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Archive for the ‘ethics’ category: Page 12

Mar 26, 2023

Using Human Brain Cells in Rats to Understand Psychiatric Disorders with Dr. Sergiu Pasca

Posted by in categories: biotech/medical, education, ethics, neuroscience

The journal Nature published a groundbreaking new study by world-renowned Stanford neuroscientist Sergiu Pasca involving the transfer of human brain organoids into the brains of rats. Insoo Hyun, Director of the Center for Life Sciences and Public Learning at the Museum of Science, speaks candidly with Dr. Pasca about his research. Why did he do it? How might this uncover the mysteries of psychiatric disorders? And the Big Question we are all wondering about – can these rats ever develop “human-like” consciousness? Together they demystify the science.

00:33 Dr. Sergiu Pasca’s Romanian roots.
00:55 Why is Dr. Pasca’s work important for Psychiatry?
04:14 Dr. Pasca’s work with human brain organoids.
06:14 Challenges with using animal brains when trying to unlock mysteries of human psychiatric disorders.
07:13 Reason for Dr. Pasca’s latest research transplanting human brain organoids into rat brains.
08:47 How the human brain organoid transplantation into a rat brain is accomplished.
10:19 What Dr. Pasca learned from his experiment and its importance.
12:02 Brain cells’ amazing ability to take over and organize themselves in appropriate environments.
13:03 Will animals with human brain organoids in their brain develop human-like consciousness?
17:30 Will manipulating human neurons in a rat change the behavior of the rat?
19:43 Application of rat experiment findings for human patients.
22:07 The ethics and regulation of using animals in scientific research.
25:25 Why context matters in research of transplanting human brain organoids into rat brains and the challenge of people backfilling science they might not understand with mythology and science fiction.
32:28 Dr. Pasca’s inspiration to work so hard to unlock the mysteries of psychiatric disorders.

Continue reading “Using Human Brain Cells in Rats to Understand Psychiatric Disorders with Dr. Sergiu Pasca” »

Mar 23, 2023

Inside a mini-brain (with eyes?) lab

Posted by in categories: biotech/medical, ethics, neuroscience

If a free-floating brain could feel pain or ‘wake up,’ how would we know? That’s an important ethical question — and it’s one we need to ask more often as labs around the world create new organoids, or miniature human organs. To answer it we talked to Jay Gopalakrishnan at his ‘mini brain’ lab for centrosome and cytoskeleton biology in Düsseldorf, Germany.

STUDY: https://www.cell.com/cell-stem-cell/fulltext/S1934-5909(21)00295-2

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Mar 21, 2023

Free Will is Impossible. Interview with Derk Pereboom

Posted by in categories: ethics, neuroscience

Derk Pereboom claims that free will is impossible because of its incompatibility with both determinism and indeterminism. Also he defends a robust nonreductive physicalism. It says that although consciousness can’t be reduced to physical it’s not something over and above physical.
The interview was taken by Vadim Vasiliev and Dmitry Volkov. Below you’ll see a list of questions of the interview.
1. The most influential books.
2. What are the differences between notions of moral responsibility and basic desert?
3. Which type of punishment should be eliminated if we find out that there is no justification for basic desert?
4. Is indignation as a reaction on wrongdoing a kind of irrational emotion?
5. How was the manipulation argument invented?
6. Why you’ve recently changed a presentation of the first case of Manipulation Argument?
7. How does the problem of free will relate to the problem of mental causation?
8. Could the problem of personal identity pose difficulties for moral responsibility and for basic desert? And why causal determinism is at the focus of free will debate?
9. Is there a real difference between hard incompatibilist’s position and that of compatibilists?
10. Can you list or name some differences and similarities between you and Daniel Dennett?
11. Could cognitive science and neuroscience eliminate the discussion on free will?
12. What is a definition of mental?
13. What were the most important changes of your views?
14. What is meaning of life?
15. What is your current research?

Mar 17, 2023

#176 Human organoids are new AI frontier; Listening to the big bang through the cosmic microwave background

Posted by in categories: bioengineering, biotech/medical, ethics, information science, robotics/AI

Brainoids — tiny clumps of human brain cells — are being turned into living artificial intelligence machines, capable of carrying out tasks like solving complex equations. The team finds out how these brain organoids compare to normal computer-based AIs, and they explore the ethics of it all.

Sickle cell disease is now curable, thanks to a pioneering trial with CRISPR gene editing. The team shares the story of a woman whose life has been transformed by the treatment.

We can now hear the sound of the afterglow of the big bang, the radiation in the universe known as the cosmic microwave background. The team shares the eerie piece that has been transposed for human ears, named by researchers The Echo of Eternity.

Mar 15, 2023

Microsofts latest layoffs could be the beginning of the end for ‘ethical AI’

Posted by in categories: ethics, robotics/AI

Microsoft’s latest layoffs throw ethics out the window and we should all be worried.

Mar 14, 2023

The Top 5 Science Fiction Books That Explore the Ethics of Cloning

Posted by in categories: biotech/medical, ethics

FallenKingdomReads’ list of The Top 5 Science Fiction Books That Explore the Ethics of Cloning.

Cloning is a topic that has been explored in science fiction for many years, often raising questions about the ethics of creating new life forms. While the idea of cloning has been discussed in various forms of media, such as movies and TV shows, some of the most interesting and thought-provoking discussions on the topic can be found in books. Here are the top 5 science fiction books that explore the ethics of cloning.

Alastair Reynolds’ House of Suns is a space opera that explores the ethics of cloning on a grand scale. The book follows the journey of a group of cloned human beings known as “shatterlings” who travel the galaxy and interact with various other sentient beings. The book raises questions about the nature of identity and the value of individuality, as the shatterlings face challenges that force them to confront their own existence and the choices they have made.

Mar 14, 2023

Microsoft lays off an ethical AI team as it doubles down on OpenAI

Posted by in categories: ethics, robotics/AI, sustainability

Microsoft laid off an entire team dedicated to guiding AI innovation that leads to ethical, responsible and sustainable outcomes. The cutting of the ethics and society team, as reported by Platformer, is part of a recent spate of layoffs that affected 10,000 employees across the company.

The elimination of the team comes as Microsoft invests billions more dollars into its partnership with OpenAI, the startup behind art-and text-generating AI systems like ChatGPT and DALL-E 2, and revamps its Bing search engine and Edge web browser to be powered by a new, next-generation large language model that is “more powerful than ChatGPT and customized specifically for search.”

The move calls into question Microsoft’s commitment to ensuring its product design and AI principles are closely intertwined at a time when the company is making its controversial AI tools available to the mainstream.

Mar 13, 2023

Prof. KARL FRISTON 3.0 — Collective Intelligence [Special Edition]

Posted by in categories: ethics, information science, robotics/AI

This show is sponsored by Numerai, please visit them here with our sponsor link (we would really appreciate it) http://numer.ai/mlst.

Prof. Karl Friston recently proposed a vision of artificial intelligence that goes beyond machines and algorithms, and embraces humans and nature as part of a cyber-physical ecosystem of intelligence. This vision is based on the principle of active inference, which states that intelligent systems can learn from their observations and act on their environment to reduce uncertainty and achieve their goals. This leads to a formal account of collective intelligence that rests on shared narratives and goals.

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Mar 12, 2023

Think more rationally with Bayes’ rule | Steven Pinker

Posted by in categories: ethics, neuroscience

The formula for rational thinking explained by Harvard professor Steven Pinker.

Up next, The war on rationality ► https://youtu.be/qdzNKQwkp-Y

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Mar 8, 2023

The ethics of using CGI to resurrect dead actors

Posted by in category: ethics

If Paul Walker can star in ‘Fast X’ right now, what else could we cast him in?

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