The neuroimaging work is interesting from a research point of view, but what ultimately matters in a study like this are the clinical results. These were promising, but I think the headlines are over-optimistic. This is very much a preliminary study and the results seem mixed to me.
Yea, after learning that the patient died a few months later from a lung infection (after being kept alive for 15 years) yet the doctors/researchers claim there is "no link", it makes this whole story sound like BS. I could see "a link is unknown", or something like that but concluding "no link" from that info is impossible and even unreasonable.
I'll even allow that by stimulating the vagus nerve he had more unconscious movements than before and they misinterpreted it as responding to the environment, so its not totally malicious. But that team has given a very strong reason not to trust anything they say.
The neuroimaging work is interesting from a research point of view, but what ultimately matters in a study like this are the clinical results. These were promising, but I think the headlines are over-optimistic. This is very much a preliminary study and the results seem mixed to me.
http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/neuroskeptic/2017/09/28/co...