the word comes with a lot of cultural baggage,
and it’s not clear what you might mean by “something we might describe with
that word” if not Cartesian dualism — not because there are no possibilities,
just because those alternatives are not well known.

~~~
DoreenMichele
I'm aware it comes with baggage. That's why I made an effort to qualify it.

I don't personally think it's hugely important whether one prefers the framing
of _self_ over _soul._ The woman told a tale that credibly suggested she got
something of his consciousness in the exchange, not just his physical organs.

I realize it matters a whole lot to most people which framing gets used.
Again, this is why I did my best to qualify it.

~~~
dragonwriter
> I don't personally think it's hugely important whether one prefers the
> framing of _self_ over _soul_.

The existence of the _self_ , and it being seated in physical organs, is
noncontroversial, and in no way particular associated with the spiritual
belief of people who go to church. The idea that the self is seated somewhere
distinct from the body—the _soul_ —is. So, I think that the “framing” is quite
relevant to the connections you tried to draw upthread.

Which isn't to say it's not an interesting anecdote (though, on its own, of
very little probative value) either way.

~~~
DoreenMichele
I was replying to a comment that ended with "Let's hope our understanding of
brain death is fully and completely correct."

It seemed pertinent to that line of thinking.

There's a fairly rich history of Western Christians who were serious
scientists and also sincere believers in God who argued that belief is a
matter of faith, God is not provable and there is zero contradiction between
being both a Christian and a scientist.

I don't have some personal need to relitigate that point. I'm very aware that
some people frame things in terms of religion and some don't.

I don't personally feel it is critically important to pick a camp in order to
see the story this woman told as intriguing and potentially casting light upon
or at least calling into question some of our current framing concerning brain
death being the single most important detail.

I know it's a touchy subject for most people. Whether they believe in a soul
and a religious/spiritual framing or not, they tend to feel strongly that the
other camp is in the wrong and that this is a really big deal.

I generally agree with the conclusion that "being a believer" is a matter of
faith. Some people believe. Some don't.

I believe in souls and reincarnation and so forth. My ex did not. Everyone
swore that a marriage could not work if you didn't have the same belief system
in that regard.

We both believed in the American Constitutional right of freedom to believe as
you saw fit. It was the only thing we didn't fight about in two decades of non
stop arguing.

Having different points of view in this matter had no bearing on the decision
to divorce.

------
Wowfunhappy
Throwing it out there—when I'm dead, you are _totally_ allowed to resuscitate
my brain. Better than being dead.

Please make sure I am supplied with some good books to read, if at all
possible.

~~~
xfitm3
I can't relate to this at all. When I'm dead, I'd like to cease. I have no
desire for my brain to outlast my body.

~~~
dpcx
Will you know you're dead though? If they have the technology to bring your
brain back, they probably have the technology to make your brain think you're
still in your body and you woke up.

~~~
xfitm3
I'm alive now and my wishes are to not experience this.

~~~
badger_bravo
Are you though?

------
rixed
Immediately reminded me of that unforgettable movie in which a 1WW soldier who
have lost all his sensory inputs and motor control and is still alive brain is
used for experiments.

Movie title is "Johnny got his gun". No idea how mainstream it is but i
suspect not that much.

If you believe nothing could be worse than death, you should consider to watch
it.

~~~
kstrauser
It was relatively unknown until Metallica based a popular song and video on
it.

~~~
rossdavidh
Perhaps, but we read it in my high school English class, in a small midwestern
town in the 1980's, so it wasn't _that_ obscure.

------
Balgair
What am I missing here?

Rodent studies routinely use whole brain and slice tissues for long term
neuro-experimentation [0]. You can keep slices alive for days on end, if
you're careful [1]. Is it just that it's a whole pig brain that they used
these tried and true techniques with? Ischemia isn't something to laugh at,
it's very tough to deal with. But the 'ethical' issues have long been put to
bed, we've been doing this since 1951 [2]

[0]
[https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/28744893](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/28744893)

[1]
[https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/9914290](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/9914290)

[2] McIlwain, H., Buchel, L. & Cheshire, J. D. The inorganic phosphate and
phosphocreatine of Brain especially during metabolism in vitro. Biochem. J.
48, 12–20 (1951).

------
byteface
Anyone here considered cryo? the only thing putting me off is being trapped in
an infinite torture with some bitter robot overlord. The good thing about
death is just that. No one can suffer infinitely. We get to die. I read a
short story once where this kind of happens. It's the end of time and 3 people
are stuck in an evil machine who keeps them alive. Then one guy kills/free's 2
of the others. Can't remember what it was called. May have been an Asimov
short. As far as I know cryo can be as little as £30 a month on a life
insurance plan. Backing people up will become big business if they can show
everyone there is nothing metaphysical about the mind.

~~~
kittiepryde
I have no mouth and I must scream
[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/I_Have_No_Mouth,_and_I_Must_...](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/I_Have_No_Mouth,_and_I_Must_Scream)

Is it this?

~~~
byteface
wow. amazing. so much came back to me reading that. was a long time ago.
thanks!. But ye, before this book I was well up for cryo. Since, I've decided
death is probably for me.

------
aperrien
If this technology pans out, and there doesn't seem to be anything fundamental
against it, the future will be very different from what I imagined. Medical
treatment, space travel and exploration, even _retirement_ may have gotten a
lot more interesting.

~~~
bufferoverflow
Not really. We know that oxygen-starved brain quickly destroys itself in
minutes, unless very cold. So even if you can revive a brain after hours, it
will not be a very good brain.

~~~
aperrien
Why would anyone wait a few hours after death to do the technique? Wouldn't it
make more sense to do it right away, and get the brain into its new medium?
Right now there's all the limitations of something that's a nascent
technology, but the methods should surely be improved as time goes on.

~~~
bufferoverflow
Cause it takes time to get to the hospital that does the procedure and it
takes time to start the procedure.

~~~
rticesterp
Train first responders to do it. There's already a pilot program for blood
transfusions and it's already saving lives:
[https://wtop.com/virginia/2019/03/new-fire-and-rescue-
progra...](https://wtop.com/virginia/2019/03/new-fire-and-rescue-program-
delivers-blood-trapped-crash-victims/)

------
gwern
Fulltext:
[https://www.gwern.net/docs/longevity/2019-vrselja.pdf](https://www.gwern.net/docs/longevity/2019-vrselja.pdf)

_Nature_ overview/discussions:
[https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-019-01216-4](https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-019-01216-4)
[https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-019-01168-9](https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-019-01168-9)

------
iandanforth
"Mostly dead is slightly alive!"

~~~
dwd
Was slightly disappointed that none of the researchers' names was Max.

------
scotty79
Freezing your head might be good idea. If one day you could simulate a braina
and scan a brain in sufficient detail just freezing might be enough to keep
sufficient detail.

Who you are must be in chemistry of your brain not in the electricity because
you are same person after epileptic seizure as before.

~~~
AQuantized
This presumes that you _are_ the same person after a seizure, or even after a
nap, or even after half a minute of ordinary life, or even a unitary "person"
to begin with.

~~~
scotty79
That's a philosophical question (i.e. useless).

You are same enough for practical purposes like holding relationships and
retaining knowledge and skills.

------
ggm
Cellular revived not neurally coherent?

------
luckydata
Frankenstein has taught us nothing uh?

~~~
davidw
Idle thought: Frankenstein with VC money...

"Yeah, we're raising our series A so we can ink a deal with a Chinese morgue
for a steady supply of parts to stitch together, and to scale up our
electricity generation to the needed amount so we don't have to depend on the
odd lightning bolt, which turns out to be really rare here in Palo Alto"

~~~
fsniper
That could be a great short, or a novel.

------
charlieo88
Wait, isn't this how the zombie apocalypse normally starts?

~~~
halfbrown
That’s precisely what I was thinking!

------
veryworried
I don’t see why they bothered drugging the brains. Even if they became
conscious, the pig’s bodies are dead and gone. There is nothing to feel, one
is simply alone with their thoughts, perhaps even dreams.

~~~
Sharlin
We don’t know what a brain disconnected from all sensory inputs feels. It
could be agonizing pain for all that we know.

~~~
dpatrick86
It sure seems like patterns of cortical activation (or something like that)
could be compared to some sort of waking standard to take a very good measured
guess at some point.

