What's Wrong With Growing Blobs of Brain Tissue?

What's Wrong With Growing Blobs of Brain Tissue?

An upcoming ethical quandary. “At what point would an organoid be worthy of moral status? Of respect? “At what point is it reasonable to at least discuss the question of sentience? Or conscious experience? Pain? Pleasure?” asks Christof Koch from the Allen Institute, “We’re not there, but we have to start thinking about these possibilities.” Farahany, Koch, and 15 other leading ethicists and neuroscientists have now outlined some of those issues in a new paper, based on a workshop they held last May. (The debate was vigorous: “Every one of the authors wordsmithed every line of this paper,” Farahany says.)”