Pig Brain Kept Alive for Five Hours While Separated from the Body

Rapidcreek@lemmy.world to News@lemmy.world – 145 points –
Pig Brain Kept Alive for Five Hours While Separated from the Body
syfy.com
53

This is torture.

Most animal clinical trials and studies could be classified as such.

i think torture is when the pain is the goal of the procedure with the goal of punishing the victim or forcing them to comply. since this was just a scientific inquiry with no (apparent) malice, i'd say it is definitively not torture.

In that case, let me pull out your fingernails for the purpose measuring whether they are all equally well attached. Don't worry, they'll grow back.

...still doesn't sound like torture to you?

"They found that brain activity remained largely unaltered as compared to ordinary conditions."

Fucking hell, hope that does not mean the pig was still conscious of some sorts. This is a nightmare

But what is animal consciousness in terms of being self-aware? Pigs are damn smart, but I'm not sure they're on the list of animals that exhibit self-awareness.

Also, the article merely states that blood flow to the brain was interrupted, not that the head was removed, which, I'm guessing, is why brain activity was largely unchanged.
If the head was still attached to the spine, then I would assume that all the nerves were still functioning normally. As normal as they would in an anesthetized pig that is, with no interference from outside stimulus. In this study, the animal was quietly sleeping. I can't imagine any reputable doctor of science today doing such a thing to a conscious animal or human.

And, in one of the linked articles, it talks about how this research can further work on better life saving techniques for humans by developing much better blood and oxygen machines used during complicated surgeries.
So long as the animal is treated respectfully, I have no issue in using animals for research that help human medicine.

I might have let my imagination run a bit rampant there, for some reason I was thinking of a completely detached brain. but what you said makes more sense.

1 more...

Find out how scientists kept a pig's brain alive while separated from its body.

Do I have to?

HOLY SHIT THIS IS THE MOST AWFUL THING I'VE READ ABOUT CAN WE NOT PLEASE

Why can't we just fucking treat animals nicely instead of doing insane shit to them, I'm literally going to go and throw up now

Sounds like someone doesn't aspire to one day be an immortal brain in a jar.

My biggest fear is to be an immortal brain a jar, forced to run DOOM as a proof of concept.

The DOOM theme eternally slaps though. Ner ner nert ner nert ner nert ner nert ner ner ner nert ner forever and ever.

Sometimes I kind of wish a superior alien race would come down and do exactly the same shit to us as we do to cattle, pigs, chickens, lab rats & mice, etc.

We did it to ourselves during WW2. It's not a good look no matter who the victims are or who does it.

In any case, animal testing is sometimes a necessary evil (not you, cosmetic industry). It was also asleep during the whole thing which makes it a bit better.

I feel there's a bit of dissonance between these two points.

Yeah, completely agree it's not right no matter who does it. From Japan to Germany, to the US forgiving such actions to garner the knowledge gained from these inhumane studies.

My alien quip was merely to invoke some sense of perspective and empathy by seeing how absurd and how quickly people would turn around and go, "This is so cruel!" after they become the victims.

And somehow I doubt people would be assuaged by, "well at least you look like your detached brain is sleeping" or, "Don't worry; it's a necessary evil for the greater good of our species."

Kinda horrifying but also makes me hope things like this lead to advances in medicine that can allow sci fi shit like a totally body transplant or being able to take the brain out, work on it like a car engine and pop it back in

As far as I know experiments with dog heads being kept alive were happening in the 1940's, but reconnecting it is still the problem.

ITT literally like 1 person read the article, the rest just complain.

Yeah no wonder. I'm one of those that read half of it, just because some titles are misleading. Well it's clearly not one of those.

If those scientists tried stuff on themselves, I wouldn't object.
Doing these stuff to other creatures and also trying to justify them... NO. JUST NO.

Truly, truly disgusting.

What did they do with their brain after they were done with their bullshit experiment?

Or did they just leave it alive as long as possible, letting it die in panic?

Well for one, I doubt it was panicking since it was asleep.

For two, I'd imagine they reconnected the blood vessels and then the pig was perfectly fine aside from scarring.

Had you read the article, as previously mentioned, you would know point 1 and be able to imply point 2

Edit: article was possibly edited, I'm 95% sure it stated the pig was unconscious. As commented below, there is reason to believe they did not bother to fix the pigs afterwards.

The way the article said they disconnected it after 5 hours, having already shut off all natural blood flow to the brain, and considering that it seems that the brain was completely disconnected from all bodily input as one of the variables of the experiment, I honestly believe all of those pigs died at the end.

They did not say the pigs were asleep in the article, they said that brain function was seen to be mostly normal. I hope that means that, disconnected from all input, the brain was unable to experience conscious panic, but my spidey sense tells me that probably isn’t the case.

Horrific experiment that hopefully yields very useful results and doesn’t need to be repeated. With any luck, one of the benefits of AI may be modeling things like this so we don’t have to do it for real.

Where did they say the pig was asleep?

Where did they say that the pig was fine after the experiment?

What makes you think those 2 things?

You're assuming things that aren't explicitly stated. For me, even if your conditions are met, the experiment is still disgusting. Would you allow them to do it to you? No? Why not? So why is it acceptable to pull that shit on a other sentient being?

I'm convinced the article was edited, I definitely remember it saying they were asleep when I read it previously.

They didn't state the pig was fine, but they did state that the experiment could've continued. And since all they did was remove natural blood flow, all they would have to do is restore natural blood flow. Hence why I thought that.

As for your final point, no, in it's current state I would not accept this procedure, however now that it has been tested and confirmed to work I don't see any harm in allowing them to do it to me. I also plan to sign up for neuralink as soon as it's commercially available.

Do I think they should be doing this? No. Do I think that hooking a pig up to an artificial heart is as horrific as people are making it out be? No.

To be fair half of the article was about Frankenstein. Now all these people have pitchforks.

Corpse Conglomeration is a badass band name though

What the fuck is wrong with humans?

I can see rare and extreme medical uses for this. Potentially lifesaving if something in the body threatens the brain, and it's something that can be repaired, but you don't have time because of potential brain damage.

Also, I've been cursed with a weird nervous system so maybe they can give me a robot body in the future

One small step closer to brain transplants for Trump supporters though.

I've read animal farm so I'm worried they'd be just as bad but also smarter.

Guys that's a bit much please don't

Cool, so your body is going to die, they can pull your brain out and then move it into another body.

I suppose that's a better position to be in rather than the brain whose body you're now inhabiting

So the rich people we all love so much can finally become immortal and never have to share their money again! I love this idea.

One of the most faithful adaptations is the 2004 two-episode miniseries (streaming now on Peacock) starring Alec Newman as the good doctor and Luke Goss as the Creature.

Are these articles just advertisements now?

Syfy is a cable TV channel, i don't exactly expect the paragon of journalism.

This is the high point of your so-called civilization.

I'm sure this won't lead to a matrix-style utilization of brains to be a giant literal neural network (lol Duracell batteries) in an apocalyptic future...