Definitions
Neuroethics
Because neuroethics is a new term and a new approach to ethics, there is not a set definition. William Safire gives the following definition, “neuroethics [is] the examination of what is right and wrong, good and bad, about the treatment of, perfection of, or unwelcome invasion of and worrisome manipulation of the human brain.”[1] Some see neuroethics as a subcategory of bioethics, while others emphasize that, because neuroethics brings new ethical questions, it should be approached as a new field. Mitchell et al. write that neuroethics is “a new subbranch of bioethics [that] deals specifically with the questions that emerge from the cybernetic, electromagnetic, and pharmacological manipulations of the human brain. The ethical issues of brain enhancement have special moral significance because of the close association of brain function with thinking, personhood, free will, and behavior.” [2] Roskies, however, refuses to put neuroethics as a subcategory of bioethics. She argues that neuroethics is a new and important field, not merely a subdivision of bioethics, because “the intimate connection between our brains and ourselves generates distinctive questions that beg the interplay between ethical and neuroscientific thinking . . . These are the issues that warrant the introduction of a new era of intellectual and social discourse.”[3]Furthermore, she rightly distinguishes between “the ethics of neuroscience” and the “neuroscience of ethics,”[4] which seeks to understand “the neurobiological basis for moral reasoning.”[5]
Enhancement/ Enhancers
Enhancers can be distinguished as pharmacological enhancers (i.e. Ritalin, Prozac), natural enhancers (i.e. smoking, crossword puzzles, private tutoring) and technological enhancers (i.e. NeuroNexus microchip). Moreover, brain enhancers differ from bodily enhancers, because “unlike steroids, which mainly affect the body, cognitive treatments/enhancers affect specifically the brain—its thinking, its feeling, its ability to make decisions and act on them.”[6] Thus, this type of enhancer raises neuroethical problems as it has the ability to change one’s personality.[7]The controversy lies not so much in the therapeutic use of such drugs (or devices), but in its use by a “healthy” population. The Hasting Center writes:
An enhancement is a nontherapeutic intervention intended to improve or extend a normal human trait. Cosmetic surgery to achieve a younger, more attractive appearance is perhaps the most obvious example. However, with the rapid growth of medical and biotechnology advances, many other possibilities are on the horizon. Would you take a drug to feel happier? Would you undergo gene therapy to run faster? Would you use a neuroimplant to boost your memory? Should you? Should anyone? And, particularly in an Olympics year, what are the boundaries between enhancement and normalcy?[8]
Therapy, embellishment, prevention, or enhancement
These manipulations of the brain can be perceived in different categories. It is helpful to distinguish between prevention, therapy, embellishment, and enhancement. The line is often grey between enhancement, embellishment, therapy, and/or prevention. Here, therapy is understood as the cure of a malfunction or disease, and embellishment, as beautification and not as an ontological alteration. It is also helpful to be reminded that plastic surgery was first used therapeutically and now it is used beyond therapy.[9]
Transhumanism
Transhumanists are a group of interdisciplinary individuals who work together in order to enhance human physical and intellectual capacities. They want to control their own abilities to evolve in what might be a post-human form.
The Singularity
[1] William Safire quoted in Walter Glannon, “Introduction,” in Defining Right and Wrong in Brain Science, ed. Walter Glannon (NY: Dana Press, 2007), xiv.
[2] Mitchell, Biotechnology, 130.
[3] Adnia Roskies, “Neuroethics for the New Millennium,” in Defining, 13.
[4] Ibid.
[5] Judy Illes, Neuroethics, Defining the Issues in Theory, Practice, and Policy (NY: Oxford University Press, 2006), 3.
[6] Ibid.
[7] Of course one who uses bodily enhancers will also affect one’s mind.
[8] http://www.thehastingscenter.org/Issues/Default.aspx?v=242.
[9] The Dana Foundation, “The Neuroethics of Enhancement,” accessed 18 July 2009, available from http://www.dana.org/events/detail.aspx?id=7854.