Donating your body to medical science... before you are dead.

[ace rooster]

The premise of this thread is that you are diagnosed with a terminal illness*, which gives you an opportunity. You are going to die, but you have some choice in the manner in which it occurs (The Dumbledore dilemma). This gives you one subject for medical research where killing the subject is expected or at least not a problem. What experiment would you volunteer for?

I've come up with one serious one, and one that really fits the 'mad science' board.

Firstly, I would like to see how much pressure is survivable, and the effects of various factors at depths. This would be a test till destruction experiment, so it would be invariably fatal.

Alternatively, I would like to see how long a brain could be kept alive and conscious outside of a body. The side experiment would be trying to keep the body alive without a brain, and attempting to 'hack' the nervous system to get it to move controllably.


*Suppose for simplicities sake that your organs would not be viable for transplant.

Gentle reminder: This is not a discussion on the morality or legality of the situation, interesting though it is. It is restricted to the mad and not so mad science that is possible and useful.

[Kato]

Alternatively, I would like to see how long a brain could be kept alive and conscious outside of a body. The side experiment would be trying to keep the body alive without a brain, and attempting to 'hack' the nervous system to get it to move controllably.


Okay, even assuming this would not be a very long time I don't feel like volunteering for that :smalleek:

That said... I am rather willing to give up my body for science if not have it taken apart (in case anyone wants my probably useless spares) but something I would actually do if I didn't fear it would be pretty painful is exposure to vacuum. I'm sick and tired of us not having proof about what happens to humans in really low pressure for extended periods of time.

[NichG]

Pretty much only things which give me some extra chance of survival in some form, even if that outcome is unlikely. Cryo, destructive brain-mapping, things like that. I'm not really keen on additional suffering for sake of a result I won't personally get to enjoy.

[Peelee]

I wouldn't volunteer for a specific experiment so much as i would only volunteer if significant advancement could come out of the process. If I was John Travolta in Phenomenon, basically.

[cobaltstarfire]

A lot of people already sort of do that by participating in drug trials/experimental procedures for terminal diseases and such.

The only way I can see myself allowing my body to be put through more suffering than it ordinarily would is if I was brain dead and thus unable to actually experience the suffering, and then there's the issue of people who are locked in and not actually brain dead, which sounds extra terrible.

[Ravens_cry]

A lot of people already sort of do that by participating in drug trials/experimental procedures for terminal diseases and such.

The only way I can see myself allowing my body to be put through more suffering than it ordinarily would is if I was brain dead and thus unable to actually experience the suffering, and then there's the issue of people who are locked in and not actually brain dead, which sounds extra terrible.

Which is why brain computer interfaces are such an amazing breakthrough. With them, we can help reach out to the poor souls trapped in their own body.

[DavidSh]

Testing the LD50 of chocolate. Dark, semisweet chocolate.

[Fri]

Testing the LD50 of chocolate. Dark, semisweet chocolate.

Well, we kinda already can surmised that one, sorry :smallbiggrin:.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theobromine_poisoning

[Trixie]

Firstly, I would like to see how much pressure is survivable, and the effects of various factors at depths. This would be a test till destruction experiment, so it would be invariably fatal.

Alternatively, I would like to see how long a brain could be kept alive and conscious outside of a body. The side experiment would be trying to keep the body alive without a brain, and attempting to 'hack' the nervous system to get it to move controllably.

Actually, both of these were done. Look up axis pseudo-scientific experimentation on prisoners during WW2. Most of modern winter clothing, pressure suits, diving apparatus etc has bits of these tests somewhere in the roots. Ditto for nervous system, there were actual attempts at head transplantation - maybe we would get slightly better results with modern methods, but we would learn nothing new anyway and any ethic department worth anything would stamp research brief with big red NO if only to avoid being tainted by association.

One experiment I can see being worthwhile with this premise, though, would be space travel. Effects of limited food, background radiation, effects of magnetic belt and cosmic rays, etc. You'd need a very specific disease to not distort the end results though.

[ace rooster]

Well, we kinda already can surmised that one, sorry :smallbiggrin:.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theobromine_poisoning

it works out about 5kg, if anyone is interested. Considerably less than I thought it would be.


Our understanding of the effects of pressure on the body are still very limited, but we certainly know much more about them than we used to. There is some suggestion that many anaesthetics (including alcohol) counteract some of the dangerous effects of very high pressure, and that much of the effect of the anaesthetics is countered by high pressure! It looks like there is much to be learned about the mechanism of anaesthetics (which we actually know very little about) with this sort of experiment.

Very deep divers use a mix of oxygen, hydrogen, and nitrogen, and find it works better with the nitrogen. This is in contrast to medium depth divers, for whom the nitrogen acts as a narcotic and anaesthetic. This narcotic effect seems to cancel the effects of high pressure.

[Brother Oni]

it works out about 5kg, if anyone is interested. Considerably less than I thought it would be.

Assuming 0.7% theobromine content, 5kg of chocolate would give 35g of theobromine, which with an LD50 of 1g/kg body weight, would maybe kill a small child, assuming they could eat 5kg of dark chocolate in a single serving.

A 70kg human would need 70g of theobromine, so at 0.7%, that'd be 10kg of dark chocolate. I'm fairly sure that the sugar content would cause hypoglycaemic shock first though - the body over reacts to the massive sugar intake by over producing insulin, which causes your blood sugar to plummet and you keel over and die from (ironically, considering how much sugar you've just eaten) too little blood sugar.

Edit: Some further research indicates that some coca powders can reach as high as 10% theobromine content which would reduce the lethal dose to a mere 700g for our 70kg human, but keeping down that much dark chocolate eaten in a single dose would be tough.

[Sermil]

I would probably try to prove / disprove the Many Worlds Interpretation of QM by trying the so-call "Quantum suicide" experiment.

Basically, arrange to measure a quantum value every 2 seconds, in such a way that each measurement is independent and has a 50% chance of having value 1 and a 50% chance of having value 2. Now connect a gun to the system. Have the gun fire if the value is 1, and have the system just flash a light (no firing) if the value is 2.

Start it up. Everyone will see a random pattern of firing and flashing -- bang, flash, flash, bang, flash, bang, bang, bang. Now, get into the machine, and put the gun up to your temple, so that you will die if it fires. What happens?

Well, if most of the standard interpretations of Quantum Mechanics are right, you might see a few flashes, and then bang, you're dead. BUT, if the many worlds interpretation is correct, then you will see flash, flash, flash, flash, flash, flash -- no matter how long you sit there, the gun will never fire, until you get up, at which point the gun will start firing randomly again. This is because the gun fired in one universe and didn't fire in another -- and you are only conscious of the universe in which it didn't fire. If the flash-flash-flash-flash-flash happens, you've just proven the Many Worlds Interpretation, and, oh yes, probably proven that you, and everyone else, are actually immortal because everything that can happen, will happen, and in at least a few universes, you survive any given thing that might kill you -- and you're not aware of the universes in which you don't survive.

What's weird is that the people around you wouldn't know the outcome of the experiment -- they'd see you die either way (in most universes, at least).

Of course, this kind of immortality would suck -- we'd all be living under the curse of Tithonus, getting older and older but never dying. But at least you'd know...