[EvaH (OP)]

Paul wants to know:

Einstein's brain has apparently been preserved, presumably in formaldehyde, but if you hooked his brain up to a blood supply and some sort of electrochemical solution, how would you get his brain to work and wouldn't it be devoid of thoughts? If it had been possible before he died for him to wear a hat of sensors so his brain patterns could be recorded, and then try to feed them through his brain again, would that help? I haven't read his biography yet but if he were in pain before his demise I assume there may be brain signals contaminating any creative signals.

What do you think?

[DeepSpace]

Paul wants to know:

Einstein's brain has apparently been preserved, presumably in formaldehyde, but if you hooked his brain up to a blood supply and some sort of electrochemical solution, how would you get his brain to work and wouldn't it be devoid of thoughts? If it had been possible before he died for him to wear a hat of sensors so his brain patterns could be recorded, and then try to feed them through his brain again, would that help? I haven't read his biography yet but if he were in pain before his demise I assume there may be brain signals contaminating any creative signals.

What do you think?

So far as I am aware, Albert Einstein’s brain was returned to a relative round about three decades after having been cut into sections. 

I remember reading something about the present ability to grow functional brains.  From what I read, there is a lab which was growing ‘sorts’ of brains for research.  I say ‘sorts’ because the brains were/are in a very simple state due to debate as to whether a conscious human brain outside of a body can become aware of its’ surroundings and therefore encounter some inconvenience.  So the brains were not conscious.  I think, however, that since the brain would not have learned what it would be like to be inside a human head, then it would not be inconvenienced.

[evan_au]

Einstein's brain has apparently been preserved, presumably in formaldehyde

A lot of museum specimens have been preserved in formaldehyde.

Formaldehyde breaks the DNA backbone, and bonds to the DNA and RNA, thus immediately stopping any life processes.
- This prevents decay (the original idea)
- But it also blocks DNA decoding (the modern ideal)
- Since DNA transcription is essential for operation of neurones, it is safe to say that Einstein is now brain-dead
- Modern geneticists would love to sequence many old museum samples (especially extinct species), but so far that has proved impossible.

A team at Stanford claim to have discovered a catalyst which removes formaldehyde from RNA, allowing the possibility of decoding RNA from preserved specimens.
See: https://news.stanford.edu/2015/08/03/formaldehyde-catalyst-kool-080315/