The neuroscience is radically close in crossing the ethical lines of Humanity along with the research involving Human Brain. Some neuroscientists say debate needed over research with ‘potential for something to suffer’.
Some researchers are warning that neuroscientists are on the verge of crossing an ‘Ethical Rubicon’. It has been brought to our attention that some scientists are growing lumps of the human brain in the lab and in some cases, the lumps are transplanted into animal brains. The scientific works on organoids are controversial.
Work on Human Organoids could bring severe pain to humanity as the lumps have the ability to feel and perceive by itself. By creating such sentient lumps of human brain neuroscience may get to the point of no return. Think of someone who wakes up to realize that he is an organoid (grown from stem cells) – this would mean a severe identity crisis for him. Living among people who are born from a mother’s womb while that person would be an invention of neuroscience.
The creation of mini-brains or brain organoids has turned into one of the hottest fields in modern neuroscience. The blobs of tissue are made from stem cells and despite their small size, some have been able to develop spontaneous brain waves. Like the waves of the brain of a premature baby in a mother’s womb.
Scientific Works on Organoids
Many scientists believe that organoids have the potential to transform medicine. Organoids would enable them to probe the living brain like never before. However, the work is controversial because it is unclear where it may cross the line into human experimentation.
Researchers will tell the world’s largest annual meeting of neuroscientists that works on organoids are dangerously close to crossing the ethical line. However, some scientists may already have done so by creating sentient lumps of the brain in the lab.
“If there’s even a possibility of the organoid being sentient, we could be crossing that line”, said Elan Ohayon, the director of the Green Neuroscience Laboratory in San Diego, California.
Elan added that – “We don’t want people doing research where there is potential for something to suffer”.
Hank Greely, director of the Center for Law and the Biosciences at Stanford University in California, said – “I think it is never too soon to raise issues about ethics in science, hence a thoughtful dialogue is important to guide scientific research and decisions”.
