Description
This course uses popular sci fi tropes as a vehicle for teaching science and strengthens the ability to discriminate wild claims from sound ideas.
A disembodied brain is a common narrative. Can isolated brains survive and function? Yale’s BrainEx system kept post-mortem pig brains alive. Yale spinoff Bexorg is seeking organ donations of whole human brains for research. Can they awaken, become conscious or suffer? Do they have rights? CorticalLabs has 800,000 human neurons on a chip for biocomputing along with cloud subscriptions. What about chimeras, animal-human hybrids, with implanted human brain organoids/neurons? Virtual brains and mind uploading? Join us for a fascinating tour of the science, current technologies and bioethics.
