Creepy or Not Creepy: Arm Implanted with Ear

Photo credit: NYTimes, Nina Sellars

The New York Times reported today on an Australian artist known as Stelarc who has been working on implanting an artificial, Bluetooth-enable ear in his arm. It's all part of his art exhibit that looks at the blurred lines between the living human form and its artificial extensions.

Stelarc has had to undergo a number of surgeries to implant the ear and has had to endure many infections along the way, delaying his 'art.' He plans to have a microphone installed in the ear on his arm, which will post all the sounds it records on the web.

I would say that this whole 'exhibit' is without a doubt 'creepy.'

Creepy or not creepy: Robot scientist

UK researchers have created a "Robot Scientist" which, they believe, is the first robot to "discover new knowledge" using the scientific method. The robot, named Adam (of course), posed an original hypothesis about a strain of baker's yeast, devised and executed an experiment to test that hypothesis, and interpreted the results.
The work (written up by the human scientists, not the robot one) is published this week in Science.
Creepy or not creepy?

Creepy or not creepy? Kleptomania drug

Sometimes, science fills us with awe and wonder.

Sometimes, it just creeps us out.

Remember when scientists grafted an ear on to a mouse's back? Or when a monkey operated a robot using only its mind?

It's not that these weren't great moments in science. But they carried some heavy heebie-jeebie baggage.

So, with that in mind, we're introducing a new feature called Creepy or not creepy? in which we present research that's walking that delicate line between forward-looking science and mad-scientist freak-out. Which is which? You be the judge.

Today's entry: Suppressing the compulsion to steal.

I think we're all in agreement that, aside from those Jean Valjean-stealing-a-loaf-of-bread-to-feed-his-starving-family-type situations, stealing is probably a bad thing. But it sure seems to make kleptomaniacs happy. Now, researchers at the University of Minnesota School of Medicine have given self-described kleptomaniacs a drug called naltrexone, which kills the "rush" compulsive stealers get from a good pilfer.

So is this the sweet relief kleptomaniacs (and other addicts) have been waiting for, or something more sinister? And who gets to decide which "thrills" are acceptable and which should be medicated away?