Dr. Barnhart’s project examines the ethical challenges of Cerebroids cum Silico (CCSs) – biohybrid entities that combine human brain organoids with silicon-based technologies such as AI. Inspired by systems like DishBrain, where neuronal cultures learned to play Pong in a simulated environment and were described as exhibiting “sentient” or sentience-like behavior, the project will develop a scalable, complexity-based ethical framework to assess CCSs’ moral status by analyzing their cognitive and behavioral capacities. The work aims to provide practical guidance for researchers and to inform broader debates on governing emerging biotechnologies.
A list of all the awarded grants can be found here.