Table 2 General, typical, variant, and uncommon subdomains within each theme considered, based on the qualitative analysis of researchers’ stance over the ethical discussion on HCOs
From: Human cerebral organoids: the ethical stance of scientists
General themes, domains, and sub-domains | Frequency |
|---|---|
On consciousness and moral status | |
Consciousness | |
Skepticism about consciousness emerging in HCOs today | General |
Skepticism about consciousness emerging in HCOs in the future | Variant |
Repercussions on the usage of HCOs if consciousness is detected | Typical |
Consciousness in HCOs would be similar to that of flies or grasshoppers | Uncommon |
Moral status | |
There is no ethically relevant difference between HCOs and other tissue products | Typical |
There is an ethically relevant difference between HCOs and other tissue products | Variant |
Human/non-human chimeras | |
Chimeras are no different compared to other animals without HCOs grafts | General |
Personal ethical concerns | |
No personal ethical concern | Typical |
Personal experience with HCOs | |
HCOs as “mini-brains” | |
HCOs are not “mini-brains” | Typical |
Rejection of the usage of the term “mini-brains” | Variant |
Acceptance of the usage of the term “mini-brains” | Variant |
Effective contribution of HCOs to research | |
Disease modeling as future application | Typical |
Treatment development as future application | Variant |
Study of healthy human brain development as future application | Variant |
Skepticism on the effective usefulness of HCOs | Variant |
Personal attitude toward the ethical debate | |
Positive attitude toward the ethical debate | Typical |
Informed consent | |
Need of specific informed consent for donating for HCOs | Typical |
No need of specific informed consent for donating for HCOs | Variant |
Guidelines and regulations | |
Current guidelines are sufficient | Typical |
Current guidelines should be updated | Variant |
Impact of ethics over research | |
Concerns that the ethical discussion could slow research down | Variant |
No concern that the ethical discussion could slow research down | Typical |
Personal attitude toward the public | |
Good relationship between science and public | Variant |
Science-public relationship could be improved | Variant |
Poor relationship between science and public | Variant |