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The Guardian is reporting that the first (almost) fully formed human brain has been grown in a lab. Note, no paper or data has yet been published, but...
An almost fully-formed human brain has been grown in a lab for the first time, claim scientists from Ohio State University. The team behind the feat hope the brain could transform our understanding of neurological disease.
Though not conscious the miniature brain, which resembles that of a five-week-old foetus, could potentially be useful for scientists who want to study the progression of developmental diseases. It could also be used to test drugs for conditions such as Alzheimer's and Parkinson's, since the regions they affect are in place during an early stage of brain development.
Is it thinking?
The ethical concerns were non-existent, said Rene Anand of Ohio State University. "We don't have any sensory stimuli entering the brain. This brain is not thinking in any way."
Personally I'd like to see it hooked up to an fMRI just to check.
(Score: 2) by RedBear on Thursday August 20 2015, @08:53PM
This sort of thing is a very popular but problematic assumption. How can you miss something you've never had, never experienced and have no awareness of being capable of experiencing? Do you miss being the King of Prussia? The whole idea that a disembodied brain would be upset about being a disembodied brain if it was a disembodied brain during its entire existence is just silly. How could it possibly understand even the concept of the passage of time or be bothered by the lack of an attached body if it never experiences any form of sensory input? If you take a video of a pitch-dark, perfectly silent room and play it back, how do you know you're even watching anything? If you can't perceive anything changing, how do you know time is even passing? You could sit there for hours not even realizing the TV has been turned off the whole time.
If the brain developed through the usual 6 years of early growth without any input or output, whatever consciousness might inhabit the neurons thenceforth would bear no resemblance to what we know of consciousness. Sort of like infants who are raised by wolves in the wild. It would be much more likely to be terrified and driven insane by the addition of sensory stimuli as by the continued lack thereof.
For all we know being a disembodied brain with no sensory input and no understanding of time or consciousness could be quite peaceful, or at least blissfully neutral. Sort of like being a rock. Would you think a rock knows how to be unhappy?
Without sensory inputs and outputs a disembodied brain has no more logical reason to be "human", "conscious", "happy" or "unhappy" than a disembodied liver does. Endless classic sci-fi screenplays notwithstanding...
¯\_ʕ◔.◔ʔ_/¯ LOL. I dunno. I'm just a bear.
... Peace out. Got bear stuff to do. 彡ʕ⌐■.■ʔ
(Score: 2) by acid andy on Thursday August 20 2015, @09:53PM
With all those neurons and cortices I can't see how your comparison to a liver is valid. Your assumptions may be right but the issue is exactly that they are mere assumptions. We honestly do not know what activity, thoughts or level of consciousness would occur in a brain in such a situation. I take your point that you can't miss something you have never experienced in the same way that someone that has lost it would. However, there are nature versus nurture arguments that are relevant here. The human brain has evolved over millions of years to be suited to processing the sensory inputs and emotions of a healthy human body. I know there have been studies that have shown that brains grow and develop according to the senses they are equipped with but that doesn't mean that it cannot be in some way boring, frustrating or unpleasant for a disembodied brain to exist. It's a lot of neurons that would normally have the capacity for intelligent thought and introspection and I don't think it's fair to say it would have zero sensory input. Likely the slightest electrical noise would cause neurons to fire and perhaps could start a feedback loop of thoughts or dreams. The brain's very good at focusing in on whatever information it has available, no matter how little that is.
If a cat has kittens, does a rat have rittens, a bat bittens and a mat mittens?
(Score: 2) by RedBear on Thursday August 20 2015, @11:35PM
Well, I suppose even fetuses have dreams of a sort. There's something in there. I just don't believe it will be recognizable as a human consciousness or necessarily be experiencing either enjoyment or discomfort as we would perceive it. But there's only one way to know for sure. How fascinating it would be to grow one for a few years and then hook up some inputs and outputs and try to communicate with it.
Picard and Dathon, at El-Adrel.
¯\_ʕ◔.◔ʔ_/¯ LOL. I dunno. I'm just a bear.
... Peace out. Got bear stuff to do. 彡ʕ⌐■.■ʔ