 A brain implant changed a woman's life, helping her to manage to her epilepsy. Then the company that made the implant went under and the implant was removed against her will. This is the grim meathook future we were promised and I hate it. https://www.technologyreview.com/2023/05/25/1073634/brain-implant-removed-against-her-will/ 24 comments
@jacobrogers256 The patient and the research team which was developing and trialing the implant were both Australian according to the article. Australia already has a nationalized single-payer Medicare system.  @staidwinnow @evacide I don't think that's a particularly accurate description of what happened here. Ms Leggett suffered from huge problems from her epilepsy and volunteered for an early-stage clinical trial. The device worked well for her but not well enough across all trial participants to get approval for wider use. The article isn't exactly clear why it had to be removed but it seems for safety reasons rather than being repossessed by heartless capitalists. My comment is more general than that. Free lab monkey and insulation from legal troubles seems to apply though. @evacide Holy shit. Is there any way we could crowdfund a new country? Buy back Alaska or something like that.  @jocarren@lile.cl @evacide@hachyderm.io lowkey colonizer moment? @evacide It’s objectivism and a mixture of capitalism and Calvinism at work. So, many of those in larger corporations talk about Christianity while believing themselves in predestination. When the self-imposed purity is removed all they are, are corporate harlots. Married to sin and vice. I know my views might offend some in religious leanings, I’m a liberal Baptist. @evacide we could have learned this lesson decades ago. The FREEHAND system was a successful neuroprosthetic approved in 1987. It changed the lives of ~250 patients; dozens implanted / yr. They became victims when investors pushed for more scale, and the business failed in an expansion effort. Without maintenance, patients became the victims of a medical device orphaned market. Many described the experience as feeling like re-suffering their traumatic injuries as a result. @evacide and another similar story, from last year: https://spectrum.ieee.org/bionic-eye-obsolete @evacide I realize I’m spitting into the hurricane of both fediverse subculture and the culture at large with these views @evacide I haven’t, sorry. I don’t think I’d like him based on https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Max_Weber, though @evacide tracks very closely to the nightmare future envisioned in so many cyberpunk stories. |
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@evacide yay, capitalism