"More ethical" I still agree that we feel this more ethical to harm other species, just like it could be less ethical to harm family than a pure stranger.
Human is an animal. It is an Ape from the beginning.
And the first thing that the monkey that actually got its head transplanted on another monkey body was to bite a nearby surgeon, before to fall unconscious and die. So I guess it was painful.
It was not a head exchange, and the monkey that loss its body was not saved.
Would it be ethical to you if 100 Houyhnhnms[1] got cured from paralysis if hundred human lost their head?
Of course, I'm not aware of any Houyhnhnm existing, so this can not be applied.
The most dangerous part of the whole surgery is what happens if something goes wrong midway after they've cut the heads out?
Scenario 1: Irrecoverable scenario where they can't sew the head to the new body. Now what? Will they sew it back to the original body? Let the guy die(What does this even mean at this stage)?
Scenario 2: Head can be put on new body but they can't do it all properly, when and how do they call it quits? What will be the state of the guy? Will they just him?
Other unknown unknowns.
Apart from the fact that the patient has taken a leap of faith, to prefer death over suffering a medical condition all his life. You have to say the doctors involved in this, and you need some really crazy amounts of courage to even attempt something like this.
