Putting your head on another body?

[Deleted]

Hey guys. I was fascinated, a great deal too, when I heard about Valery Spiridonov, a lifelong sufferer of the rare genetic Werdnig-Hoffman muscle wasting disease. If all goes according to plan, he's going to allow a doctor to sever his head from his broken body and transplant it onto a braindead persons donated body. Do you think it'll succeed? Or will the body reject the new ... head?
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/arti...-Canavero.html

There appears to be a lot of skepticism around this one. Some scientists (or just this one in particular) claims it could make him suffer a fate worse than death. http://www.sciencealert.com/world-s-...rse-than-death

This week, 30-year-old Russian man, Valery Spiridonov, announced that he will become the subject of the first human head transplant ever performed, saying he volunteers to have his head removed and installed on another person’s body.

If this sounds like some kind of sick joke, we’re right there with you, but unfortunately, this is all too real. Earlier this year, Italian surgeon Sergio Canavero outlined the transplant technique he intends to follow in the journal Surgical Neurology International, and said he planned to launch the project at the annual conference of the American Academy of Neurological and Orthopaedic Surgeons (AANOS) in the US in June, where he will invite other researchers to join him in his head transplant dream.

Thoughts?

[Vea Lea]

i think it shouldnt even be tried

[Casagrande]

I doubt he'll wake up. If he does he will almost certainly be paralyzed, on a ventilator, etc. for the rest of his presumably not very long life.

[Frozenbeef]

My thoughts are the following...

[Deleted]

My thoughts are the following...

Haha Mars Attacks... best scifi comedy of the 90s?

[Deleted]

Seeing the Presidents dog die always made me upset.

That's what happens to things that should not be I'm afraid :/

[yetgdhfgh]

Would certainly make masturbation a very interesting experience indeed especially if you are a dudes head put on a womans body!

[Sunseeker]

I'm mostly curious how he solved reconnecting the spinal cord to the brain.

[Pull My Finger]

Well I'm not adept in this kind of medical procedure, I don't know if that's actually doable, and how high or low the chances are of it even working in a desirable way. But he's making himself a guinea pig for a pretty crazy experiment and I guess there's ample reason for skepticism. I don't even want to know the neuropsychological and physical implications of the body rejecting this new foreign object. Just scratching the surface seems like absolute horror.

But: he would be the man made pioneer of what Photoshop was nearly exclusively used for in the 90es in private households: putting heads of people on top of wrong bodies. And that, you gotta admit, is pretty cool.

[Mellomania]

Well I'm not adept in this kind of medical procedure, I don't know if that's actually doable, and how high or low the chances are of it even working in a desirable way. But he's making himself a guinea pig for a pretty crazy experiment and I guess there's ample reason for skepticism. I don't even want to know the neuropsychological and physical implications of the body rejecting this new foreign object. Just scratching the surface seems like absolute horror.

But: he would be the man made pioneer of what Photoshop was nearly exclusively used for in the 90es in private households: putting heads of people on top of wrong bodies. And that, you gotta admit, is pretty cool.

So instead of waking up without a kidney in a bathtub you might wake up in a bathtub with a new body if you look good enough?

[MerinPally]

I'm not hopeful but it's interesting. It being interesting is pretty much good enough of a reason to do it provided all participants are fully aware and prepared to do it. The guy is going to die soon anyway, he hasn't any other options so I understand his reasoning, still takes balls. It's not like this could be done widespread anyway so the usual slippery slope fallacies don't really apply (as if they did before).

We already do organ donation, this is just organ donation but the organs are kept in their original packaging.

[Deleted]

I'm mostly curious how he solved reconnecting the spinal cord to the brain.

According to the article the head is basically glued to the spinal cord with a new wonder glue. After four weeks in coma the head and body should have taken care of the rest in a healing proces where they slowly merge together.
In a way it is more a full body transplantation than a head transplantation. A Individual can never get a new head obviously.

[MerinPally]

According to the article the head is basically glued to the spinal cord with a new wonder glue. After four weeks in coma the head and body should have taken care of the rest in a healing proces where they slowly merge together.
In a way it is more a full body transplantation than a head transplantation. A Individual can never get a new head obviously.

The "glue" is basically like what you use when cloning plants. You know when you take cuttings then you dip them in some chemical to make roots grow? Same thing really, this causes fat cells to grow together and into each other to seal the gap.

[Deleted]

Due to his condition everyday life must seem like death anyway. Why not risk big to potentially win big?

[Shennanigans]

Are they keeping the brain and spinal column intact for the procedure? I can't imagine how else it could work.

[MerinPally]

Are they keeping the brain and spinal column intact for the procedure? I can't imagine how else it could work.

Going to saw both off at the same point in terms of where neurones are placed and then place them together using a chemical to stimulate growth. The fat should connect up and join the tissues. Both parts will be kept "alive" but in a sort of coma state until a while after the procedure is done I imagine, and the neurones should grow into each other hopefully using a bunch of growth stimulating chemicals and I imagine immunosuppressants but I'm not sure. Was reading about this briefly at like 2am.

[Shennanigans]

yikes well I wish the dude luck hope they have atleast tried this on a monkey first to see how successful it is

[Terridon]

We can't repair a broken back, and you want them to server all of that, and connect it again? I highly doubt it's going to work with that superglue stuff.
Sounds more like a hoax than anything else.
In future. Sure. But currently we're not remotely close to it.

[MerinPally]

There were experiments done years ago to isolate a head of an animal to keep it alive, maybe even attach it to other bodies. They lived for maybe a few days and then died.

It's a hell of a leap if it's possible, but this guy reckons he can do it. I have my doubts. The guy is going to die soon anyway and very selflessly he's going to (like 100% certainty) cut short his life to aid knowledge and progress. He's probably not got long to live anyway and is almost certainly not enjoying life from the way he talks so if he's ready to die then it makes sense. Takes balls as I said previously but understandable.

[Kujako]

People are terminally bored in much of Russia...