
Lab-grown brain bits open windows to the mind - jonbaer
https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/lab-grown-brain-bits-open-windows-to-the-mind--and-a-maze-of-ethical-dilemmas/2018/09/02/9a76efee-a25b-11e8-83d2-70203b8d7b44_story.html
======
UnpossibleJim
People are a conundrum. We seem to want a brain-computer interface, or to free
ourselves from our bodies and the fear of death, to let our consciousness live
on forever, allowing our brains (in artificial bodies) explore the cosmos. We
dream about it in books and movies; chat about it in coffee shops and in our
spare time at work. When the opportunity to explore the possibility begins to
present itself, we balk at the idea. This hasn't even reached any stage where
emotions or thought might emerge, anymore than an early abortion could be
considered a life to anyone but to the most ardent fundamentalist and already
we are cringing at the moral implications.

Yes, I understand that we have to consider them before it is too late and a
tragedy has occurred. We also can't stop progress on the notion that there is
a "what if" scenario out there, like a boogie man waiting in the wings. Do it
under supervision. Keep it transparent. But don't just stop it out of knee
jerk fear of the unknown and what may be. How will anything move forward if
we, as a global society become scared of everything?

~~~
beefield
> We seem to want ... live on forever

My humble opinion is that people have not thought that enough. I mean,
eternity is a _damn_ long time. I can somehow imagine my
brain/consciousness/whatnot to find new and interesting stuff to engage with
for a few thousand years, and that is stretching it a _lot_. Much more likely
we are talking about a few hundred years and there is a real possibility that
I am completely fed up with this world before I turn 100 years old.

And now let's start stacking those years. So, say a billion years. Meaning a
million thousand year periods. I get shivers just thinking I should be hanging
around that long. And what comes to eternity, we have not even _started_ yet.

I can't think of eternal life as being anything but worst imaginable hell
(regardless whether it would be in heaven or hell).

(Admittably, I would be curious to know how how the story of humanity
progresses and most likely ends at some point)

~~~
ddingus
I woukd be quite happy to be there for my family, the young ones, and their
young ones.

Experience is so valuable.

And people are beautiful.

There is a lot to do, experience, live, laugh.

Yeah, will get tired of it, but not in my current lifespan.

I can't even do and build all I want to.

Forever is not realistic. But more? 2x? Yeah, sign me up. Easy.

~~~
shrimp_emoji
Why do you even suppose you'd get tired of it? It's like saying you'll get
tired of good music someday.

~~~
ddingus
You know I might not. You may very well be right about that. However I really
don't know, so I spoke to what I do know.

------
pmarreck
I'm not a materialist, and yet I believe we must take materialism to all of
its logical ends, as uncomfortable as it may get (discomfort being an illusion
according to materialism, of course), before any genuinely new truth will
reveal itself

~~~
glibgil
Why not become a materialist and get all the discomfort over with all at once
forever?

~~~
shrimp_emoji
I'm a materialist, but the discomfort is still there. Intellectual philosophy
(moral relativism, illusion of self, etc.) is insoluble to the emotions we
evolved with. (Take the fear of death.)

~~~
trevyn
Disagree, it is possible to eliminate fear of death (and all emotions) on this
path.

~~~
shrimp_emoji
Lol! Well, if you have, I envy you. But I doubt it.

I think there's legends of a test for master zen monks to see whether they've
cultivated enough control over themselves to not react when they have a finger
or hand cut off.

But, if it's even possible to shed your displeasure of pain, death, and all
other things and go through your daily life like that until it's over, I think
it's inaccessible to most people. (With normal lives, at any rate; if you said
you have to do master-level zen meditation or be under heavy sedation for most
of the day, I would say that doesn't count. : p)

------
taliesinb
The passage about implanting human organoids into primates reminded me of this
YA scifi novel called Eva that I read as a kid. Girl in a car accident gets
her brain transplanted into a chimpanzee. I really loved it. And a great book
to develop your kid’s interspecies empathy!

------
djfm
This should be open-sourced so that the probability of creating a dangerous
true AI is lower. I fear there may be something very wrong in this but I'd
love a DIY grow-your-brain kit with a USB interface to experiment with. This
machine would have an awesome "hello, world" program.

~~~
SubiculumCode
I'm not sure what you mean by open sourcing. There are published procedures in
open access journals for creating neural organelles from tissue samples.

It is interesting to think about how organelles might develop around a mesh of
stimulating wires in a computer interface.

Using cells from non-primate animals (e.g. rats) might alleviate some ethical
hurdles. Still, I am somewhat uncomfortable with the thought of the idea of
creating boxes of neurons trained via a interfacing mesh to accomplish certain
types of computations, etc. The hard problem looms.

Currently neural organelles are being used to study disorders like autism in
humans where taking brain samples is unethical, but taking a blood sample and
coaxing them into neurons, is not.

------
carapace
> At Day 100, Qian’s minibrains resemble a portion of the pre­natal brain in
> the second trimester of pregnancy.

OMG they are juggling nitroglycerin. I think that it's only ignorance that has
kept people from their pitchforks and torches so far.

Not that I'm against this mad science. The first thing, _the first thing_ , I
thought of when I first read about these things was: _DALEKS!_ Put these in a
roomba with some sensors and a death ray and they're Daleks.

