Head Transplants

[Ray McCarthy]

It's maybe not inherently impossible, there may be no ethical issues, if the donor and recipient are chosen in a way that is accepted for any donation due to brain death and the condition of the recipient vs risk of operation.

But what if donor is much much younger or opposite sex or different ethnicity?

Is it irresponsible to try it currently without further research and advances in medicine, such as spinal cord repairs?

What if it becomes low risk and successful? Will rich older people create a black market in "donors"? Will "suitable" disadvantaged people have "accidents"?

If you wanted to know how the first human head transplant might work

Is the worst that can happen that it succeeds? Or is it a worthy aim along with heart, lungs, liver, kidney, hand, face and recently womb transplants that have resulted in a baby (If you want, make a separate thread to consider womb transplants for people born male, sure to be next as it was attempted in 1930s).

 

[Stephen Palmer]

This may well interest you, Ray. Good book, and thought-provoking.

 

[Ray McCarthy]

I forget which SF story it was that the MC has an explosive booby trapped collar (fitted because he was convicted of something?), published long ago, and a surgeon amputated his head and re-attaches it to remove the collar tag.

may well interest you, Ray

I'm not sure I'd fancy the book ... thanks.

Baggini mashes up philosophy with psychology, Buddhism, neuroscience ... considers the role of memory, demolishes a theologian's (bad) arguments for the soul, and suggests that "multiple personalities" are like different "users" of a computer system

The "soul" if it's real, has nothing to do with the question and isn't in the realm of science. Since I think, as a "computer programmer" and having studied AI, that I am doubtful the brain is anything like a computer. So called computer "neural networks" are nothing like biological ones. I'm sceptical that I'd be other than annoyed by woolly wishful thinking and poor logic. I couldn't stomach Iain M. Banks, no idea why I finished one and started a second. I find Ray Kurtzwiel to be full of wishful thinking. He should have stuck to the OCR software, he was brilliant at that.

Most cases of "multiple personalities" seem to be mental illness, perhaps more due to childhood mistreatment than anything hereditary (as was believed for most of 20th C.) or demons (a much earlier belief).

 

[Nick B]

This may well interest you, Ray. Good book, and thought-provoking.

Think I'll look that one up Stephen, I read a lot of these kind of things. I find unusual theories fascinating.

 

[Ray McCarthy]

I find unusual theories fascinating.

Sometimes I do.

However I identify with #6's objections to the Village.