Post 1

Noah | Josh | John

Neuroenhancement

"Neuroenhancement uses the principles electromagnetic induction to focus currents in the brain, are now commercially available for non-medical improvement (such as memory and cognition boosting").




The people that practice neuroehnancement benefit from improved motor skills, increased memory and modified behaviour. Methods of Neuroenhancement include taking "smart pills" or magnet stimulation, but is this method of improving yourself ethical? An ethical issue that could arise could be whether giving the rich or those able to afford it in society an advantage over everyone else. It would be like providing basketball players with the ability to grow 10cm for a fee through some special pill. This would ruin the fairness of the game as everyone who didn't take the magic pill would become out classed. The same effect may occur in society if Neuroenhancement became mainstream.




 Obviously the people who profit from Neuroenhancement are the ones provide the treatment, For example the company Foc.us who is currently developing a trans-cranial direct current stimulation headset. The overall boost that these Neuroenhancements give are still extremely mild compared to similar ideas seen in popular media such as movies, however if they were improved to a point where they could give a person super intelligence, would it be ethical. Technology that facilitated massive intelligence could create a society that is ruled by it. The person or people to create it would gain a massive advantage over everyone and possibly have enough power to overthrow governments or countries. It would have the potential to basically destroy society as we know it. To prevent this ethical issue from happening should they stop improving Neuroenhancement or even ban it, or are pills like those seen in the movie "Limitless" which give a person access to 100% of his brain impossible to create.




 Smaller scale Ethical problems that could occur could be discrimination against people who don't use Neuroenhancement in relation to jobs and school entry. People who practice it could be preferred over those who don't, and those who don't could be fired and replaced by those who do. elite schools or university's could also deny study to children who aren't using Neuroenhancement