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there is a special place in hell for these scientists
(lemmy.blahaj.zone)
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this post was submitted on 05 Mar 2026
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Raises uncomfortable questions about consciousness. The only difference between these neurons and your own are the number of them and the structures they form. Of course it doesn't know what it's doing, but... Neither do our own neurons
I mean it's the same question we've been asking all our lives about the animals, fetuses and now AI. When does it stop being a flowchart and start being a consciousness.
Science and Ethics — the age old enmity between "I wanna know" and "I'm not allowed to find out"
FTFY
I guess my point is that sometimes even if it's illegal you can get away with it if done correctly, with ruling party aligned stated goals....or you have access to a shit tonne of money and powerful friends.
I simplified for comedic effect. You're absolutely right that the "compromise" would be finding some humane and ethical solution, but "The most effective and direct way of finding out is cruel and callous" isn't quite as snappy.
That kinda dodges the conflict by not engaging with ethical concerns at all. I feel like calling it a solution would be morbid, but it does make the problem stop being a problem...
I guess I...kinda lost the plot a bit when I wrote the second part, eh?
There's ethics...and then there's what the government in the country a scientist operates in views as "morally and ethically acceptable".
Stem cell research was banned in most places for a long time. The US is banning CRISPR, if I remember right, the OG Nazis, Soviets and Empire of Japan (and honestly basically everyone else too, just those are the three that were highlighted when I was in school) rubber-stamped and funded research that should warrant execution by vivisection...die by your own methods and all that.
You're right it's not really a solution. However the realities of modern society means that there's room within what is morally and ethically acceptable in any country to operate in both a humane and inhumane fashion. And if it doesn't then money and connections to those in power allow further leeway to be an example of humanity at it's best....or a monster in a human suit....
I think I got where you were going, I was just saying that someone trying to find a way around the legal restrictions indicates they're not actually concerned about ethics, just about not getting in trouble for it. In that context, the problem "How do I do this in an ethically acceptable manner?" is "solved" with the answer "I don't care".
Generally, laws are the standard solution to ambiguities. Ethics are a murky and often subjective topic, so it makes sense to form some sort of common agreement on what is okay and what isn't. And where there are laws, there are gonna be cunts proving exactly why we had to write it down in the first place...
Nueralink did pretty much the same thing to monkeys that are actually conscious. So it this different only because those are human neurons? Is human consciousness different than animal consciousness?
i dont think op made a mutually exclusive statement?...
I'm not sure this is quite analagous to neuralink's monkey experiments. That said,
To my mind, a neuron is a neuron. The only difference between your brain and a monkey brain is, again, the number of neurons and the structures they form. I don't see this as any different from monkey or rat or ant or entirely digital neurons.
Why not? It's a chip reading inputs from neurons. This meme doesn't make it clear if the chip was also stimulation neurons but Neuralink has plans for neural stimulation and it's possible this was also tested on monkeys. So what's the difference?
You seem to be arguing against a point that no one has made.
You seem not to understand what is being discussed here.
Correct. That was basically my point -- I don't think anything is being discussed, people are talking past each other.
Sounds like those are uncomfortable questions being raised...
Yes. Because it's us. Anything not us is always going to be less valuable. You'd kill 100 lions if it means saving 1 human.
Lions are not conscious. And I'm not asking about value. Of course we value human consciousness more than monkey consciousness. We don't grant monkeys any rights. Hell, we assign more value to unconscious (brain dead) humans than to conscious monkeys. But how exactly is human consciousness different?
What leads you to assume that lions lack consciousness exactly?
Shit, turns out lions are conscious! They are just stupid. Stephen Hawking said it in 2012. I honestly didn't know that.
That was just to try and make the equipment work at all, it wasn't about doing anything with software. It's the opposite where you're only worried about the physical damage and infection.
I was focusing more on the "hooking up conscious brain to computer" part than about the damage and infection part.
Thought experiment: let's say we have a dead brain patient. You have verified that there is no neural activity in the brain beyond cerebellum. There's no consciousness in the brain. Legally it's still considered a person. You can't for example shoot them.
We also have a 5kg blob of lab grown human brain tissue. We have verified there is neural activity in the entire blob but we don't know what it's doing and we can't communicate with it.
Which one is more conscious? Which one should be considered more human and should have more rights?
And now bring artificial neural networks, i.e., AI, into the picture to make it even more spicy.
Do those neurons interact with hormones like mine do?