Science's latest frontier � headless humans

As long as the word "human" is in there somewhere, the general public will never allow such a thing. We need to create / breed a "thing" that is basically a blob full of nice human organs to harvest...this blob would probably have to originally be a human with maybe it's legs, arms and head genetically removed, and double of each organ crammed in or something. The organism needs to resemble nothing more than an animal or a bit of machinery before the public will accept it.

I think genetically engineering a headless human irradicates a few moral issues people would have with it, since without the brain it's basically something thats not self-aware, then technically it wouldn't care about life at all. But if its derived from humans, and is alive, then would that make it human life?

Give it a few years. Opinions change.

Pretty soon every doctor's office will have a storeroom full of these things.

Something about this concept really disgusts me. Call me old-fashioned if you like, but the idea of deliberately robbing a potentially sentient human being of its life for 'harvesting' of any kind really disgusts me.

I'm all for stem cell research, and abortion is really none of my business as a male, but anything like this reeks of bad science fiction.

But if you modified this "creature" enough so that it was basically nothing but a lump of flesh designed to support human organs for transplants, it wouldn't be classed as a sentient being. It wouldn't have a brain. Would not survive without being plugged into machines, and wouldn't be able to reproduce by itself, let alone move. It would just be a really really weird container for holding human organs.

Originally posted by LordGoofus
But if you modified this "creature" enough so that it was basically nothing but a lump of flesh designed to support human organs for transplants, it wouldn't be classed as a sentient being. It wouldn't have a brain. Would not survive without being plugged into machines, and wouldn't be able to reproduce by itself, let alone move. It would just be a really really weird container for holding human organs.

And would you be first in line to volunteer and work with them in a lab? I think the disgust, emotional and physical sickness, and depression that would kick in after being around something like that for any given period of time would be a modern day version of the psychological after-effects of nuclear testing with humans nearby, Nazi experimentation on Jewish bodies, etc...

I'm not against cloning...but this?...I think there is a line to draw...even for mice (and yes, I know they do far worse things to mice and other animals)

[edit on 11/5/2004 by EnronOutrunHomerun]

[edit on 11/5/2004 by EnronOutrunHomerun]

I'm not saying there would be ALOT of dsgust about it, but i mean, look at the extreme disgust and even repulsion people had years back at the thought of having to sit next to a black person? Nowadays any decent, intelligent person looks back at that and laughs and wonders how people could have been to silly back then.

But if you think about it, how would harvesting organs from a blob of flesh which exists purely to keep these organs alive & grow them be any more gross that working at a meatworks gutting cows as they get carried around the room hanging from hooks? It's a bit of a touchy issue but I think there is no serious abuse issues if the "blob" is missing so many parts that it can't even be classed as an animal or human. There would only a need for a change in the way people think (and I'm not saying that is something easily done). This could just be the start of the next "age" of human existance. We've done the age of technology, we've moved into nanotechnology, and biotechnology is the next logical, evolutionary or technological step.

Hey I will work around these things if it pays well. I am sure it would be a rather disturbing sight, but would amount to no more than workign in a meat factory. I have unfortunately seen someone gutted open in Bogota when I was a little kid. Guts turn red pretty quick once they spill out of the stomach area.

I think we have to ask the important question:

Is extending our lifetime worth breeding headless humans as 'spare parts'?

I mean we always see the Sci-Fi Flick of the alien culture coming to Earth and destorying us because we destory ourselves or something along those lines.

Simple question, why do we need to prolong our mortality when we are all just killing each other?

Hooo Boy!! People ain't dumb enough already. Let's make em without heads. Literally.
(purposely avoids any reference to political bent and how would you know type jokes)

Originally posted by Odd
Something about this concept really disgusts me. Call me old-fashioned if you like, but the idea of deliberately robbing a potentially sentient human being of its life for 'harvesting' of any kind really disgusts me.

Well put. I agree completely. I believe (note that this is my personal belief and I'm not imposing it on anyone) that it is morally wrong to do what this topic discusses doing. The fact is that the entity could have been sentient makes even its creation murder in my eyes.

What about cloning just a body part like a heart or a liver if someone needs a transplant?

Yeah, I used to watch Star Trek....

Originally posted by OddSomething about this concept really disgusts me.

I completely and totally agree. I can't exactly [put my finger on it, as said, it would not have self awareness, but something here just disgusts me and says, no....this isn't right.

Ok hello it wouldnt have a brain! It is equivalent to a vegetable or any kind of plant. We grow all kinds of plants for food and harvest them, what the difference in growing meat and harvesting them for saving lives? If you are saying that a sack full of meat with no brain on life support could have been sentient and it is moraly unacceptable to do so, then you would agree that all that corn or potatoes could have been sentient and is morally unacceptable to do the same to that stuff.

finally the perfect woman!!! good body, and no mouth to talk back. sorry couldn't resist. lol.

Something about this makes me think of either the �head museum� from Futurama or the scene in the Matrix where humans were being �grown�. While the thought of this may sound horrible in some ways, there is a definite need for organs and this would fill it.
From an ethical standpoint; this would be a lightning rod.

Myself, I�m undecided.

BG

Originally posted by Amethyst
What about cloning just a body part like a heart or a liver if someone needs a transplant?

I'd be all for this, and the fact of the matter is that this would be a lot simpler than the profound genetic reengineering that would have to occur in order to create these horrible quasi-humans that most of you seem so eager to see in our hospitals and/or supermarkets.

Originally posted by DYepes
Ok hello it wouldnt have a brain! It is equivalent to a vegetable or any kind of plant. We grow all kinds of plants for food and harvest them, what the difference in growing meat and harvesting them for saving lives? If you are saying that a sack full of meat with no brain on life support could have been sentient and it is moraly unacceptable to do so, then you would agree that all that corn or potatoes could have been sentient and is morally unacceptable to do the same to that stuff.

The lack of a brain does not make it equivalent to a vegetable or any kind of plant. My great grandmother spent a week on life support before passing away, and was completely incapable of percieving or interacting with the world; her brain was dead, functionless, worthless... it may as well not even have been there... but was she still a human? You bet your arse she was, and I'd fight any man that said differently. Call me uncivilised if you like, but I'm not the one that wants to breed mindless commodity-beings out of human genetic material.

You're forgetting a few things... in order for one of these things to survive, it would have to have at least those parts of the brain responsible for the subtle biochemical regulation of these organs you covet.

It is one thing for a pregnant woman whose circumstances simply cannot afford the time and money needed to raise a child to have an abortion; the child will never live, but these abominations you propose would exist neither in life or death, and would die only when they had outlived their usefulness to society.

And it is one thing to take stem cells from the umbilical tissue of a willing mother for research that could save many lives and salvage others from crippling diseases or injuries.

But to rend apart human genetic material and craft it into a creature only alive enough to produce and maintain organs that are surgically removed as soon as a natural human has need of them... that whole concept really disgusts me.

What gives you or I any more right to live than the human zygotes that you propose we destroy? This whole thing just isn't right.

[edit on 11/11/2004 by Odd]