In 1968, Jürgen Habermas claimed that, in an advanced technological society, the emancipatory force of knowledge can only be regained by actively recovering the ‘forgotten experience of reflection’. In this article, we argue that, in the contemporary situation, critical reflection requires a deliberative ambiance, a process of mutual learning, a consciously organised process of deliberative and distributed reflection. And this especially applies, we argue, to critical reflection concerning a specific subset of technologies which are actually oriented towards optimising human cognition. (...) In order to create a deliberative ambiance, fostering critical upstream reflection on emerging technologies, we developed the concept of a mutual learning exercise. Building on a number of case studies, we analyse what an MLE involves, both practically and conceptually, focussing on key aspects such as ambiance and expertise, the role of ‘genres of the imagination’ and the profiles of various ‘subcultures of debate’. Ideally, an MLE becomes a contemporary version of the Socratic agora, providing a stage where multiple and sometimes unexpected voices and perspectives mutually challenge each other, in order to strength-en the societal robustness and responsiveness of emerg-ing technologies. (shrink)

The human mind has been a subject matter of study in psychology, law, science, philosophy and other disciplines. By definition, its potential is power, abilities and capacities including perception, knowledge, sensation, memory, belief, imagination, emotion, mood, appetite, intention, and action (Pardo, Patterson). In terms of role, it creates and shapes societal morality, culture, peace and democracy. Today, a rapidly advancing science–technology–artificial intelligence (AI) landscape is able to reach into the inner realms of the human mind. Technology, particularly neurotechnology (...) enables access to the human mind for research, treatment and other purposes. This enabling feature is now a growing concern. In the field of human rights, this human-science–technology interface is leading to articulation of new human rights to safeguard against modern threats. The wider usage of expressions like neurolaw and mental autonomy reflects on the emerging field of standards to protect the human mind from interference, manipulation and control. Growing literature on the subject sheds light on the human-rights-based approach to the challenge. (shrink)

Philosophy and science have always striven to make sense of the world, continuously influencing each other in the process. Their interplay paved the way for neurophilosophy, which harnesses neuroscientific insights to address traditionally philosophical questions. Given the rapid neuroscientific and technological advances in recent years, this paper argues that philosophers who wish to tackle intractable philosophical problems and influence public discourse and policies should engage in neuro-techno-philosophy. This novel type of inquiry describes the transdisciplinary endeavor of philosophers, (neuro)scientists, (...) and others to anticipate the societal implications of the impending transformations of subjects and theorizers. While human enhancement is likely to irreversibly change what it means to be human, disruptive technologies might lead to the emergence of artificial intelligent agents and human-machine hybrids. The paper predicts that neuro-techno-philosophy will be indispensable to understanding and engaging with these game-changing innovations and thus play a pivotal role in the future of philosophy. (shrink)

The formation of the World Anti-Doping Agency in 1999 was spurred by the 1998 revelation of widespread use in professional cycling of erythropoietin. The drug was supposedly a real danger. The long-term consequences were unknown, but rumor said it made athletes’ blood thick as jam with clots and other circulatory fatalities likely consequences. Today the fear of EPO has dampened. However, new scientific avenues such as ‘neuro-doping’ have replaced EPO as emergent and imagined threats to athletes and to the (...) integrity of sport. In this paper, we analyze the alleged threat from ‘neuro-doping’ in the following steps: First, we outline an understanding of ‘neuro-doping’ in a narrow sense, which we then put into context by looking at the phenomenon in a broader sense. Second, we highlight examples of societal perceptions of sport and science in order to shed light on where the concern for ‘neuro-doping’ comes from. Third, we address the more general fear of technology as a root for this concern. Fourth, we examine the evidence for the performance enhancing capacities of ‘neuro-doping’, where after we look at the obstacles for a ban on this technology. We conclude the analysis by stating that at present ‘neuro-doping’ cannot be considered a threat to the integrity of sport. Finally, however, we put this conclusion into perspective by examining what the most reasonable response would be if in the future neuro-stimulation techniques becomes an effective performance-enhancing mean in sport. (shrink)

Neuro-technical interfaces are technical devices that bridge the electronic world to neurons with the objective to establish a long term stable contact for bidirectional information exchange. What does that mean in detail and to what kind of machine and for what purpose should the central nervous system, i.e. the brain, be connected? Science fiction literature and movies offer a tremendous variety of usually uncomfortable scenarios including cyborg and robocop super-humans and mass control. Do these implants change the psyche in (...) general and what is feasible in nowadays therapeutic and rehabilitative approaches? In this overview, the author will not answer these questions but tries to deliver an overview of the technological background, the opportunities and the limitations of neuro-technical interfaces to the central nervous system. The fundamental specifications for neuro-technical interfaces will be introduced. Different degrees of implant invasiveness will be discussed and lead to a summary of clinical systems with their application-specific complexity. Actual technological opportunities and limitations will be addressed as well as general physical limitations. Current and future scenarios of neuro-technical interfaces to the central nervous system will be presented from an engineering point of view arising some questions that might be of interest with respect to ethical and societal implications when those interfaces are transferred into clinical practice and public applications. (shrink)

The field of information technology is broadened up to the domain of ‘learning’ systems and cybernetics. In covering this extension of the field due recourse is made to the epistemological basis of theory construction. When so comprehended, information technology becomes a philosophical inquiry on a variety of social, scientific and technological issues. A new idea that we refer to as neuro-cybernetics is born. The term neuro-cybernetics is used to delineate the epistemological field of system and cybernetic (...) study. The above-mentioned phenomenological or the epistemic model of a cybernetic and system type is applied to flood control problem in Bangladesh. This example presents an application of the cybernetic model to a physico-human problem. This is the nature of socio-scientific system. In it, organically unifying relations occur between the environment and the human world, with the objective of controlling the perennial problem of floods by using interactive factors. (shrink)

In this short think-piece we trace the newly emerging and rapidly expanding dimensions and dynamics of the “neuro-complex.” What this amounts to, we suggest, are a series of bio or neuro “convergences” of sorts regarding the brain and mental worlds, which in turn are traceable through what we term the bio-psych, pharma-psych, subjectivity-selves, wellness-enhancement, and the neuroculture-neurofutures relational nexuses. These issues are then illustrated through two brief case studies regarding brain scanning technologies and the problems and prospects of (...) cognitive enhancement. The paper concludes with some final reflections on these matters and a call for further research in this rich and challenging domain as the neuro-complex continues to expand in expected and unexpected, yet equally rich and fascinating, ways. (shrink)

Since the 1990’s, the debate concerning the ethical, legal and societal aspects of ‘neuro-enhancement’ has evolved into a massive discourse, both in the public realm and in the academic arena. This ethical debate, however, tends to repeat the same sets of arguments over and over again. Normative disagreements between transhumanists and bioconservatives on invasive or radical brain stimulators, and uncertainties regarding the use and effectivity of nootropic pharmaceuticals dominate the field. Building on the results of an extensive European project (...) on responsible research and innovation in neuro-enhancement, we observe and encourage that the debate is now entering a new and, as we will argue, more realistic and societally relevant stage. This new stage concerns those technologies that enter the market as ostensibly harmless contrivances that consumers may use for self-care or entertainment. We use the examples and arguments of participants in NERRI debates to describe three case studies of such purportedly innocent ‘toys’. Based upon this empirical material, we argue that these ‘soft’ enhancement gadgets are situated somewhere in the boundary zone between the internal and the external, between the intimate and the intrusive, between the familiar and the unfamiliar, between the friendly and the scary and, in Foucauldian terms, between technologies of the self and technologies of control. Therefore, we describe their physiognomy with the help of a term borrowed from Jacques Lacan, namely as “extimate” technologies. (shrink)

Limitless is a movie (released in 2011) as well as a novel (published in 2001) about a tormented author who (plagued by a writer’s block) becomes an early user of an experimental designer drug. The wonder drug makes him highly productive overnight and even allows him to make a fortune on the stock market. At the height of his career, however, the detrimental side-effects become increasingly noticeable. In this article, Limitless is analysed from two perspectives. First of all, building on (...) the views of the French novelist Emile Zola, the novel is seen as the report of a closely monitored experiment. Subsequently, building on the phenomenology of Ludwig Binswanger, I will show how the cognitive enhancement drug not only boosts the protagonist’s information processing capacities, but also modifies his experience of space and time, his sense of spatiality, his way of being-in-the-world. On the basis of these (complementary) analyses I will indicate how genres of the imagination (such as movies and novels) may play a significant role in assessing the societal implications of emerging technological developments such as neuro-enhancement, especially during the preparatory or anticipatory stage. (shrink)

It wasn't that hard to be a polymath in ancient Greece. All it meant, when you come down to it, was that you could write a poem, speak classical Greek (not very difficult in the circumstances) and understand the mechanics of the Archimedes' screw. Today it's not so easy. Arts and sciences have, for the most part, diverged to an alarming extent, with those on the arts side likely to be as hard-pressed to explain the technologies that increasingly govern our (...) world as a member of a "lost" tribe in the Brazilian rainforest. (shrink)

The increasing use of information and communication technologies (ICT) to help facilitate neuroscience adds a new level of complexity to the question of how ethical issues of such research can be identified and addressed. Current research ethics practice, based on ethics reviews by institutional review boards (IRB) and underpinned by ethical principalism, has been widely criticised and even called ‘imperialist’. In this paper, we develop an alternative way of approaching ethics in neuro-ICT research, based on discourse ethics, which implements (...) responsible research and innovation through dialogues. We draw on our work in Ethics Support, using the Human Brain Project as empirical evidence of the viability of this approach. (shrink)

Against the backdrop of emerging medical technologies that promise transgression of temporal limits, this paper aims to show the importance that an individual lifetime’s finitude and fugacity have for the question of the good life. The paper’s first section examines how the passing of an individual’s finite lifetime can be experienced negatively, and thus cause “suffering from the passing of time.” The second section is based on a sociological analysis within the conceptual framework of individualization and capitalism, which characterizes many (...) modern individualized and consumerist societies and explains how the described problem of time’s passage is particularly relevant today. The paper then proceeds to show and discuss how individuals employ various, primarily medical, enhancement-technologies like social egg freezing, anti-aging-medicine and physical- and neuro-enhancement in an attempt to overcome time’s passing. Finally, the paper seeks to explain why such attempts fail and, moreover, why it is exactly the awareness of time’s passing that can constitute a prerequisite for a good life. (shrink)

With improved diagnostic capability and accuracy, the fields of medicine, neuroscience, psychiatry, and psychology have benefitted remarkably from the dramatic advancements in neuroimaging technology. Not only can surface and subsurface structures of the brain be mapped with incredible anatomical detail, now neural activity can be imaged across time as the brain responds to different stimuli. These sophisticated techniques have been a vital element in the recent increase in neuroimaging-based research. This increase, while producing new diagnostic techniques and improved treatment (...) mechanisms for neurological disease, has also led to a new dilemma for human subjects researchers: how should incidental findings be managed? An incidental finding is a finding concerning an individual research participant that has potential health or reproductive importance and is discovered in the course of conducting research but is beyond the aims of this study. (shrink)

As we become more and more enhanced with cyborg technology, significant issues of law and policy are raised. For example, as cyborg devices implanted within the body create a class of people with enhanced motor and computational abilities, how should the law and policy respond when the abilities of such people surpass those of the general population? And what basic human and legal rights should be afforded to people equipped with cyborg technology as they become more machine and (...) less biology? As other issues of importance, if a neuroprosthetic device is accessed by a third party and done to edit one’s memory or to plant a new memory in one’s mind, or even to place an ad for a commercial product in one’s consciousness, should there be a law of cognitive liberty or of “neuro-advertising” that applies? This paper discusses laws and statutes enacted across several jurisdictions which apply to cyborg technologies with a particular emphasis on legal doctrine which relates to neuroprosthetic devices. (shrink)

Technology takes an unprecedented position in contemporary society. In particular, it has become part and parcel of governmental attempts to manufacture life in new ways. Such ideas concerning the governance of life organize around the same contention: that technology and life are, in fact, highly interconnectable. This is surprising because if one enters the sites of techno-scientific experimentation, those visions turn out to be much frailer and by no means “in place” yet. Rather, they afford or enforce constant (...) interfacing work, a particular mode of manufacturing life, rendering disparate, sturdy, and often surprisingly incompatible things available for one another. Here, we contend that both of those aspects, pervasive rationalities of interconnectability and practices of interfacing mark the cornerstones of what we call a new techno-bio-politics of life. In order to grasp the government of life under the technological condition, we must understand how both human and non-human entities are being rendered interconnectable and re-worked through practices of interfacing. We take neuro-technology and care robotics as two illustrative cases. Our analysis shows that the contemporary government of life is not primarily concerned with life itself in its biological re-constitution but rather with life as it is interfaced with and through technology. (shrink)

Name der Zeitschrift: Jahrbuch für Wissenschaft und Ethik Jahrgang: 20 Heft: 1 Seiten: 293-302.

In their article published in Nanoethics, “Ethical, Legal and Social Aspects of Brain-Implants Using Nano-Scale Materials and Techniques”, Berger et al. suggest that there may be a prima facie moral obligation to improve neuro implants with nanotechnology given their possible therapeutic advantages for patients [Nanoethics, 2:241–249]. Although we agree with Berger et al. that developments in nanomedicine hold the potential to render brain implant technologies less invasive and to better target neural stimulation to respond to brain impairments in the (...) near future, we argue against presenting the development of nanobionic clinical devices in terms of a moral obligation to conduct this research. In the first part of the paper, we consider what a duty to pursue new technologies might mean, and in the second we explore some of the negative consequences of defending such development as a moral obligation based on potential benefit. We argue that promoting the advances available to brain implants through developments in nanotechnology and bionics could contribute to medical rhetoric that indirectly increases the risk of exposing patients to harm when participating in clinical trials. We argue that rather than there being a moral obligation to improve nanobionics implants because of their potential benefit, the pursuit of improved neuro implants must be balanced against the prima facie obligations to protect patients against harm and to promote and protect patient autonomy. (shrink)

Name der Zeitschrift: Jahrbuch für Wissenschaft und Ethik Jahrgang: 20 Heft: 1 Seiten: 237-240.

Beginning with a survey of the shortcoming of theories of organology/media-as-externalization of mind/body—a philosophical-anthropological tradition that stretches from Plato through Ernst Kapp and finds its contemporary proponent in Bernard Stiegler—I propose that the phenomenological treatment of media as an outpouching and extension of mind qua intentionality is not sufficient to counter the ̳black-box‘ mystification of today‘s deep learning‘s algorithms. Focusing on a close study of Simondon‘s On the Existence of Technical Objectsand Individuation, I argue that the process-philosophical work of Gilbert (...) Simondon, with its critique of Norbert Wiener‘s first-order cybernetics, offers a precursor to the conception of second-order cybernetics (as endorsed byFrancisco Varela, Humberto Maturana, and Ricardo B. Uribe) and, specifically, its autopoietic treatment of information. It has been argued by those such as Frank Pasquale that neuro-inferential deep learning systems premised on predictive patterning, suchas AlphaGo Zero, have a veiled logic and, thus, are ̳black boxes‘. In detailing a philosophical-historical approach to demystify predictive patterning/processing and the logic of such deep learning algorithms, this paper attempts to shine a light on such systems and their inner workingsàla Simondon. (shrink)

Human beings are in the midst of very powerful shifts in our understanding of what it means to be a human. There is a non-trivial chance that sometime in the future humanity will transform itself, leading to an emergence of posthumans with God-like qualities – Homo Deificatio. Such a transformation has great potential for both good and bad. Posthumanism seeks to improve human nature, increase the human life- and health-span, extend its cognitive and physical capacities, and broaden its mastery over (...) the environment. As such, the notion of posthumanism implies a radical breaking off from, and reconceptualisation of, the state of being human. As neuroscientists, we aim to bring a neuroscientific perspective to this debate. Current scientific and technologic developments (related to brain and its augmentation) clearly demonstrate that what was formerly considered to be science fiction is slowly but firmly becoming a scientific reality. (shrink)

The portrayal of novel neurotechnologies in Steven Spielberg’s Minority Report serves to inoculate viewers from important moral considerations that are displaced by the film’s somewhat singular emphasis on the question of how to reintroduce freedom of choice into an otherwise technology driven world. This sets up a crisis mentality and presents a false dilemma regarding the appropriate use, and regulation, of neurotechnologies. On the one hand, it seems that centralized power is required to both control and effectively implement such (...) technologies and, on the other hand, individual heroic resistance is required to protect citizens from the invasions of personal privacy and state control made possible through neurotechnologies. While Minority Report, as a dystopic vision of emergent neurotechnologies, engages surface ethical issues it risks cheapening them through its rather simplistic, dichotomous analysis. Most conspicuously absent from this approach is a sense of the social matrices that work to circumscribe or augment expressions of human freedom, privacy, control and power that are all implicated in our engagement with novel neurotechnologies. Were Minority Report unique in this respect it would have little interest, but we think this type of cheapening of ethical discourse about novel technologies is common. Because science fiction film informs the social imaginary in which ethical considerations and ultimately policy decisions take place, such cheapening risks subverting pervasive and tangible ethical issues by focusing on the sensationalistic and simplistic. (shrink)

The evolution of human cognitive abilities, despite intensive sociological, psychoanalytic and neurobiological investigations, is poorly understood. The basic events of this evolution: progressive language development, technologization, increased learning aptitude, remain a field of speculations without coherent and consistent explanations. In the recent manuscript, a production of artefacts as a general pre-condition of human being is highlighted, and a key role they played by reshaping of neuro-physiological functions is factually substantiated. • • • -/- German Abstract: Die Evolution menschlicher kognitiver (...) Fähigkeiten ist, trotz vielseitiger Untersuchungensmethoden, bislang kaum verstanden. Die grundsätzlichen Ereignisse dieser Evolution: fortschreitende Sprachentwicklung, Intellektualisierung, Technisierung, Bildung großer Gemeinschaften, werden spekulativ, ohne zusammenhängende und schlüssige Erklärung, diskutiert. In aktuellem Manuskript wird die allgemeine Voraussetzung menschlicher Existenz, die Artefaktenherstellung, hervorgehoben, um auf ihre Schlüsselrolle bei der Neuformung neuro-physiologischer Funktionen hinzuweisen. Im Weiteren werden die Gefahren erörtert, die entstehen, wenn der Schöpfer die Kontrolle über sich selbst verliert, und im Züge der Technisierung und Verwissenschaftlichung die Grundlagen eigener Existenz zerstört. • • • -/- Russian Abstract: Происхождение рассудочной деятельности у вида Homo sapiens, несмотря на интенсивные социологические, психологические, нейробиологические и прочие методы изучения, до сих пор мало понято. Основные события эволюции человека: прогрессивное развитие речевой деятельности, технологизация, повышенная способность к обучению, остаются областью бессвязных спекуляций. В данной работе освящается значение производства артефактов как условие возникновения человека, и доказывается роль, которую артефакты играют в процессе новообразования нейро–физиологических функций. (shrink)

Nanotechnology is an important platform technology which will add new features like improved biocompatibility, smaller size, and more sophisticated electronics to neuro-implants improving their therapeutic potential. Especially in view of possible advantages for patients, research and development of nanotechnologically improved neuro implants is a moral obligation. However, the development of brain implants by itself touches many ethical, social and legal issues, which also apply in a specific way to devices enabled or improved by nanotechnology. For researchers developing (...) nanotechnology such issues are rather distant from their daily work in the lab, but as soon as they use their materials or devices in medical applications such as therapy of brain diseases they have to be aware of and deal with them. This paper is intended to raise sensitivity for the ethical, legal and social aspects (ELSA) involved in applying nanotechnology in brain implants or other devices by highlighting the short term problems of testing and clinical trials within the existing regulatory frameworks (A), the short and medium-term questions of risks in the application of the devices (B) and the long-term perspectives related to problems of enhancement (C). To identify and address such issues properly nanotechnologists should involve ethical, legal and social experts and regulatory bodies in their research as early as possible. This will help to remove pressure from regulatory bodies, to settle public concern and to prevent non-acceptable developments for the benefit of the patients. (shrink)

Da sempre l’uomo ha cercato di migliorare la sua condizione. Oggi nel contesto del rapido sviluppo della tecno-scienza si aprono nuove possibilità di interventi finalizzati all’enhancement o potenziamento della salute e della vita dell’uomo e della stessa umanità. Molteplici sono gli interrogativi etici emergenti. È lecito usare farmaci e tecnologie non solo per curare malattie, ma anche per potenziare capacità fisiche, mentali ed emotive? È lecito estendere la vita biologicamente ad ogni costo fino alla ‘immortalità terrena’? È lecito selezionare e (...) alterare le caratteristiche genetiche degli individui? È lecito impiantare protesi meccaniche nel cervello per migliorare la mente? È lecito usare farmaci o stimolazioni neurologiche per cancellare ricordi? È lecito costruire computer che imitano la mente e che la sostituiscano? È lecito costruire robot che interagiscano con umani e tra loro? Il modo in cui risponderemo a queste domande sarà determinante non solo per il presente, ma anche per il futuro dell’umanità. Il volume si articola in due parti. Una prima affronta il dibattito sul piano teorico mettendo a confronto gli argomenti favorevoli e contrari all’enhancement in senso generale, allo scopo di delineare una riflessione critica ponderata che giustifichi i requisiti etici minimi per una regolamentazione che non ostacoli l’innovazione ma al tempo stesso sappia tutelare i valori e i diritti fondamentali dell’uomo. La seconda parte analizza i principali ambiti applicativi oggi in discussione: dalle tecnologie esistenti (chirurgia estetica, doping sportivo), alle tecnologie emergenti (potenziamento genetico, biologico, neuro-cognitivo) fino alle tecnologie convergenti (nanotecnologie, biotecnologie, informatica e scienze cognitive) e agli scenari radicali che si prefigurano nel transumanesimo e postumanesimo. (shrink)

I wholeheartedly sympathize conceptually with Coeckelbergh’s paper. The dialectical relationship between vulnerability and technology constitutes the core of Hegel’s Master and Slave. Yet, the empirical dimension is underdeveloped and Coeckelbergh’s ideas could profit from exposure to case studies. Building on a movie/novel devoted to vulnerability coping and living with ICT, I challenge the claim that modern heroism entails overcoming vulnerability with the help of enhancement and computers.

Rationalities of Knowledge Production: On Transformations of Objects, Technologies and Information in Biomedicine and the Life Sciences. Since decades, scientific change has been interpreted in the light of of paradigm shifts and scientific revolutions. The Kuhnian interpretation of scientific change however is now more and more confronted with non‐disciplinary thinking in both, science and studies on science. This paper explores how research in biomedicine and the life sciences can be characterized by different rationalities, sometimes converging, sometimes contradictory, all present at (...) the same time with varying ways of influence, impact, and visibility. In general, the rationality of objects is generated by fitting new objects and findings into a new experimental context. The rationality of hypotheses is a move towards the construction of novel explanatory tools and models. This is often inseparable meshing with the third, the technological rationaliy, in which a technology‐driven, self‐supporting and sometimes self‐referential refinement of methods and technologies comes along with an extension into other fields. During the second and the third phase, the new and emerging fields tend to expand their explanatory reach not only across disciplinary boundaries but also into the social sphere, creating what has been characterized as “exceptionalism” (e.g. genetic exceptionalism or neuro‐exceptionalism). Finally, recent biomedicine and life‐sciences reach a level in which experimental work becomes more and more data‐driven because the technologically constructed experimental systems generate a plethora of findings (data) which at some point start to blur the original hypotheses. For the rationality of information the materiality of research practices becomes secondary and research objects are more and more getting out of sight. Finally, the credibility of science as a practice becomes more and more dependent on consensus about the applicability and relevance of its results. The rationality of interest (and accountability) has become more and more characteristic for a research process which is no longer primarily determined by the desire for knowledge but by the desire for relevance. This paper explores in which ways object‐driven and hypotheses‐driven experimental life‐sciences transformed into domains of experimental research evolving in a technologically constructed, data‐driven environment in which they are subjected to constant morphing due to the forces of different rationalities. (shrink)

In recent years, a number of prominent scientists have argued that free will is an illusion, appealing to evidence demonstrating that information about brain activity can be used to predict behavior before people are aware of having made a decision. These scientists claim that the possibility of perfect prediction based on neural information challenges the ordinary understanding of free will. In this paper we provide evidence suggesting that most people do not view the possibility of neuro-prediction as a threat (...) to free will unless it also raises concerns about manipulation of the agent’s behavior. In Experiment 1 two scenarios described future brain imaging technology that allows perfect prediction of decisions and actions based on earlier neural activity, and this possibility did not undermine most people’s attributions of free will or responsibility, except in the scenario that also allowed manipulation. In Experiment 2 the scenarios increased the salience of the physicalist implications of neuro-prediction, while in Experiment 3 the scenarios suggested dualism, with perfect prediction by mindreaders. The patterns of results for these two experiments were similar to the results in Experiment 1, suggesting that participants do not understand free will to require specific metaphysical conditions regarding the mind–body relation. Most people seem to understand free will in a way that is not threatened by perfect prediction based on neural information, suggesting that they believe that just because “my brain made me do it,” that does not mean that I didn’t do it of my own free will. (shrink)

In ‘Moral Enhancement, Freedom, and the God Machine’, Savulescu and Persson argue that recent scientific findings suggest that there is a realistic prospect of achieving ‘moral enhancement’ and respond to Harris's criticism that this would threaten individual freedom and autonomy. I argue that although some pharmaceutical and neuro‐scientific interventions may influence behaviour and emotions in ways that we may be inclined to evaluate positively, describing this as ‘moral enhancement’ presupposes a particular, contested account, of what it is to act (...) morally and implies that entirely familiar drugs such as alcohol, ecstasy, and marijuana are also capable of making people ‘more moral’. Moreover, while Savulescu and Persson establish the theoretical possibility of using drugs to promote autonomy, the real threat posed to freedom by ‘moral bioenhancement’ is that the ‘enhancers’ will be wielding power over the ‘enhanced’. Drawing on Pettit's notion of ‘freedom as non‐domination’, I argue that individuals may be rendered unfree even by a hypothetical technology such as Savulescu and Persson's ‘God machine’, which would only intervene if they chose to act immorally. While it is impossible to rule out the theoretical possibility that moral enhancement might be all‐things‐considered justified even where it did threaten freedom and autonomy, I argue that any technology for biomedical shaping of behaviour and dispositions is much more likely to be used for ill rather than good. (shrink)

This paper addresses five questions: First, what is trajectory of Western liberal ethics and politics in defining life, rights and citizenship? Second, how will neuro-remediation and other technologies change the definition of death for the brain injured and the cryonically suspended? Third, will people always have to be dead to be cryonically suspended? Fourth, how will changing technologies and definitions of identity affect the status of people revived from brain injury and cryonic suspension? I propose that Western liberal thought (...) is working towards a natural end, a “telos.” In response to a variety of biotechnologies, law and public opinion in liberal democracies will be forced to make explicit that the rights of a living thing are determined by its level of consciousness. I discuss the way that technology will force three clarifications about the value of consciousness, at the beginning, the end and boundaries of human life. Sentience and personhood will become the basis of moral concern, regardless of its media. Just as human rights have become independent of race, gender and property, rights will become independent of being a breathing human being. But even as we make this transition, the cryonically preserved are still likely to be considered dead for pragmatic reasons, albeit with gradually increasing rights as technology makes their reanimation increasingly probable. I suggest that it could be acceptable to cryonicists that the frozen continue to be defined as dead if assisted suicide can be legalized. Under a liberal assisted suicide policy cryonicists might be allowed to carry out suspension before a declaration of death, preserving the maximum amount of neural information. The gradual redefinition of life and personal identity in terms of psychological continuity will also have consequences for the legal status of the reanimated. If, due to information loss, the reanimated do not meet a threshold of psychological continuity, they may be considered new persons. Cryonicists may therefore wish to specify ahead of time whether they are still interested in being reanimated if pre-animation assessment suggests that the result will not meet the necessary threshold of continuity. Finally, I touch on the way that neural technology will fundamentally problematize the separate, autonomous self on which liberal democratic values are based, leading to a legal and political Singularity. It is this looming neural Singularity that makes the proposed liberal democratic telos a final stage in humanistic thought, before it is superceded by something radically different. (shrink)

Besides offering opportunities in both clinical and non-clinical domains, the application of novel neuroimaging technologies raises pressing dilemmas. ‘Responsible Research and Innovation’ (RRI) aims to stimulate research and innovation activities that take ethical and social considerations into account from the outset. We previously identified that Dutch neuroscientists interpret “responsible innovation” as educating the public on neuroimaging technologies via the popular press. Their aim is to mitigate (neuro)hype, an aim shared with the wider emerging RRI community. Here, we present results (...) of a media-analysis undertaken to establish whether the body of articles in the Dutch popular press presents balanced conversations on neuroimaging research to the public. We found that reporting was mostly positive and framed in terms of (healthcare) progress. There was rarely a balance between technology opportunities and limitations, and even fewer articles addressed societal or ethical aspects of neuroimaging research. Furthermore, neuroimaging metaphors seem to favour oversimplification. Current reporting is therefore more likely to enable hype than to mitigate it. How can neuroscientists, given their self-ascribed social responsibility, address this conundrum? We make a case for a collective and shared responsibility among neuroscientists, journalists and other stakeholders, including funders, committed to responsible reporting on neuroimaging research. (shrink)

Experience machines, popularized in print by Robert Nozick and on the screen by the Wachowskis’ film The Matrix, provide highly or perfectly realistic experiences that are more pleasant and less painful than those generated in real life.1 The recent surge in virtual reality and neuro-prosthetic technologies is making the creation of real-world experience machines seem inevitable and perhaps imminent.2 Given the likelihood of the near-future availability of such machines, it behooves ethicists to consider the moral status of their potential (...) uses. In this chapter, we investigate the use of experience machines in palliative and end-of-life care situations. We pair up various kinds of experience machines with patients in a range of conditions, to illuminate the moral problems and benefits of using experience machines in this way. We argue that the use of Nozickian experience machines to treat patients in most conditions would be morally problematic, most notably for the negative effects on patients’ characters and real-world relationships. Informed by this initial moral analysis, we describe an experience machine that is more closely related to a virtual reality game, and argue that it can avoid the moral problems encountered by Nozickian experience machines. In fact, we argue that this new kind of experience machine could improve some patients’ characters and relationships with real-world people. We conclude that some kinds of experience machines could benefit many patients, especially those in extreme pain and those not in the position to meaningfully interact with their loved ones in reality. We also note that certain kinds of experience machines could be useful for religious people, for whom the range of palliative and end-of-life care options is often thought to be relatively narrow. (shrink)

Aicardi et al. look to neuroscience to mitigate the limitations of current robotics technology. They propose that robotics technology guided by neuroscience has the capacity to create intelligent robots that function with awareness and capacity for abstraction and reasoning. As neurorobotics extends the capability of robotics technology, it introduces new social and ethical concerns, in particular co-opting civilian applications for military use, conflicts between industry and the academy, and data security. However, here we argue that empirical evidence (...) has shown that human cognition is faulty; therefore there is not a clear motivation to build intelligent robots on a human model; representation of meaning in the brain is not well-understood; therefore neuro-robotics is limited; and to the extent that intelligent robots become a reality, the ethics of robot rights will be of central concern. (shrink)

The proliferation of late of disciplines beginning in “neuro”—neuroeconomics, neuroaesthetics, neuro–literary criticism, and so on—while welcomed in some quarters, has drawn a great deal of critical commentary as well. It is perhaps natural that scholars in the humanities, especially, tend to find these “neuro”-prefixes irritating. But by no means all of them: there are those humanists who discern in this trend a healthy development that has the potential of “revitalizing” the notoriously bookish humanities. Neurohistory is a case (...) in point, typically being dismissed by historians while finding more sympathetic consideration elsewhere. While it sides with the former position, this essay attempts to develop a more complex picture. It will suggest that defiant humanists may underestimate the extent to which they are already participating in a culture profoundly tuned toward a quasi-naturalistic construction of the mind/brain as an embodied, situated, and distributed thing. The roots of this construction will be traced into the popular, academic, and technological discourses that began to surround the “user” in the 1980s, with special emphasis on the concomitant assault on “cognitivism.” What is more, the very same story—insofar as it demonstrates the complicity of the “postclassical” mind with our own man-made and “digital” age—will serve to complicate the neuro-optimists’ vision of human nature exposed by a new kind of science. (shrink)

In recent years, direct brain interventions have shown increased success in manipulating neurobiological processes often associated with moral reasoning and decision-making. As current DBIs are refined, and new technologies are developed, the state will have an interest in administering DBIs to criminal offenders for rehabilitative purposes. However, it is generally assumed that the state is not justified in directly intruding in an offender’s brain without valid consent. Thomas Douglas challenges this view. The state already forces criminal offenders to go to (...) jail without their consent. This represents a serious interference with an offender’s rights. If criminal offenders are already morally liable to incarceration, why is the state not also entitled to administer DBIs without consent for the purposes of rehabilitation? Douglas argument focuses on the right to ‘bodily integrity’. He argues that there is no compelling reason to believe that bodily rights that protect an offender from non-consensual DBIs are stronger than rights that protect an offender from incarceration. This paper will extend Douglas’ analysis. It will consider the more fundamental right to ‘mental integrity’. The right to mental integrity defends an inner sphere of liberty. It protects critical capacities necessary for the exercise of autonomous human agency—without which a vast majority of moral rights could not exist. Thus, the right to mental integrity is ultimately more important for a moral assessment of DBIs. The right strongly suggests that both presently, and in the future, there may be many cases in which the state is not entitled to administer DBIs to criminal offenders without valid consent. (shrink)

Human gait is a complex activity that requires high coordination between the central nervous system, the limb, and the musculoskeletal system. More research is needed to understand the latter coordination's complexity in designing better and more effective rehabilitation strategies for gait disorders. Electroencephalogram and functional near-infrared spectroscopy are among the most used technologies for monitoring brain activities due to portability, non-invasiveness, and relatively low cost compared to others. Fusing EEG and fNIRS is a well-known and established methodology proven to enhance (...) brain–computer interface performance in terms of classification accuracy, number of control commands, and response time. Although there has been significant research exploring hybrid BCI involving both EEG and fNIRS for different types of tasks and human activities, human gait remains still underinvestigated. In this article, we aim to shed light on the recent development in the analysis of human gait using a hybrid EEG-fNIRS-based BCI system. The current review has followed guidelines of preferred reporting items for systematic reviews and meta-Analyses during the data collection and selection phase. In this review, we put a particular focus on the commonly used signal processing and machine learning algorithms, as well as survey the potential applications of gait analysis. We distill some of the critical findings of this survey as follows. First, hardware specifications and experimental paradigms should be carefully considered because of their direct impact on the quality of gait assessment. Second, since both modalities, EEG and fNIRS, are sensitive to motion artifacts, instrumental, and physiological noises, there is a quest for more robust and sophisticated signal processing algorithms. Third, hybrid temporal and spatial features, obtained by virtue of fusing EEG and fNIRS and associated with cortical activation, can help better identify the correlation between brain activation and gait. In conclusion, hBCI system is not yet much explored for the lower limb due to its complexity compared to the higher limb. Existing BCI systems for gait monitoring tend to only focus on one modality. We foresee a vast potential in adopting hBCI in gait analysis. Imminent technical breakthroughs are expected using hybrid EEG-fNIRS-based BCI for gait to control assistive devices and Monitor neuro-plasticity in neuro-rehabilitation. However, although those hybrid systems perform well in a controlled experimental environment when it comes to adopting them as a certified medical device in real-life clinical applications, there is still a long way to go. (shrink)

PurposeSince the 1980s we have witnessed a soaring “extra-therapeutic” use of psycho-pharmacology. But there is also an increasing interest in invasive methods of neuroenhancement that can be subsumed under the term “brain engineering”. The present article aims to identify key issues raised by those forms of neuro-technical enhancement (e.g., deep brain stimulation, brain-computer interfaces, memory chips, neurobionic interventions). First it distinguishes different forms of neuroenhancement, then describes features of those methods and finally discusses their ethical implications.MethodsThe article is based (...) on an in-depth literature study and an ethical assessment of the current and emerging forms of neuroenhancement.ResultsFrom a medical and normative perspective, psycho-pharmacological enhancement and nonpharmacological enhancement by brain engineering demonstrate considerable differences. Many arguments in favour of nonpharmacological enhancement fall short, for they fail to sufficiently consider the medical, anthropological and socio-cultural context. In many respects unsecured use is confronted with considerable risks.ConclusionsResearch on invasive forms of neuroenhancement partly takes place in the fields of (nano-)technology and military, to which health care experts and medical ethicists do not have easy access. This raises the danger of misjudging trends and developmental tendencies. Thus medicine and medical ethics must a priori thematize the goals and risks linked to these questions as well as participate discursively right from the beginning. (shrink)

The article deals with the philosophical problem field of modern neuroethics. The general idea of the state of modern neuroethics is given and it is shown that research in this area encompasses both fundamental problems that classically belonged to the field of philosophy research (for example, such as the problem of psychophysical dualism, the physical bases of consciousness, freedom of will and its interrelation with brain activity) and problems with applied orientation, explicating the ethical-social and legal dimension of innovation development (...) in the field of neuroscience and actualizing the analysis of their social risks. It is shown that the development of neuro-ethics in the modern world became possible thanks to a special way of functioning of modern science, which was called the technology of science and to the development of the phenomenon of technological development ethification, which in practical terms was expressed in the study of the problem of the correspondence of the results of innovative scientific and technical projects to the interests of various social groups, their expectations and values, and also helped to determine the status of new technologies in relation to social reality. The article gives an idea of the existing normative field necessary for the development of neuro-ethics. On the basis of using the resource of discourse analysis of R. Harre, who singled out personal grammar (P-grammar), organism grammar (O-grammars) and molecular grammar (M-grammar), a philosophical analysis of such a problem of modern neuroethics as brain death was carried out. Also was given a structural description of new biotechnogenic identities of human being. The conclusion is drawn that the concept of brain death is an example of the conventional nature of scientific truth, the formation of which is influenced by various socio-cultural and economic factors. In the context of the development of neuroscience and the emergence of new methods of brain regeneration, it can be rethought. (shrink)

This article is dedicated to methodological questions in ethical regulation of neuroresearch. Neuroethics has emerged recently within the framework of the neuro-trend in modern technoscience; its regulatory capabilities are yet to be discovered. Sciences that study human brain and behavior orient towards existing institutions of ethical regulation, which do not consider the complexity and specificity of the emerging threats and risks. The author examines the circumstances for formation of the research ethics and points of intersection with neuroethics. Research ethics (...) is viewed as a part of bioethics, which not only assessed the potential harm for the examinees, but also the social and anthropological consequences of scientific and technological development. The author provides a “narrow” understanding of research ethics as a system of rules within the framework of particular disciplines, and as a clinical research practice. Based on the historically established ethical regulation of clinical research and the forming beneath our eyes rules of modification of human genome and artificial intelligence, the author demonstrates contradictions and trends of the separate regulatory systems, which should be taken into account to prevent risks in neuroresearch and prediction of social implications of the spread of neurotechnologies. Ethical examination became a part of a complex system of international control of clinical research, which leads to fading of the value component aimed at protection of research subjects. The author underlines two factors that form the types of harm peculiar to neuroresearch: orientation towards technological realization and vulnerability of mental sphere as a subject of research. The conclusion is made on inefficiency of application of the calculation of harm/advantage in ethical assessment of neuroresearch. Leaning on the experience of bioethics, neuroethics requires development of the own systems of rules that would become the institutions of neuroethical regulation. For preventing formalization of ethical control, it is essential to advance extensive socio-humanistic assessment of new achievements in neuroscience, as well as neuroethical education for the scientists. (shrink)

In Search of Lost Culture: From Neuroimaging via Critical Neuroscience to Cultural Neuroscience – and back to Critique. The availability of new technologies for visualizing brain activity generated great expectations to identify the centers responsible for human action and behavior and to “reduce” all mental processes to neuronal states. Some scientists even called society to adapt to the new insights from brain research by giving up outdated concepts of autonomy and free will. This project spurred harsh critiques from philosophy, sociology, (...) and cultural studies, diagnosing the rise of a new phrenology. A critical neuroscience group took up these criticisms and pledged for a more nuanced reflection about the political, historical and ethical contexts and implications of current neuroscience and argued for an integration of societal concerns into the research agenda – rather similar to the agenda for responsible research of the EU. With the development of more sophisticated visualization strategies, new sub‐disciplines emerged, integrating sociocultural aspects into neuroimaging. Social and cultural neuroscience replaced overstated reductionist claims without leaving the overarching naturalist epistemology, but extending the ontological realm. New research objects such as empathy, religion or ‘Western’ vs. ‘East‐Asian’ attitudes of thinking started to populate the research domain. Especially cultural neuroscience was widely celebrated as new scientific bridge across the nature‐culture gulf. A closer look, however, reveals that this claim and the popular success of cultural neuroscience are based on a decisive lack of conceptual clarity. ‘Culture’ functions as fuzzy denominator for a broad range of social phenomena with unknown links to neurophysiological processes but visualized as brain states. Instead of implementing more reflexive forms of research, cultural neuroscience stabilizes problematic stereotypes and racist attitudes by an expansion of neuro‐culture. In light of this deflation of interdisciplinary cooperation a more radical critique of this ideology seems in place. (shrink)

The concept of responsibilization that originally emerged out of the context of the so-called Governmentality Studies is now widely used in various social sciences to describe a governing technology particularly attuned to the challenge of neoliberalism, i.e. how to govern free individuals. However, in seemingly paradoxical simultaneity with the hegemeony of neoliberalism that relies heavily on individual choice, freedom and responsibility, two powerful scientific discourses exist that appear to undermine these assumptions vehemently, namely genetics and neuroscience. Starting from a (...) discussion of the strengths and limits of the notion of responsibilization, the article argues for the need to introduce the complementary concept of irresponsibilization that can be interpreted as a form of what Foucault in his lectures on the History of Governmentality refers to as ‘counter-conduct’ – in this case, against the neoliberal governing technology of responsibilization. The article proceeds to explore to what extent genetics and neuroscience can be considered discourses fuelling forms of genetic and/or neuro-irresponsibilization, which would make sense of the seemingly paradoxical co-hegemony of neoliberalism, on the one hand, and genetics and neuro-science, on the other. However, the article ultimately argues that, upon closer inspection of the findings in these disciplines and how they are used, it turns out that constituting oneself as a ‘somatic individual’ as a form of counter-conduct comes at a considerable cost, notably new forms of genetic and/or neuro-responsibility. Thus, the article closes with the twofold conclusion that wherever there is responsibilization, there is also irresponsibilization and that genetic and neuro-irresponsibilization are risky strategies of counter-conduct that might bring in responsibilization on a different level through the back door again. (shrink)

Music raises many problems for those who would understand it more deeply. It is rooted in time, yet timeless. It is pure form, yet conveys emotion. It is written, but performed, interpreted, improvised, transcribed, recorded, sampled, remixed, revised, rebroadcast, reinterpreted, and more. Music can be studied by philosophers, psychologists, sociologists, mathematicians, biologists, computer scientists, neuro-scientists, critics, politicians, promoters, and of course musicians. Moreover, no single perspective seems either sufficient or invalid. This situation is not so different from that of (...) other arts, but perhaps more intense, due to the pervasiveness of pop, the inaccessability of much contemporary classical music, the strong cultural associations of many styles , the infusions of technology, and the combination with lyrics. (shrink)