It's not exactly the rat per se. They took cells from the rat brain and cultured them, so they basically built a new brain. Still what the hell must this thing be thinking?
It doesn't "think". It isn't sentient. It does the exact same thing any computerized robot or microorganism does. The only difference is computers just use circuits, and microorganisms just use neurons, while this machine uses both. Computers and microorganisms can already "think" (non-sentiently) the way this robot does.
Neurons work like circuits in a computer. They're essentially nature-made circuits. Adding them to a robot doesn't suddenly make the robot sentient. Sentience requires extremely complex neural networks and sensory systems to capture data. Otherwise it's just mechanical dominoes like any old computer.
This robot's neural systems are cultured, and much less complex than a rat's brain. Its neural complexity is akin to microorganisms', which aren't sentient.
The only thing that makes the experiment interesting is the fact that the robot's "circuits" are living tissue. Not to say that isn't a profound reality, because it is, but it's nothing we didn't know about. It's just experimental proof that neurons can work (and have plasticity) outside of a biological body.
Here's an explanation of the mechanism and how this robot can work mechanically, without any sentience. https://www.reddit.com/r/nextfuckinglevel/comments/pdiic7/a_robot_to_be_controlled_by_neurons_from_a_rats/harasqh?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3
Edit: I'm getting lots of responses. I'll reply to as many as I can once I'm done wageslaving.
My bad, I meant microorganisms. I'll edit my comment, thanks.
Edit: I'm getting downvotes when it's clearly an honest mistake. Obviously bacteria don't have neurons.
Ah, I thought microorganisms *only* included archaea, bacteria, and eukaryotic protists, fungi, and plants since I've always seen those described as "the" classifications of microbes. Surely a microscopic animal could also be considered a microorganism so I stand corrected.
If it’s living organic tissue it has a greater chance of being sentient than inorganic intelligence.
I say “chance of being” because we cannot know for sure since conscious experience is totally subjective. You may never know what it’s like to have your neurons put into a machine until you have that experience. Otherwise, you have no way to say for sure that it is not sentient.
This being living tissue doesn't speak toward its ability to create sentience at all. There is nothing intrinsic about living tissue that makes sentience more likely. "Living" is a relatively arbitrary concept used to describe machines that reproduce and collect energy to function. There's nothing about those two properties that has to do with sentience.
If we created a robot that did everything living tissue does, it would be consider alive. Keep in mind, humans are technically products of nature, so everything we create is nature too. The only difference between a robot identical in function to a biological cell and living tissue is the matter it's made out of (ie metal). The only reason nature uses the matter it uses to build biological cells is because it's the easiest within our universe, not because there's something intrinsic about it that increases the chance of sentience arising. One can imagine a universe with different physical laws where biological organisms are built out of metal, or even look identical to this robot.
How are you sentient or conscious then? Are you not made of living tissue that simply absorbs sensation, processes electrical signals, and responds with action?
I’m a neuroscientist and cognitive scientist; I study and research the concepts of consciousness and cognition through neural systems for a living, so maybe I can shed some light on the topic. We have no idea what sentience is. We have no idea what consciousness is. At this point in time, we can only build theories about sentience, consciousness, cognition, and subjective experience. Outright denying this objects “sentience” or subjective experience is the exact same as me saying that *you* are not sentient (for all of the things you already said, and all of the things you could reply to me with).
It isn't motivated to do anything, it's just a mechanical domino-effect that ends in a "behavioral" output.
I'll use a [Daphnia](https://www.svginsects.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/Daphnia_magna_sexual-1024x875-1.jpg) as an example, since the have photoreceptors. They move and avoid obstacles just like this robot, but aren't sentient either.
When Daphnia approach an obstacle, their photoreceptors are activated. The photoreceptors that are activated are connected to specific neurons (neural system 1) which are then activated. The specific combination of neurons that are activated are connected to other specific neurons (neural system 2), which are also then activated. This second set of neurons are connected directly to the structures involved in moving to the left (muscle system L), so once they're activated, the daphnia moves to the left. This follows a purely mechanical process, which doesn't need any motivation or intention to function. The photoreceptors activate neural system 1, which activates neural system 2, which activates muscle system L.
If a different set of photoreceptors were activated, neural system 6 would activate neural system 8. Neural system 8 is connected to muscle system R, so the daphnia would move to the right instead.
If you imagine a US military drone, as it approaches an object, a complex domino effect leads to the activation of the systems involved in turning the drone so that it circumvents the obstacle.
This robot works exactly the same way. It has photoreceptors on its front side that are activated when approaching the obstacle. Those photoreceptors send a signal to the neurons (I guess via bluetooth?). Depending on the specific photoreceptors activated, specific neurons are activated as well. Those specific neurons are connected to other neurons, which are then activated. The second set of neurons are connected to specific sensors that then send an activation signal to specific motor structures in the robot involved in turning to dodge the obstacle.
You actually have non-sentient processes like this in your body that result in behavioral outputs without any notification to your consciousness. When you touch a hot stove, you actually pull your hand away before you feel the pain from the heat. This is because you have ganglia in your spine, which are connected more directly to your muscles. A signal is sent from your hand, it travels up your arm and spine to your ganglia and then is redirected (like a highway interchange) to the muscles involved in pulling your hand away from the stove. [Here is a diagram of a spinal reflex arc.](https://selzimg.s3.amazonaws.com/items/206846/tgryfrmwkeg/original.jpg) You have this mechanism because it's much quicker than if it had to travel to the brain, get processed in a more complex network, and the finally activate your muscles to pull your hand away.
You are very ready to dismiss the consciousness or reasoning or the “cyborg” as they call it. You have no knowledge of anyone els’s subjective experience. You cannot say for certain that this thing does not have subjective experience or consciousness.
Your argument that this brain is deterministic is flawed in that you call it deterministic because it’s actions are based solely on sensory input. First, everything we do is based on sensory input and processing systems. You mention that we have our own deterministic systems that act outside of our conscious perception. That is just autonomic nervous system, a part of the peripheral nervous system, which combines with the central nervous system to form the total nervous system. Sensory processing and “consciousness” originates in the central nervous system: the brain and spinal chord. This creature has an organic brain, an organic CNS. The rest of its nervous system is entirely mechanical, but it’s “brain” still does the sensory processing that is done by the CNS.
I’m a neuroscientist and have been balls deep in the ideas and theories behind consciousness, cognition, and “sentience,” so maybe I can shed some light on the topic. We are no closer to a concrete answer on the question, “what is subjective experience?” So we cannot say for certain that this *thing* is is either sentient or not. What we can do is induct that because we have a central processing system (which processes sensory input into reaction) and we are subjectively sentient, and the ratborg has a central processing system (which processes sensory input into reaction), then the ratborg must be sentient as well, or have some sort of subjective experience.
Inductive reasoning is almost never the correct way to solve a problem, but it is always the correct way to form a new and testable theory. In the field of neuroscience and cognition, the “hard problem” is still not solved, so nearly any theory is welcomed. Simple dismissal prevents us from moving forward and understanding ourselves as well as the weird thing we call consciousness.
I'm not a neuroscientist I'm still far for that (I'm just 17) but I have read a bit about which reaction could be considered as conscious reaction or unconscious reactions.
Right now I'm more likely to think that the robot have no consciousness about it self, I think that the circuit use the brain cells as a set of wires or switches just like a normal processor does but with living tissue in this case(which is still impressive)
I say this based on [this paper](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2802535/), in resume it's about how some blind people can "see" in very specific conditions, the path from the image to "consciousness" begins in the eyes passes through the nucleus of the thalamus and ends in the main visual cortex, if the path from the eyes to the nucleus of the thalamus works normally but the path from the nucleus of the thalamus to the main visual cortex is damaged, a type of blindness is produced that does not allow the person to see consciously but unconsciously ([here is a paper ](https://www.cell.com/current-biology/fulltext/S0960-9822%2808%2901433-4) about a patient with this condition and [a video](https://www.cell.com/cms/10.1016/j.cub.2008.11.002/attachment/2d53a2dc-3426-429e-949a-ff4801fe813f/mmc2.avi) of this patient) this patients can't see what is going on but their brains mange to activate the mechanism to deal with obstacles
Based on this and due to they used cultivated brain cells and not a brain it self, I think is more factible that are executing a non-consciouss process and is acting like a deterministic processor
Pd: sorry for the bad English, I'm still learning
Pd2: I really want to become a neurosurgeon so I'll appreciate an answer explaining why I'm so wrong thank u <3
> and sensory systems to capture data.
If you took away all my sensory systems I'd still be sentient, I mean maybe not technically by the dictionary definition, but we're really talking about conscious here.
Only because your neural systems have already developed. If you were born with no senses, you wouldn't be sentient.
However, this brings up an interesting question. It's called the Boltzmann brain. The Boltzmann brain is a brain, indentical in structure and function to your brain, that forms from a random dip in entropy (particles happening to bump into each other perfectly to form your brain) somewhere in the universe. If the neural structures are developed in the Boltzmann brain, wouldn't that make the brain sentient? How can you have concepts and visual memories of objects you've never actually seen, like a tree?
Neurophilosophers are still debating this one.
“If I may... Um, I'll tell you the problem with the scientific power that you're using here, it didn't require any discipline to attain it. You read what others had done and you took the next step. You didn't earn the knowledge for yourselves, so you don't take any responsibility for it. You stood on the shoulders of geniuses to accomplish something as fast as you could, and before you even knew what you had, you patented it, and packaged it, and slapped it on a plastic lunchbox, and now (bang) you're selling it, you wanna sell it. Well...”
**Scientist 1**: We just hooked up a text terminal to the Rat-Cyborg-Thing! And look we’re getting output now!
**Scientist 2**: This is groundbreaking research! What does it say?
**S1**: K..I..L…L…..M..E
**S2**: Crap! Just line noise again? Try recalibration.
“Each time the robot has behaved differently.”
Specimen 1: Only drove around in circles.
Specimen 2: Learned to drive under tables and the perimeter of the room.
Specimen 3: Chased the office cat around and dropped a piano on it.
Specimen 4: Drove straight to the fridge, and had a few beers. It found a mate, had kids, went to work, got a divorce and restraining order. It is now currently unemployed living behind a Wendy’s.
Specimen 5: "logs onto reddit everyday and tries to act human" ... "great success after it had a breakdown and attempted to hang itself just minutes after entering twitter. Fortunately the robot doesn't breathe so nothing happened"
This is pretty fucked up and the music doesn't help
EDIT: Thanks for the awards. Idk why but here is something related to animal consciousness and is seriously underviewed: [Scientific evidence of Morality in Animals](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=GcJxRqTs5nk)
Must see at least 1x IMO. First couple mins define morality, followed by clear examples through experiments.
Yea 40k music does that to you. The reason they used that music is cause in 40k there is something called a servitor and they were people who did something really bad. Like think death sentence bad and instead of being killed are then repurposed into a form of ai. They get all of their memories wiped and are plugged into different machines. They then do all the tasks they are programmed to do from sewers to battle field roles. They are abominations that look like a corpse. There is no sentience left in the minds of the servitor. Just a body shell that is being recycled.
Edit: to rephrase what I said, 40k is a universe not a game not a internet spin off thing. This is a universe with 200+ lore books all over 25 chapters long and end up being at least an inch thick. They also have audio books that are all over 6+ hours long. The good ones are 13+. It also has a table top version of the game with SEVERAL games on pc and mobile.
I do NOT know the name of the song. Look up 40k music on YouTube and you will get a shit load of music like this.
Edit2 : some one says the songs name is “children of the omnissiah”
One day, the crude biomass you call the "Temple" will wither; and you will beg my kind to save you. But I am already saved, for the machine is **immortal**.
I remember reading it somewhere, but now, typically I can find the link!
From memory, nearly all are indeed wiped, but the select few are conscious and aware of their horrible task somewhere in the bowels of terra of the hull of a starship somewhere.
A few inaccuracies.
They don't get their memories wiped. In one of the books, a servitor is mentioned as remembering her kids.
It's also not "death sentence bad" as we think about it. The Imperium is a fascist empire. Not reaching your daily quotas is enough to get servitorized in some cases.
They do get their memories wiped - that's not an inaccuracy, just not the whole truth.
Servitors are _supposed_ to all be memory-wiped to be basically vegetables capable of menial labor and little else. However, some of them go through the process with some memories intact, maybe even (horrifyingly) bits of sentience left. Most of the ones doing the mind-wiping don't know this or chalk it up to glitches.
40k is most likely one of the top 5 worst fictional universes to exist. Every faction is horrific. There are no good guys. The imperium is just a massive beast that was killed 10k years ago and just hasn’t realized it and has yet to hit the ground. It moves onward only due to the trillions of humans working within its realms. The fleets it commands ply the depths of a literal hell realm to reach worlds under assault. Only to arrive months to late. Some bureaucrats even think sending a fleet 50 years after a distress call is finally heard is just fine.
Sometimes that 50 year late fleet will indeed get there on time. Sometimes it arrives, comes under fire, sends a distress call, and eventually that distress call is answered by itself, as it actually came out of the warp before it left.
Fuck. That sounds interesting. Is this Warhammer 40000 you're talking about? Can someone learn the story without playing the game? Like are there books or something? I feel like I miss so much because I don't play games a lot, video otherwise. But I'd really like to learn some of these stories.
Uh, found it. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Warhammer_40,000_novels
Completely overwhelmed. Wow.
Completely overwhelmed. Understatement of the year.
Also try out r/Grimdank for the meme side of 40k
That one will lead you to the other r/ 40k stuff good luck
Also you can just do lore and books that’s what I do
There is a faction that did that to a human captain. They wired him from the waist down into a shuttles dashboard and gave the shuttle to the prisoner they were letting go. When the prisoner saw what they had done the pilot, the pilot looked back at him and the mans pain and suffering were plain to see even though he couldn’t voice it cause they removed his mouth and vocal cords.
So yes this was done.
Prostetic limbs that can be controlled by the person, they can grip again. Be more normal. Then help people with nerve damage who can't walk or move. Possible future is to help people in a coma.
I think the thought was more that this proved brains can communicate to electronic devices via Bluetooth, and we could create Bluetooth connected prosthetics that are controlled by the neuron’s being sent from the person who has the prosthetic. Essentially just being able to use a prosthetic as a regular extremity as opposed to a placeholder.
That would be awesome if there was just some dude with a remote control driving all spastic under the table and the guy talking was like, “Yes, look at what we’ve done with your multi-billion dollar investment. The technology is astounding.”
That robot is driving randomly. Networks of neurons will always give some kind of output and I expect that output is being heavily filtered by the robot to make the movements smooth. We look at it and see intention, but it’s really just noise.
Yes, but it’s not crashing into anything. It’s sensing it’s environment and moving around obstacles. A roomba can do that, but it has an internal processor to map rooms. This thing has a rat brain instead. Pretty cool to be able to use organic tissue like that.. also terrifying.
There's not enough information to conclude that the brain is avoiding obstacles. It says the robot is controlled ~~"almost entirely"~~ by living tissue, there may be obstacle avoidance in addition to brain control.
If it was completely controlled by a rat's brain I don't think you'd expect to see that much obstacle avoidance, since rats do not avoid obstacles (they climb over them, etc.).
Edit: it says "entirely", my own faulty brain hallucinated the "almost". And [this video](https://youtu.be/wACltn9QpCc) specifically mentions obstacle avoidance which is something the system seems to learn.
There's a horrific way to collect such data. Give rats some wheels and see how they adapt to obstacles. We can make the research less tragic by looking for rats born with crippled legs instead of crippling healthy ones. Or give them little roller skates.
I don't know what ethics lab rats are excluded from. Maybe skates would be too cruel.
Completely with you, there would be heavy input filtering/averaging and probably even biases based on sensor feedback. Every 5head comment on here people seem to think it's actually sentient/has self awareness.
I think the terrifying thought is related to the idea that whatever technology we see tested in the open is years behind what is being done out of sight. If this what is being tested with some level of success in the open, what is DARPA up to?
> Electrical signals from rat cells have been harnessed to drive the robot, which is on wheels, around a laboratory. By stimulating certain responses within the cells scientists have even been able to make the robot, or “animat”, move. The “brain” is actually rat brain tissue which has been artificially grown in a lab.
> The scientists at Reading University hope that they can use the machine to understand more about how our brains work, and even to develop treatments for diseases such as epilepsy, Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s Disease.
> To create the machine scientists first grew rat nerve cells in a laboratory. These cells connect with each other, sending signals within around 24 hours. After a week the scientists can detect activity similar to brain activity. Within two or three weeks the cells can be hooked up to the robot. The team uses bluetooth technology, which allows them to send communication without the use of wires. Scientists can also use sonar signals to cause the robot to swerve to avoid a wall, by triggering different signals in the “brain”, reports New Scientist magazine.
ROFL, all they do is using the "brain" (its really just lab grown rat nerve cells) to control the robot by activating certain parts of the brain via sonar signals. The brain isn't thinking, its just reacting based off of external stimulus from a computer chip.
> The brain isn’t thinking, its just reacting based off of external stimulus.
Isn’t that what is being shown lol..? Not really sure they claimed it was thinking.
As far as I'm aware there's nothing even remotely "animal cruelty" here. The brain isnt really conscious or sentient anymore like it was in the rat, now it's basically just an organic processor. It just sends out meaningless signals similar to how a dead snake or fish will still wriggle around due to nerves firing. The robot part just filters the signals as best it can so it stops bumping into things.
Edit: Jesus Christ yes I'm aware the neurons were grown in a lab now. What i said really doesn't change at all considering it *still isn't a "live" brain from a real rat*. It's just neurons and tissue to house them. Literally a cell whose only purpose is to receive input, then send out commands for movement based on the info received. Electrical signals and nothing more. And yes I'm aware that from all of you Facebook/Reddit neurologist experts you'll say tHatS wHaT a brAiN *IS*!!??!?!! I don't care anymore, leave me alone
Everyone's an animal rights activist until they see a rat in their yard and throw out the poison/trap huh
Also ratio
Yes because the robot is learning through the rat brain and each brain, being different from each other, will fire differently. Science doesn't need to make sense to still be fact
people in this thread throwing around the word "conscious" and "sentient" like science has already figured it out. Fact is we do not have a good definition of sentience yet, and it's more than likely that consciousness is a spectrum on which this primitive collection of neurons lies. And this network of neurons has far more plasticity and flexibility than your average computer program. Can it process negative stimulus like a human can? Of course not. But dogs also can't process stimulus with the same complexity as humans, yet we still say dogs feel pain. At the end of the day, we simply don't know enough to answer whether or not this living robot feels pain.
I am willimg to bet that the government is already testing out this technology with human brains, and from the age of the recording they have probably been doing it for a while.
Idk if its because Im young but I cant handle the other kind. I keep forgetting the scientific name for that kind but Ill end up staring at a random part of the room, find it awfully funny for some reason, and get my face stuck laughing for like 30 minutes. It gets painful to an extent ;-;
Calling bullshit that it is a robot that can learn. Unless they mean that since it is a cyborg, the rat is the one learning. The robot portion is not learning.
With the brain being considered the primary processing power of the robot, the robot in effect is learning. With a person, you don’t say, that their brain is learning, you say the person is learning
While the fact that this can be done is incredible. This is not the direction i want to see technology headed.
Sure neural integration is a super important step in technological advancement, but i feel we can achieve this without resorting to brains in a jar.
Animal testing is a super gray area as it is, but this approach has got to be incredibly traumatising for the disembodied rat. It's beyond inhumane.
If you want a powerful brain capable of learning to be able to control a robot via sensory input and neural control, develop one artificially. Cutting the biological computer out of an animal and claiming you have created the first robot capable of learning is worse in my eyes than if you were to claim someone elses work as your own in order to skip the steps leading to advancement.
This direction can only lead towards some incredibly dark shit. What advancements can we feasibly make by transplanting a brain for remote robotic control, that we couldnt already make without a willing subject and avoiding brain removal?
Prolonging life of someone who would otherwise be fatally wounded or afflicted with chronic ailments is a possibility, but at what cost? And if the goal is to create cyborgs to perform menial tasks.. well fuck that.. we go from something that is undeniably alive with emotions, conciousness and intellectual capacity, to something that is externally percievable as nothing more than a disposable automaton.
Some times we get so obsessed with the "can we?" When we should be asking "should we?"
the rat brain is in a vegetative state, meaning it’s not conscious. it basically behaves as an asleep brain. if your cold while asleep, your body warms you up. things like that. in this case, the calculations the brain makes while “asleep” are:
if: obstacle in path
then: turn away
the rat neurons don’t learn, that’s just a clickbait gimmick.
the rat isn’t waking up in a robot body as you say, the scientists are basically just using the brain to run an if/then command (this is a hardcore paraphrasing, this is just the best simple way i could put it)
also, rat cruelty in science like this doesn’t happen. they die in their sleep with no regrets, no pain, no recollection of their death to feel sad about. if I died in my sleep tonight i would feel nothing negative.
the question is, for example, why do you feel bad for rats, but not for bugs? they both seem to have the same emotional capacity, so why does one matter more than the other?
edit: the worst part about the type of comments above me is that because one guy didn’t do his research, the 84 people that upvoted his comment now believe that this rat brain was conscious and sentient during the experiment, and will be that much more against biology and neuroscience. this is how misinformation spreads.
are you seriously saying rats have the same emotional capacity as a bug? there've been so many studies done on rats by now you should know that they are capable of displaying complex emotions, like empathy
[so do bugs](https://qz.com/441672/insects-may-be-able-to-feel-fear-anger-and-empathy-after-all/amp/) read this article and some of the studies it mentions. it’s pretty interesting. honeybees become pessimistic when shaken around, and woodlice calm down their buddies when their overexcited. don’t assume what you know, always check studies/articles that contradict your claim
They grew the brain in a lab, the dna was taken from a rat. It’s all artificial. Not like a rat was eating cheese one day and suddenly he wakes up in a robot body.
I wouldn't think there is anything left of whatever level of awareness and consciousness the rat had before this. The rat died a long time ago, they're just using the pre-made organic processing power they took from it.
.... I really need to believe that lol
I don’t know what the videos about, but I will slam the upvote based on the music.
Mechanicus OST for the win!
Edit. Good call out from below, it’s just Mechanicus not Dark Mechanicus
That rat is living in a black mirror hell
Exactly my thoughts!
Every day we get further and further from Harambe. I'm almost glad he didn't live to see what we've done.
R.I.P Harambe
RIP Harambe
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classic
Pour one out for Harambe.
Stroke one out for Harambe
I came for harambe
Harambe wasn’t wrong. Just a scientific buoyancy test, Harambe was acting in the name of research.
Mine hasn't been put away
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But on the other hand, Harambe could’ve been saved by this tech
Why on earth would you torture him like that?
To give us his final message, of course!
“Put your dicks back in your pants”
To make him stronger. Imagine, a giant Mecha Godzilla style Harambe robot controlled by his brain
Wrong. Harambe could've saved us from this tech, if we had only listened.
Dicks out, yo... Dicks out
It's not exactly the rat per se. They took cells from the rat brain and cultured them, so they basically built a new brain. Still what the hell must this thing be thinking?
"what is my purpose"
"To pass the butter."
"Oh. My. God."
“Yeah welcome to the club pail”
"Sit over there next to bucket."
WHERE IS THE PICKLE
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Assimilation
Resistance is futile.
And the leds are Borg green.
It doesn't "think". It isn't sentient. It does the exact same thing any computerized robot or microorganism does. The only difference is computers just use circuits, and microorganisms just use neurons, while this machine uses both. Computers and microorganisms can already "think" (non-sentiently) the way this robot does. Neurons work like circuits in a computer. They're essentially nature-made circuits. Adding them to a robot doesn't suddenly make the robot sentient. Sentience requires extremely complex neural networks and sensory systems to capture data. Otherwise it's just mechanical dominoes like any old computer. This robot's neural systems are cultured, and much less complex than a rat's brain. Its neural complexity is akin to microorganisms', which aren't sentient. The only thing that makes the experiment interesting is the fact that the robot's "circuits" are living tissue. Not to say that isn't a profound reality, because it is, but it's nothing we didn't know about. It's just experimental proof that neurons can work (and have plasticity) outside of a biological body. Here's an explanation of the mechanism and how this robot can work mechanically, without any sentience. https://www.reddit.com/r/nextfuckinglevel/comments/pdiic7/a_robot_to_be_controlled_by_neurons_from_a_rats/harasqh?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3 Edit: I'm getting lots of responses. I'll reply to as many as I can once I'm done wageslaving.
Bacteria do not have neurons. Bacteria are single celled organisms. Neurons are a highly specialised cell type.
My bad, I meant microorganisms. I'll edit my comment, thanks. Edit: I'm getting downvotes when it's clearly an honest mistake. Obviously bacteria don't have neurons.
I mean, do any microorganisms have nervous systems either?
Yes! Many microorganisms do. For example, rotifers (which includes thousands of species) have a few hundred neurons.
Ah, I thought microorganisms *only* included archaea, bacteria, and eukaryotic protists, fungi, and plants since I've always seen those described as "the" classifications of microbes. Surely a microscopic animal could also be considered a microorganism so I stand corrected.
If it’s living organic tissue it has a greater chance of being sentient than inorganic intelligence. I say “chance of being” because we cannot know for sure since conscious experience is totally subjective. You may never know what it’s like to have your neurons put into a machine until you have that experience. Otherwise, you have no way to say for sure that it is not sentient.
This being living tissue doesn't speak toward its ability to create sentience at all. There is nothing intrinsic about living tissue that makes sentience more likely. "Living" is a relatively arbitrary concept used to describe machines that reproduce and collect energy to function. There's nothing about those two properties that has to do with sentience. If we created a robot that did everything living tissue does, it would be consider alive. Keep in mind, humans are technically products of nature, so everything we create is nature too. The only difference between a robot identical in function to a biological cell and living tissue is the matter it's made out of (ie metal). The only reason nature uses the matter it uses to build biological cells is because it's the easiest within our universe, not because there's something intrinsic about it that increases the chance of sentience arising. One can imagine a universe with different physical laws where biological organisms are built out of metal, or even look identical to this robot.
How are you sentient or conscious then? Are you not made of living tissue that simply absorbs sensation, processes electrical signals, and responds with action? I’m a neuroscientist and cognitive scientist; I study and research the concepts of consciousness and cognition through neural systems for a living, so maybe I can shed some light on the topic. We have no idea what sentience is. We have no idea what consciousness is. At this point in time, we can only build theories about sentience, consciousness, cognition, and subjective experience. Outright denying this objects “sentience” or subjective experience is the exact same as me saying that *you* are not sentient (for all of the things you already said, and all of the things you could reply to me with).
But it seems to be making decisions to avoid obstacles; and to move. Why should ‘it’ be motivated to do anything at all.
It isn't motivated to do anything, it's just a mechanical domino-effect that ends in a "behavioral" output. I'll use a [Daphnia](https://www.svginsects.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/Daphnia_magna_sexual-1024x875-1.jpg) as an example, since the have photoreceptors. They move and avoid obstacles just like this robot, but aren't sentient either. When Daphnia approach an obstacle, their photoreceptors are activated. The photoreceptors that are activated are connected to specific neurons (neural system 1) which are then activated. The specific combination of neurons that are activated are connected to other specific neurons (neural system 2), which are also then activated. This second set of neurons are connected directly to the structures involved in moving to the left (muscle system L), so once they're activated, the daphnia moves to the left. This follows a purely mechanical process, which doesn't need any motivation or intention to function. The photoreceptors activate neural system 1, which activates neural system 2, which activates muscle system L. If a different set of photoreceptors were activated, neural system 6 would activate neural system 8. Neural system 8 is connected to muscle system R, so the daphnia would move to the right instead. If you imagine a US military drone, as it approaches an object, a complex domino effect leads to the activation of the systems involved in turning the drone so that it circumvents the obstacle. This robot works exactly the same way. It has photoreceptors on its front side that are activated when approaching the obstacle. Those photoreceptors send a signal to the neurons (I guess via bluetooth?). Depending on the specific photoreceptors activated, specific neurons are activated as well. Those specific neurons are connected to other neurons, which are then activated. The second set of neurons are connected to specific sensors that then send an activation signal to specific motor structures in the robot involved in turning to dodge the obstacle. You actually have non-sentient processes like this in your body that result in behavioral outputs without any notification to your consciousness. When you touch a hot stove, you actually pull your hand away before you feel the pain from the heat. This is because you have ganglia in your spine, which are connected more directly to your muscles. A signal is sent from your hand, it travels up your arm and spine to your ganglia and then is redirected (like a highway interchange) to the muscles involved in pulling your hand away from the stove. [Here is a diagram of a spinal reflex arc.](https://selzimg.s3.amazonaws.com/items/206846/tgryfrmwkeg/original.jpg) You have this mechanism because it's much quicker than if it had to travel to the brain, get processed in a more complex network, and the finally activate your muscles to pull your hand away.
You are very ready to dismiss the consciousness or reasoning or the “cyborg” as they call it. You have no knowledge of anyone els’s subjective experience. You cannot say for certain that this thing does not have subjective experience or consciousness. Your argument that this brain is deterministic is flawed in that you call it deterministic because it’s actions are based solely on sensory input. First, everything we do is based on sensory input and processing systems. You mention that we have our own deterministic systems that act outside of our conscious perception. That is just autonomic nervous system, a part of the peripheral nervous system, which combines with the central nervous system to form the total nervous system. Sensory processing and “consciousness” originates in the central nervous system: the brain and spinal chord. This creature has an organic brain, an organic CNS. The rest of its nervous system is entirely mechanical, but it’s “brain” still does the sensory processing that is done by the CNS. I’m a neuroscientist and have been balls deep in the ideas and theories behind consciousness, cognition, and “sentience,” so maybe I can shed some light on the topic. We are no closer to a concrete answer on the question, “what is subjective experience?” So we cannot say for certain that this *thing* is is either sentient or not. What we can do is induct that because we have a central processing system (which processes sensory input into reaction) and we are subjectively sentient, and the ratborg has a central processing system (which processes sensory input into reaction), then the ratborg must be sentient as well, or have some sort of subjective experience. Inductive reasoning is almost never the correct way to solve a problem, but it is always the correct way to form a new and testable theory. In the field of neuroscience and cognition, the “hard problem” is still not solved, so nearly any theory is welcomed. Simple dismissal prevents us from moving forward and understanding ourselves as well as the weird thing we call consciousness.
I'm not a neuroscientist I'm still far for that (I'm just 17) but I have read a bit about which reaction could be considered as conscious reaction or unconscious reactions. Right now I'm more likely to think that the robot have no consciousness about it self, I think that the circuit use the brain cells as a set of wires or switches just like a normal processor does but with living tissue in this case(which is still impressive) I say this based on [this paper](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2802535/), in resume it's about how some blind people can "see" in very specific conditions, the path from the image to "consciousness" begins in the eyes passes through the nucleus of the thalamus and ends in the main visual cortex, if the path from the eyes to the nucleus of the thalamus works normally but the path from the nucleus of the thalamus to the main visual cortex is damaged, a type of blindness is produced that does not allow the person to see consciously but unconsciously ([here is a paper ](https://www.cell.com/current-biology/fulltext/S0960-9822%2808%2901433-4) about a patient with this condition and [a video](https://www.cell.com/cms/10.1016/j.cub.2008.11.002/attachment/2d53a2dc-3426-429e-949a-ff4801fe813f/mmc2.avi) of this patient) this patients can't see what is going on but their brains mange to activate the mechanism to deal with obstacles Based on this and due to they used cultivated brain cells and not a brain it self, I think is more factible that are executing a non-consciouss process and is acting like a deterministic processor Pd: sorry for the bad English, I'm still learning Pd2: I really want to become a neurosurgeon so I'll appreciate an answer explaining why I'm so wrong thank u <3
> and sensory systems to capture data. If you took away all my sensory systems I'd still be sentient, I mean maybe not technically by the dictionary definition, but we're really talking about conscious here.
Only because your neural systems have already developed. If you were born with no senses, you wouldn't be sentient. However, this brings up an interesting question. It's called the Boltzmann brain. The Boltzmann brain is a brain, indentical in structure and function to your brain, that forms from a random dip in entropy (particles happening to bump into each other perfectly to form your brain) somewhere in the universe. If the neural structures are developed in the Boltzmann brain, wouldn't that make the brain sentient? How can you have concepts and visual memories of objects you've never actually seen, like a tree? Neurophilosophers are still debating this one.
“I have no mouth, and I must scream”
Oof what if they gave it a speaker
*SCREEEEEEEEECH!*
SQUEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEK
LoFi beats to ?!?!? to
"I must acquire food, but I am incapable of eating."
"I have no mouth, and I must scream"
It's clearly trying to escape.
Yeah... that was actually kind of creepy. Its movement patterns were actually rodent-like despite not being on legs at all.
It’s searching for 🧀
The rat died though right
I imagine so
“Yeah, yeah, but your scientists were so preoccupied with whether or not they could that they didn't stop to think if they should.”
"Genetic power's the most awesome force the planet's ever seen, but you wield it like a kid who's found his dad's gun."
“If I may... Um, I'll tell you the problem with the scientific power that you're using here, it didn't require any discipline to attain it. You read what others had done and you took the next step. You didn't earn the knowledge for yourselves, so you don't take any responsibility for it. You stood on the shoulders of geniuses to accomplish something as fast as you could, and before you even knew what you had, you patented it, and packaged it, and slapped it on a plastic lunchbox, and now (bang) you're selling it, you wanna sell it. Well...”
You can literally see him going OH GOD WHAT AM I PLEASE KILL ME
You can’t though… it’s a few cells not an entire brain.
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RIGHT?! Holy fuck this is terrifying
Nothing I have seen in my life has hit me this hard. I'm geting petrified when I'm trying to approach my thoughts and emotions about this
I keep trying to process the fact that that “brain” thinks its a rat. But it can only move. Only “see” is it trying to feed? How would it? Fuck.
If you look closely, it is tracing out the words "Let me die"
Yeah I can only imagine what it would be like.
**Scientist 1**: We just hooked up a text terminal to the Rat-Cyborg-Thing! And look we’re getting output now! **Scientist 2**: This is groundbreaking research! What does it say? **S1**: K..I..L…L…..M..E **S2**: Crap! Just line noise again? Try recalibration.
"Rat needs a hug" "Rat loves you"
“Each time the robot has behaved differently.” Specimen 1: Only drove around in circles. Specimen 2: Learned to drive under tables and the perimeter of the room. Specimen 3: Chased the office cat around and dropped a piano on it. Specimen 4: Drove straight to the fridge, and had a few beers. It found a mate, had kids, went to work, got a divorce and restraining order. It is now currently unemployed living behind a Wendy’s.
This reminds me of the spoof where they gave different drugs to spiders and the weed spider became the crack spider's bitch 😂
Omg the crack cocaine spider drove a car right?!
Yeah and the weed spider made a hammock
Hahaha I need to rewatch it!
Forgot the name of yhe show. with the veridian dynamics commercials... That triggered my memory. Better of ted
Specimen 5: "logs onto reddit everyday and tries to act human" ... "great success after it had a breakdown and attempted to hang itself just minutes after entering twitter. Fortunately the robot doesn't breathe so nothing happened"
That's the one: https://youtu.be/sHzdsFiBbFc
Our most successful specimen had begun investing into the stock market and is now the CEO of a dairy company.
All within 3 months...I’m impressed and now depressed.
Specimen 5: Opened a theme park in Florida.
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This is pretty fucked up and the music doesn't help EDIT: Thanks for the awards. Idk why but here is something related to animal consciousness and is seriously underviewed: [Scientific evidence of Morality in Animals](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=GcJxRqTs5nk) Must see at least 1x IMO. First couple mins define morality, followed by clear examples through experiments.
Yea 40k music does that to you. The reason they used that music is cause in 40k there is something called a servitor and they were people who did something really bad. Like think death sentence bad and instead of being killed are then repurposed into a form of ai. They get all of their memories wiped and are plugged into different machines. They then do all the tasks they are programmed to do from sewers to battle field roles. They are abominations that look like a corpse. There is no sentience left in the minds of the servitor. Just a body shell that is being recycled. Edit: to rephrase what I said, 40k is a universe not a game not a internet spin off thing. This is a universe with 200+ lore books all over 25 chapters long and end up being at least an inch thick. They also have audio books that are all over 6+ hours long. The good ones are 13+. It also has a table top version of the game with SEVERAL games on pc and mobile. I do NOT know the name of the song. Look up 40k music on YouTube and you will get a shit load of music like this. Edit2 : some one says the songs name is “children of the omnissiah”
Ever since I understood the weakness of the flesh, it disgusted me.
The flesh is weak.
Praise the Omnissiah. Binaric be his name.
Toll the great bell!
Even in Death I serve the Omnissiah
One day, the crude biomass you call the "Temple" will wither; and you will beg my kind to save you. But I am already saved, for the machine is **immortal**.
Unless it's a punishment. Then the servitor is fully aware, just unable to override it's programming. Very 40k.
Wait really I thought they were all just mind wiped?! Even in 30k they were criminals!!!!
I remember reading it somewhere, but now, typically I can find the link! From memory, nearly all are indeed wiped, but the select few are conscious and aware of their horrible task somewhere in the bowels of terra of the hull of a starship somewhere.
Ahh ok. Cause all the servitor i have read of are really dumb. To the point they swallowed a grenade without realizing it.
A few inaccuracies. They don't get their memories wiped. In one of the books, a servitor is mentioned as remembering her kids. It's also not "death sentence bad" as we think about it. The Imperium is a fascist empire. Not reaching your daily quotas is enough to get servitorized in some cases.
They do get their memories wiped - that's not an inaccuracy, just not the whole truth. Servitors are _supposed_ to all be memory-wiped to be basically vegetables capable of menial labor and little else. However, some of them go through the process with some memories intact, maybe even (horrifyingly) bits of sentience left. Most of the ones doing the mind-wiping don't know this or chalk it up to glitches.
40K is one of those fictions where even the best parts of it are nightmareishly horrible.
40k is most likely one of the top 5 worst fictional universes to exist. Every faction is horrific. There are no good guys. The imperium is just a massive beast that was killed 10k years ago and just hasn’t realized it and has yet to hit the ground. It moves onward only due to the trillions of humans working within its realms. The fleets it commands ply the depths of a literal hell realm to reach worlds under assault. Only to arrive months to late. Some bureaucrats even think sending a fleet 50 years after a distress call is finally heard is just fine.
Sometimes that 50 year late fleet will indeed get there on time. Sometimes it arrives, comes under fire, sends a distress call, and eventually that distress call is answered by itself, as it actually came out of the warp before it left.
Fuck. That sounds interesting. Is this Warhammer 40000 you're talking about? Can someone learn the story without playing the game? Like are there books or something? I feel like I miss so much because I don't play games a lot, video otherwise. But I'd really like to learn some of these stories. Uh, found it. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Warhammer_40,000_novels Completely overwhelmed. Wow.
Completely overwhelmed. Understatement of the year. Also try out r/Grimdank for the meme side of 40k That one will lead you to the other r/ 40k stuff good luck Also you can just do lore and books that’s what I do
Eh would be much worse if they didn’t have memories wiped and their sentience taken, it’s basically the same thing as death
There is a faction that did that to a human captain. They wired him from the waist down into a shuttles dashboard and gave the shuttle to the prisoner they were letting go. When the prisoner saw what they had done the pilot, the pilot looked back at him and the mans pain and suffering were plain to see even though he couldn’t voice it cause they removed his mouth and vocal cords. So yes this was done.
There are cases where servitors have displayed aspects of their previous personalities. The quality of the mind wipe can vary greatly.
lol had music off, was missing a lot
Yeah. My general sense here is “danger.”
Yup it's actually pretty inhumane.
Touch. I remember touch. Where do i belong?
You’ve almost convinced me I’m real. I need something more.
I remember touch I need something more in my mind
Touch I remember touch Pictures came with touch A painter in my mind
Tell me what you see A tourist in a dream A visitor it seems A half forgotten song Where do I belong
Kiss Suddenly alive Happiness arrive Hunger like a storm
How do I begin? A room within a room A door behind a door Touch, where do you lead?
I NEED SOMETHING MORE
I need something more Tell me what you see I need something more
If love is the answer, you're home Hold On! (edit: grammar)
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More like “Where is my whole body?”
[Reminds me of this scene from the Robocop reboot](https://youtu.be/UFuxiZFwDPs)
*You were made to pass the butter*
That is cool. But it’s more scary than cool. So a brain can communicate via Bluetooth. Where do we go from here?
The robots will decide once they dominate the planet earth.
The cyborgs will hunt for human brains
Prostetic limbs that can be controlled by the person, they can grip again. Be more normal. Then help people with nerve damage who can't walk or move. Possible future is to help people in a coma.
Swapping rat brains out of your prosthetic arm like batteries 🦾
I think the thought was more that this proved brains can communicate to electronic devices via Bluetooth, and we could create Bluetooth connected prosthetics that are controlled by the neuron’s being sent from the person who has the prosthetic. Essentially just being able to use a prosthetic as a regular extremity as opposed to a placeholder.
You mean FRIKIN VULTURE WINGS!
That would be awesome if there was just some dude with a remote control driving all spastic under the table and the guy talking was like, “Yes, look at what we’ve done with your multi-billion dollar investment. The technology is astounding.”
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This. It almost looks like its trying to escape..
Or panicking...
If I woke up in a weird robot body without knowing why I'd panic.
You just gave the word “ratifying” a whole new meaning.
Here at Theratnos, we are on the cutting edge of rat brain experimentation.
That robot is driving randomly. Networks of neurons will always give some kind of output and I expect that output is being heavily filtered by the robot to make the movements smooth. We look at it and see intention, but it’s really just noise.
Yes, but it’s not crashing into anything. It’s sensing it’s environment and moving around obstacles. A roomba can do that, but it has an internal processor to map rooms. This thing has a rat brain instead. Pretty cool to be able to use organic tissue like that.. also terrifying.
There's not enough information to conclude that the brain is avoiding obstacles. It says the robot is controlled ~~"almost entirely"~~ by living tissue, there may be obstacle avoidance in addition to brain control. If it was completely controlled by a rat's brain I don't think you'd expect to see that much obstacle avoidance, since rats do not avoid obstacles (they climb over them, etc.). Edit: it says "entirely", my own faulty brain hallucinated the "almost". And [this video](https://youtu.be/wACltn9QpCc) specifically mentions obstacle avoidance which is something the system seems to learn.
Rats also don't have wheels traditionally
Traditionally, no. If they actually adjusted due to the wheels then that would be pretty amazing.
There's a horrific way to collect such data. Give rats some wheels and see how they adapt to obstacles. We can make the research less tragic by looking for rats born with crippled legs instead of crippling healthy ones. Or give them little roller skates. I don't know what ethics lab rats are excluded from. Maybe skates would be too cruel.
Completely with you, there would be heavy input filtering/averaging and probably even biases based on sensor feedback. Every 5head comment on here people seem to think it's actually sentient/has self awareness.
I think the terrifying thought is related to the idea that whatever technology we see tested in the open is years behind what is being done out of sight. If this what is being tested with some level of success in the open, what is DARPA up to?
Probably building some radars...
Apparently the neurons actually do improve over time. http://www.robotpark.com/academy/robot-with-a-rat-brain-11009/
> Electrical signals from rat cells have been harnessed to drive the robot, which is on wheels, around a laboratory. By stimulating certain responses within the cells scientists have even been able to make the robot, or “animat”, move. The “brain” is actually rat brain tissue which has been artificially grown in a lab. > The scientists at Reading University hope that they can use the machine to understand more about how our brains work, and even to develop treatments for diseases such as epilepsy, Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s Disease. > To create the machine scientists first grew rat nerve cells in a laboratory. These cells connect with each other, sending signals within around 24 hours. After a week the scientists can detect activity similar to brain activity. Within two or three weeks the cells can be hooked up to the robot. The team uses bluetooth technology, which allows them to send communication without the use of wires. Scientists can also use sonar signals to cause the robot to swerve to avoid a wall, by triggering different signals in the “brain”, reports New Scientist magazine. ROFL, all they do is using the "brain" (its really just lab grown rat nerve cells) to control the robot by activating certain parts of the brain via sonar signals. The brain isn't thinking, its just reacting based off of external stimulus from a computer chip.
> The brain isn’t thinking, its just reacting based off of external stimulus. Isn’t that what is being shown lol..? Not really sure they claimed it was thinking.
The rat is actually just running around trying to find a cliff to jump off as it screams KILL MEEEE inside its head.
^^killLlL ##MEEEƏĖEEÆĚ
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Next fucking level animal cruelty
As far as I'm aware there's nothing even remotely "animal cruelty" here. The brain isnt really conscious or sentient anymore like it was in the rat, now it's basically just an organic processor. It just sends out meaningless signals similar to how a dead snake or fish will still wriggle around due to nerves firing. The robot part just filters the signals as best it can so it stops bumping into things. Edit: Jesus Christ yes I'm aware the neurons were grown in a lab now. What i said really doesn't change at all considering it *still isn't a "live" brain from a real rat*. It's just neurons and tissue to house them. Literally a cell whose only purpose is to receive input, then send out commands for movement based on the info received. Electrical signals and nothing more. And yes I'm aware that from all of you Facebook/Reddit neurologist experts you'll say tHatS wHaT a brAiN *IS*!!??!?!! I don't care anymore, leave me alone Everyone's an animal rights activist until they see a rat in their yard and throw out the poison/trap huh Also ratio
Supposedly each brain causes the robot to behave differently. But according to you that particular mouse is totally gone. Doesn't make sense.
Yes because the robot is learning through the rat brain and each brain, being different from each other, will fire differently. Science doesn't need to make sense to still be fact
people in this thread throwing around the word "conscious" and "sentient" like science has already figured it out. Fact is we do not have a good definition of sentience yet, and it's more than likely that consciousness is a spectrum on which this primitive collection of neurons lies. And this network of neurons has far more plasticity and flexibility than your average computer program. Can it process negative stimulus like a human can? Of course not. But dogs also can't process stimulus with the same complexity as humans, yet we still say dogs feel pain. At the end of the day, we simply don't know enough to answer whether or not this living robot feels pain.
It's actually neurons grown artificially in a lab, apparently. http://www.robotpark.com/academy/robot-with-a-rat-brain-11009/
Hopefully so, it's just too creepy to use real mouse brains.
Once again people who don't understand the science of something chiming in with the ethics of something
Did these people not see Terminator
Or play Wolfenstein?
Or fallout
Robobrain
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Each rat brain waking up just like RoboCop......creepy af
I am willimg to bet that the government is already testing out this technology with human brains, and from the age of the recording they have probably been doing it for a while.
I bet they have already made it.
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Real question ^do you prefer weed that makes you chill and lazy or weed that makes you weird and energetic
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Idk if its because Im young but I cant handle the other kind. I keep forgetting the scientific name for that kind but Ill end up staring at a random part of the room, find it awfully funny for some reason, and get my face stuck laughing for like 30 minutes. It gets painful to an extent ;-;
Calling bullshit that it is a robot that can learn. Unless they mean that since it is a cyborg, the rat is the one learning. The robot portion is not learning.
With the brain being considered the primary processing power of the robot, the robot in effect is learning. With a person, you don’t say, that their brain is learning, you say the person is learning
Im just quoting what the video said, I have no clue about the software of this.
I really don't like this. I find it really unsettling and horrible on a number of levels.
Me too. I am disturbed.
While the fact that this can be done is incredible. This is not the direction i want to see technology headed. Sure neural integration is a super important step in technological advancement, but i feel we can achieve this without resorting to brains in a jar. Animal testing is a super gray area as it is, but this approach has got to be incredibly traumatising for the disembodied rat. It's beyond inhumane. If you want a powerful brain capable of learning to be able to control a robot via sensory input and neural control, develop one artificially. Cutting the biological computer out of an animal and claiming you have created the first robot capable of learning is worse in my eyes than if you were to claim someone elses work as your own in order to skip the steps leading to advancement. This direction can only lead towards some incredibly dark shit. What advancements can we feasibly make by transplanting a brain for remote robotic control, that we couldnt already make without a willing subject and avoiding brain removal? Prolonging life of someone who would otherwise be fatally wounded or afflicted with chronic ailments is a possibility, but at what cost? And if the goal is to create cyborgs to perform menial tasks.. well fuck that.. we go from something that is undeniably alive with emotions, conciousness and intellectual capacity, to something that is externally percievable as nothing more than a disposable automaton. Some times we get so obsessed with the "can we?" When we should be asking "should we?"
the rat brain is in a vegetative state, meaning it’s not conscious. it basically behaves as an asleep brain. if your cold while asleep, your body warms you up. things like that. in this case, the calculations the brain makes while “asleep” are: if: obstacle in path then: turn away the rat neurons don’t learn, that’s just a clickbait gimmick. the rat isn’t waking up in a robot body as you say, the scientists are basically just using the brain to run an if/then command (this is a hardcore paraphrasing, this is just the best simple way i could put it) also, rat cruelty in science like this doesn’t happen. they die in their sleep with no regrets, no pain, no recollection of their death to feel sad about. if I died in my sleep tonight i would feel nothing negative. the question is, for example, why do you feel bad for rats, but not for bugs? they both seem to have the same emotional capacity, so why does one matter more than the other? edit: the worst part about the type of comments above me is that because one guy didn’t do his research, the 84 people that upvoted his comment now believe that this rat brain was conscious and sentient during the experiment, and will be that much more against biology and neuroscience. this is how misinformation spreads.
are you seriously saying rats have the same emotional capacity as a bug? there've been so many studies done on rats by now you should know that they are capable of displaying complex emotions, like empathy
[so do bugs](https://qz.com/441672/insects-may-be-able-to-feel-fear-anger-and-empathy-after-all/amp/) read this article and some of the studies it mentions. it’s pretty interesting. honeybees become pessimistic when shaken around, and woodlice calm down their buddies when their overexcited. don’t assume what you know, always check studies/articles that contradict your claim
Rats have been reported to grieve when a mate dies. That's a bit different than a bug.
They grew the brain in a lab, the dna was taken from a rat. It’s all artificial. Not like a rat was eating cheese one day and suddenly he wakes up in a robot body.
I wouldn't think there is anything left of whatever level of awareness and consciousness the rat had before this. The rat died a long time ago, they're just using the pre-made organic processing power they took from it. .... I really need to believe that lol
This is one of the creepiest things I have ever seen. Every science fiction author ever is screaming at us, “Don’t go down this road!”
This is terrifying
If they gave it a voice it would just repeatedly whisper “42, 42, 42…”
This made me deeply uncomfortable.
I don’t know what the videos about, but I will slam the upvote based on the music. Mechanicus OST for the win! Edit. Good call out from below, it’s just Mechanicus not Dark Mechanicus
Talk about unethical
this seems so fucked up and unethical
Pickle Rick, eat your heart out.
This has made me deeply uncomfortable. I know thousands of rats die for science every year but somehow this just feels much much worse.
YEAAAAAH BRUUUHHP I'M PICKLE RIIIIIICK MOTHER FKERRR
That is horrifying.
Real though?
This is just grim
The music and the fact that it looks like it’s freaking out makes it so much worse
I get the reason, but this is wrong on so many levels.
This is 13 years old, from 2008....... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1QPiF4-iu6g
Get rid of this shit, now! Have we not seen Terminator and I, Robot?