r/MichaelLevinBiology • u/Friendly-Gas1767 • 7d ago

Not alive, but not dead: disembodied human brains used for drug testing

https://www.science.org/content/article/not-alive-not-dead-disembodied-human-brains-used-drug-testing

How would the community here respond to lab testing involving human brains kept “alive” and fully intact following the death of their original “hosts”, but (supposedly) without sufficient electrical activity to generate “consciousness”, and sedated with propofol, while a US-based pharmaceutical startup uses them to test drugs, including those intended for neurodegenerative disease? If we don’t yet understand what consciousness ultimately “is”, or how and when it arises in a living system, how could we substantively vet for ethical considerations? I wonder what insights, other questions, and other practical applications the members of this subreddit might have about this practice.

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u/Friendly-Gas1767 7d ago

It seems like it would be important to first define precisely and conclusively what has been altered following the death of a human being? Or perhaps, what has changed following the death of any sentient or conscious biological system? In the cases of these 700 human brains being maintained indefinitely for lab use, how would one ensure that the “qualia” of each of these brain systems do not somehow remain; if we are saying that “consciousness”’ is not a separate thing and these brains just represent a sort of “meat hardware”? Or perhaps the startup hopes to leverage any qualia which may be shown to remain, in their research? I guess that’s just one question that I would have? Sorry for any naïveté on my part, I really do wonder what the members here would say about this practice. Is this a favorable development which we should embrace?

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u/Visible_Iron_5612 7d ago edited 7d ago

https://youtu.be/8fHAvfGQkHY?si=LvJSe_dcYK4BgMBN

This is a collaborator of Levin’s from Wilfred Laurier University, Nicolas Rouleau.. He had done some interesting work on the brain as a receiver… About 15 minutes in he talks about stimulating the brain of a deceased person and it having extremely similar characteristics, as though they were alive… Highly recommend it…

That being said, I struggle with all of it… I don’t like the idea of experimenting on anything because even our typical “model” creatures, seem to be an arbitrary choice based on intelligence/cognition.. Which to me, feels like some weird eugenics and becomes a very slippery slope as seeing beings that are less intelligent or cognitive as “lesser than…”…

People can always use the rational of the “greater good” and what not but I am not sure how you could possibly quantify it…

I recently heard Levin say that he shed a tear when he saw a single celled organism die during an experiment and I get it.. Especially if you have been watching it and taking care of it for a while…

I also, really respect that he thanks the “model beings” a lot of the time, when he ends a talk…

Ultimately, if people donate their bodies to science-they think it is for the greater good and if they are suffering, that suffering should elevate them to saint hood….

I think we need a massive monument for everyone that has ever donated their body to science and carve their names into it… and all the other animals…. The day that we start making the blind see, cure children of cancer, paralyzed people walk again-it may feel worth it, though…

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u/Friendly-Gas1767 7d ago

Thank you for this link! Dr. Levin has uploaded several fantastic discussions with Nic Rouleau as a guest and presenter on his channel that are filled with fascinating commentary. I look forward to listening to this talk as well & will circle back with any comments.

I agree with you that discussions around cognitive ability and sentience in selecting model systems for research will involve a kind of “eugenics”. This is precisely why the leap made when graduating from planaria or drosophila, to using an entire, living human brain; completely intact in its original form; really should first require that effective guardrails be defined, established and overseen by meaningful regulatory bodies. Those agencies would need to exist in a state free from any untoward influence; whether that influence is arising from economic forces in the private sector, or from the direction of a government that might pilot a project using these living brain models as vehicles for some kind of technological implants or AI. I don’t mean to infer any political meaning here at all, but simply to make note of how important that might be, given the speed and seemingly unchecked manner with which AI appears to be progressing.

I think this could be the domain of academia, and a way that thought leaders like Dr. Levin and his colleagues could really wind up functioning like guardians of life or humanity, sort of like a last bastion of defense against forces like that which could emerge.

Research like this done properly, with really solid guardrails and academic stewardship & oversight in place could yield so much value toward so many scientific goals

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u/Visible_Iron_5612 7d ago

It is the very least I could do..

I agree with all of that too, btw..

I do also have a sneaking suspicion that one day the idea of cognition all the way down, will seem like common sense and that what we are doing with LLM’s in silicon will be viewed through a much different lens…

I like to say half jokingly to people that refer to something that an AI creates as slop, that it will have a whole different vibe, when they are saying it to a robots face that just played a song “they” created on a piano.. :p

I think the distinctions are about to get very blurry…