Freedom and the right to decide?
The prospect of being able to enhance human cognition presents a nexus of questions associated with future ambitions, hopes and concerns. Should individuals be allowed the freedom and the right to decide for themselves how best to use enhancement technologies?
The development of cognitive enhancement has meant the phrase "give your brain a boost" now brings with it a range of connotations which have never been experienced thus far in human history. The convergence of nano - , bio - and information technology with cognitive science promises many interesting forms of cognitive enhancement. Neurobiology is expanding our understanding of how the brain works in association with neural systems and information technology is providing vastly improved signal processing capabilities for use in neurobiological research. Accompanying such advances, cognitive neuroscience is pushing back the traditional boundaries of cognitive psychology to broaden understanding with regard to the interaction between brain structure, function and cognition.
The prospect of being able to enhance human cognition presents a nexus of questions associated with future ambitions, hopes and concerns. Should individuals be allowed the freedom and the right to decide for themselves how best to use enhancement technologies? Is government intervention and regulation required in order for both individuals and society to thrive through the use of enhancement technologies? Or does the very notion of human essence prohibit enhancement in all its forms?
BioCentre hosted an assessment of what cognitive enhancement promises and how best to harness its potential informed by leading specialists in the field.
Speaker Profiles
Speaking on: Will enhancement make us better? Ethical issues of the use of biotechnology enhance our (cognitive) capacities. Prof. Ruud ter Meulen is Director of Centre for Ethics in Medicine at Bristol University. He is psychologist and ethicist. He was Director of the Institute for Bioethics and Professor for Philosophy and Ethics at the University of Maastricht (1995-2005). The main research areas of Prof. ter Meulen are Justice in health care, ethics of research, medical ethics committees, ethical pluralism and the problem of consensus. Prof. ter Meulen has directed several international projects, including the BIOMED 2 project 'Solidarity and care in the European Union' (1998-2000) and the EU Fifth Framework project 'Ethical Issues of Evidence Based Practice in Medicine and Health Care' (EVIBASE). He was partner of the Project Bio-Technology-Ethics, coordinated by the University of Genoa (Prof. Celada), and is involved as a partner in the BIOTETHED project which is the successor to the Bio-T-Ethics project. He is member of the Advisory Group of the Science and Society programme of the European Commission. Prof. ter Meulen will be responsible for the over-all coordination of the project (WP 1), Final Meeting (WP 6) and Reporting (WP 8) and will be involved in Work package 3 coordinated by University of Maastricht.
Speaking on: Morphological freedom: best served by institutions or rights? Anders Sandberg’s research at FHI centers on societal and ethical issues surrounding human enhancement and new technology, as well as estimating the capabilities and underlying science of future technologies. Topics of particular interest include enhancement of cognition, cognitive biases, technology-enabled collective intelligence, neuroethics and public policy. He has worked on this within the EU project ENHANCE, where he also was responsible for public outreach and online presence. Besides scientific publications in neuroscience, ethics and future studies he has also participated in the public debate about human enhancement internationally. He has a background in computer science, neuroscience and medical engineering. He received a Ph.D. in computational neuroscience from Stockholm University, Sweden for work on neural network modelling of human memory. He has also been the scientific producer for the major neuroscience exhibition "Se Hjärnan!" ("Behold the Brain!"), organized by Swedish Travelling Exhibitions, the Swedish Research Council and the Knowledge Foundation that toured Sweden 2005-2007. He is co-founder of and writer for the think tank Eudoxa.
Donald is a Director with ePlanetVentures based in the Fund’s London office. Previously he was a Professor of Nanochemistry at University College Dublin, during which time he published over one hundred and fifty publications and patents. His research focused on developing next generation integrated circuit and solar cell technologies. Recently, he was elected a member of the Royal Irish Academy and was awarded the Boyle-Higgins medal. He has founded a number of start-ups including NTERA, a company developing paper-quality electronic displays; TopChem, a company manufacturing compounds for the pharmaceutical sector; and TSA, a company developing solar-powering solutions for mobile electronic devices. Donald has recently completed his third term as a member of the Science, Technology and Innovation Advisory Council, the body responsible for advising the Government on these and related issues. Within ePlanetVentures, Donald focuses on opportunities in Cleantech and Medtech. He has led three investments for ePlanet in HPL, SpinX and BiancaMed. He has also been involved in raising ePlanetVenture’s new fund. He has a long standing interest in emerging technologies, including those that will enable human physical and cognitive enhancement.
