Botox 4 the brain

Human Cloning, likely to happen before 2050

Scientific American

According to “12 Events that will change Everything,” an article in the latest issue of Scientific American, the cloning of humans will likely happen before 2050. How likely? This article contemplates “12 possibilities and rate their likelihood of happening by 2050” (36) and use the following scale: Very unlikely, Unlikely, 50-50, Likely, and Almost certain. We shall then prepare ourselves to meet our Mini-Me(s).

The author, Charles Q. Choi, suggests that since the cloning of Dolly, the further step is inevitably the cloning of humans. However, Choi recognizes, like most scientists would, that the procedure is not only more complex with humans, but also raise some ethical concerns. Should we, for example, clone someone without her consent?

Nonetheless, human cloning would have some advantages and new possibilities. A clone might have a better life as she could learn from her old ‘self.’ If someone learns at only 25 that she is talented in music, she could tell her 5 year old clone to take music lessons. Moreover, extinct species like the Neanderthal could be revived.

Finally, Choi recognizes that the ‘yuck’ factor can play a major role in human cloning.  We might find the idea of cloning ourselves disturbing now, the same way we did with IVF.  But in a few years, we might not even think much about it.

Aristotle & Human Enhancement

Nicomachean Ethics

For Aristotle, good conduct produces a morally good person. For him, “we become just by performing just acts” (32). Thus, in a sense ‘doing’ precedes ‘being’. But how can we even know what a ‘good’ act look like, if we are not good? In The Nicomachean Ethics, which looks more like a self-help book rather than a book on moral philosophy, Aristotle suggests a way to enable us to make good decision.

At the end of book II, “Moral Goodness,” he suggests some practical advice. First, keep away from extremes; choose the lesser evil if necessary. Second, notice your own errors and drag yourself in the opposite direction. Third, beware of pleasures and pleasant things.

Concerning the advice on keeping away from extremes, Aristotle expands. For him, the key is to choose the right ‘mean’ between two extremes. For instance, if one is unsure how to act between fear and confidence, she will follow Aristotle’s advice by choosing between two extremes: rashness or cowardice. Rashness is an excess of confidence, while cowardice is a deficiency of confidence.

Here is a graph:

Human Enhancement

While reading Aristotle, the argument presented by Erik Parens in the debate about human enhancement comes to mind. In the second part of his essay, “Towards a more fruitful Debate about Enahncement,” Parens looks at the two different frameworks used by critics and proponents of enhancement. Parens distinguishes between two philosophical/ethical frameworks that “people seem to come to the academic debate about enhancement technologies.” The first framework desires “to mend and transform ourselves and the world.” Because of this desire to create and change creation, Parens names this framework: Creativity. The second framework takes a different approach. It reminds us that we are not creators and that life is a gift. This view, which he calls Gratitude, tends to let nature be. He writes, “According to Genesis, and it seems to me much of Judaism, our responsibility is not merely to be grateful and remember that we are not the creators of the whole. It is also our responsibility to use our creativity to mend and transform ourselves and the world. As far as I can tell, Genesis and Judaism do not exhort us to choose between gratitude and creativity. Rather . . . it is our job to figure out how to maintain that fertile tension, making sure that neither stance gets more than its share” (189).

This search for a “fertile tension” sounds indeed Aristotelian as Parens seeks for the right mean between two extremes.

Here is another graph:

Parens and Aristotle may be on to something important here.

Coming out in theaters: Inception

Inception Trailer from Ab Aeterno on Vimeo.

‘We will be able to live to 1,000′

Dr Aubrey de Grey from the University of Cambridge is a fascinating fellow. In a 2004 article on BBC News, he explains why we will be able to live to 1,000 years.

Life expectancy is increasing in the developed world. But Cambridge University geneticist Aubrey de Grey believes it will soon extend dramatically to 1,000. See the article here.

Question: Suppose we can live to 1,000, does that mean that we should?

Beyond Humanity? The Ethics of Biomedical Enhancement

Biotechnologies already on the horizon will enable us to be smarter, have better memories, be stronger and quicker, have more stamina, live longer, be more resistant to diseases, and enjoy richer emotional lives. To some of us, these prospects are heartening; to others, they are dreadful. In Beyond Humanity a leading philosopher offers a powerful and controversial exploration of urgent ethical issues concerning human enhancement. These raise enduring questions about what it is to be human, about individuality, about our relationship to nature, and about what sort of society we should strive to have. Allen Buchanan urges that the debate about enhancement needs to be informed by a proper understanding of evolutionary biology, which has discredited the simplistic conceptions of human nature used by many opponents of enhancement. He argues that there are powerful reasons for us to embark on the enhancement enterprise, and no objections to enhancement that are sufficient to outweigh them.

The creation of chimeras using human genes

“Geoffrey Bourne, former director of the Emory University primate center, once stated that ‘it would be very important scientifically to try to produce an ape-human cross.’ Other researchers have suggested using women as ‘hosts’ for the embryos of chimpanzees or gorillas” (See Francis Fukuyama, Our Posthuman Future, Consequences of the Biotechnology Revolution, 207. )

“Toward a More Fruitful Debate About Enhancement,” Review

Toward A More Fruitful Debate

In this essay, Erik Parens wants to “illuminate the structure of the debate” in neuroethics, particularly in the issues

related with “the enhancement of human traits and capacities” (181). He rightly thinks that if “we get better at noticing the structure of the debate about enhancement, we might engage in a more fruitful debate” (180). He points out three important issues.

First, he shows how critics and proponents of enhancement technology both seek to be authentic human beings. He states, “[M]any in fact are striving to live up to the moral ideal of authenticity. Whether or not they achieve it, they aspire to find self-fulfillment and to become who they really are” (182). Unfortunately, critics and proponent differ in their understanding of authenticity. He writes, “[T]he knockers and boosters –or critics and proponents–of ‘enhancement technologies’ share the moral ideal of authenticity, but they understand authenticity differently: they have different views about what it consists in, and thus about how to achieve it” (183). For the critics, enhancement can be a threat to who we really are. They would worry that “mood-alternating drugs will separate us from the actions and experiences that normally accompany those moods . . . we will be separated from who we really are and from how the world really is” (184). On the other hand, for the proponents, enhancement can help us be more authentic. They sees enhancement not as “a threat to authenticity, but rather as tools that can facilitate our authentic efforts at self-discovery and self-creation” (186).This disagreement about authenticity comes from a disagreement raised by two different frameworks used to look at the world, which Parens analyses in the second part of his essay.

Second, he looks at the two different frameworks used by critics and proponents. This section echoes one of his earlier essays. In “Creativity, gratitude, and the enhancement debate” and in this essay, Parens distinguishes between two philosophical/ethical frameworks that “people seem to come to the academic debate about enhancement technologies.” The first framework desires “to mend and transform ourselves and the world.” Because of this desire to create and change creation, Parens names this framework: Creativity. The second framework takes a different approach. It reminds us that we are not creators and that life is a gift. This view, which he calls Gratitude, tends to let nature be. He writes, “According to Genesis, and it seems to me much of Judaism, our responsibility is not merely to be grateful and remember that we are not the creators of the whole. It is also our responsibility to use our creativity to mend and transform ourselves and the world. As far as I can tell, Genesis and Judaism do not exhort us to choose between gratitude and creativity. Rather . . . it is our job to figure out how to maintain that fertile tension, making sure that neither stance gets more than its share” (189).

Third, Parens discusses two cases to illustrate how critics and proponents can learn from each other. He discusses a problem for an honest proponent and then for an honest critic. First, he demonstrates that in some cases a pill (or enhancement) might not foster authenticity, but hinders it. He points out the example of the creation of a pill who could engender the “perception of intimacy” in order to encourage a woman to experience the desire for sexual intercourse. He rightly thinks that “honest proponents will acknowledge that the idea of a pill that would, in the absence of genuine intimacy, create the perception of intimacy is perplexing” (193). Indeed, the person taking this pill would not live truly or authentically. Second, he demonstrates how, in some cases, enhancement might help someone to become who she/he truly is. He gives the examples of transgenders, to whom surgeries enable them to change their anatomies in order to become more authentic. He writes, “Different from the ‘pill of intimacy,’ which undermines the purpose of achieving genuine intimacy and relationship, [transgender]’s surgeries seem to promote that purpose” (195).

Parens is really helpful in distinguishing both frameworks used in the enhancement debate in neuroethics. Instead of focusing on major differences they might have, he tries to make them work together. He argues that the biblical story and Judaism contains both frameworks. He acknowledges that “it is our job to figure out how to maintain that fertile tension” between Creativity and Gratitude (189). Unfortunately, he does not reflect on how we could have those two frameworks working together. It would be helpful to understand the cultural mandate in order to understand in what ways humans are allowed or able to alter nature. Furthermore, the Fall has not only affected human creativity but has also forced us to be innovative in order to fight sickness and diseases. One will need to take this in consideration in order to make those two frameworks work together.

Parens is also right in pointing out that both critics and proponents seek to become authentic human beings. The idea of authenticity raises some problems which religious people and theologians have struggle with for a long time. As Sandel writes in The Case Against Perfection, “To grapple with the ethics of enhancement, we need to confront question largely lost from view in the modern world–question about the moral status of nature, and about the proper stance of human beings towards the world. Since these questions verge on theology, modern philosophers and political theorist tend to shrink from them. But our new powers of biotechnology make the unavoidable” (Sandel, 9). I suppose religious people also desire to become authentic human beings, but differ about what is authenticity and how one should achieve it. One may wonder if someone should be encouraged to take an enhancer in order to become fully human.