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Here are the details on the grisly deaths of Elon Musk’s Neuralink monkeys (www.theverge.com)

submitted 11 months ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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[–] [email protected] 8 points 11 months ago (1 children)

From what I could tell from the article, it did not seem odd at all

Animal 15 began to lose coordination and staff observed that she would shake uncontrollably when she saw lab workers. Her condition deteriorated for months until the staff finally euthanized her. A necropsy report indicates that she had bleeding in her brain and that the Neuralink implants left parts of her cerebral cortex “focally tattered.”

Along with claiming that no monkeys have died because of a Neuralink implant, Musk has said the startup “chose terminal mon[k]eys (close to death already)” as test subjects to “minimize risk to healthy monkeys.” However, Wired cites an anonymous former employee saying that is not true: Shown a copy of Musk’s remarks on X about Neuralink’s animal subjects being “close to death already,” a former Neuralink employee alleges to WIRED the claim is “ridiculous” if not a “straight fabrication.” “We had these monkeys for a year or so before any surgery was performed,” they say. The ex-employee, who requested anonymity for fear of retaliation, says up to a year’s worth of behavioral training was necessary for the program, a time frame that would exempt subjects already close to death’s door.

This didn't seem odd to you?

[+] [email protected] -10 points 11 months ago (1 children)

To be clear it sounds like it could have been horrific. But it’s also vague enough on the details that I don’t trust it be free of some inflammatory spin. Otherwise, it sounds like something went wrong with one animal and they had to euthanise.

How wrong it went and why could be negligence or it could be experimentation that was reasonably handled. Months sounds like a long time but we don’t really know how bad it was over that period. It could have gotten bad only just before they decided to act on it. Shaking in front of lab workers doesn’t necessarily mean much, though I’m no veterinarian.

Even if it were negligence or at least some degree of indifference to the welfare of the animals, no, I don’t believe that’s odd, because that’s the world we live in. And that’s my broader point, this sort of shit is all over the place. It probably sounds bad because it’s a brain implant and there’s brain damage, but there are all sorts of ways animals can and do suffer, with farming and animal experimentation occurring all over the world.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 11 months ago (1 children)

Oh well if things are bad everywhere I guess we should never bring up anything bad ever or criticize bad behavior or try to be better. Got it 👍

[–] [email protected] 1 points 11 months ago (1 children)

Ummm … I’m criticising it, just pointing out that it’s a much bigger issue than musk doing something dodgy and missing that fact would do a disservice to animals. If you know about the state of animal experimentation and farming already, my posts don’t say anything new.

Otherwise taking down musk and neurallink and not doing anything about the broader industries out of ignorance would be negligent IMO.

Or worse, expressing outrage online while not doing something actually within your control like altering the way your actions affect animals … that’d be petty poor behaviour too IMO.