The Null Device

Here comes the remote electronically controlled around corners trajection of frankenstein cyborg rats. What would Francis E. Dec have thought? Quite ingenious. Of course, the ethical question of running electrodes into an animal's brain and training it by stimulating its pleasure centres comes up. Though is that any more inhumane than training an animal to perform an artificial task by conventional means? (And it could be argued that the implanted rats have more fun than their regular cousins.)

There are 2 comments on "":

Posted by: np http://www.neuroprosthesis.org Fri May 3 11:29:57 2002

You can find related science news and some background info here:

<b><a href="http://www.neuroprosthesis.org/blogger.html">NeuroProsthesis News</A></b>

Posted by: Tate http://www.obscurantist.net Fri May 3 11:53:51 2002

This rat thing was mentioned here in the States on Science Friday [http://www.sciencefriday.com/] last Friday on National Public Radio. By way of contrast, they also mentioned the lamprey-controlled robots of yore [http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/sci/tech/newsid_1043000/1043001.stm].