Via Reason and Popular Science:
…the technology required for successful human-head transplantation is finally here, and that it could be used to help people with irreparable damage to their bodies and spinal cords.
Points:
- “…scientists would have to perform multiple successful experiments on primates, Stephen Latham, a bioethicist at Yale University, says. And none of those, he believes, would be condoned by any reasonable ethics committee.”
- “…a head transplant is a bit outrageous for the needs of most patients.”
- “…doctors might be motivated to perform head-switching operations for all the wrong reasons.”
- “…the surgery would raise some thorny philosophical questions, chief among them what makes us human.”