The latest episode of the Listen To The Signal podcast is up!
Listen to the new episode “Robot Brains From Outer Space” now!
So this month I was reading this article in the New York Times (https://www.nytimes.com/2019/08/29/science/organoids-brain-alysson-muotri.html), and had that moment, you know, where fact can be stranger than fiction. Apparently scientists have been growing brain organoids for a while – taking human stem cells and cultivating little clusters of neurons, to help with brain disease research. At some point someone raised the ethical question, “what if we grow a brain that gains consciousness?” But everyone pooh-poohed that idea, I mean, come on, it’s just a cluster of cells, right? Well, they shot a bunch of these organoids into space, aboard the International Space Station, to see how they’d grow there, and even hooked some up to a robot. And then they started seeing brain wave activity, similar to that of retrieving memories and dreaming, at the level of a developing premature baby. I’m not kidding. So this is a horror story waiting to happen, right? Let’s see what happens… P.S. You can also subscribe to the podcast on iTunes, and get your monthly free sci-fi short audio delivered right to your phone/tablet/whatever!
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