Addiction is a Disability, and it Matters
AbstractPrevious discussions of addiction have often focused on the question of whether addiction is a disease. This discussion distinguishes that question – thedisease question– from the question of whether addiction is a disability. I argue that, however one answers the disease question, and indeed on almost any credible account of addiction, addiction is a disability. I then consider the implications of this view, or why it matters that addiction is a disability. The disease model of addiction has led many to see addiction as primarily a medical problem, and to make medical treatment of the addicted person the first...
Source: Neuroethics - April 22, 2021 Category: Medical Ethics Source Type: research
Shining a Light also Casts a Shadow: Neuroimaging Incidental Findings in Neuromarketing Research
AbstractRapid growth in structural and functional brain research has led to increasing ethical discussion of what to do about incidental findings within the brains of healthy neuroimaging research participants that have potential health importance, but which are beyond the original aims of the study. This dilemma has been widely debated with respect to general neuroimaging research but has attracted little attention in the context of neuromarketing studies. In this paper, I argue that neuromarketing researchers owe participants the same ethical obligations as other neuroimaging researchers. The financial resources availabl...
Source: Neuroethics - April 12, 2021 Category: Medical Ethics Source Type: research
Embodiment, Movement and Agency in Neuroethics
AbstractEmerging neurotechnologies, such as brain-computer interfaces, interact closely with a user ’s body by enabling actions controlled with brain activity. This can have a profound impact on the user’s experience of movement, the sense of agency and other body-and action-related aspects. In this introduction to the special issue “Mechanized Brains, Embodied Technologies”, we reflect on the relationships between embodiment, movement and agency that are addressed in the collected papers. (Source: Neuroethics)
Source: Neuroethics - April 12, 2021 Category: Medical Ethics Source Type: research
The Normative Implications of Recent Empirical Neuroethics Research on Moral Intuitions
AbstractEmpirical neuroethics models have always had normative ambitions. Older models (e.g., dual process) attempted to debunk traditional moral theories, whereas newer models (e.g., ADC model) attempt to fit their empirical and normative claims with them. The issue of normative significance as it pertains to the use of social science methodology on moral intuitions remains open. This paper analyzes the Is/Ought gap and the empirical underpinnings of influential constructivist approaches in order to argue that the normative ambitions of empirical neuroethics models are not necessarily always misguided. The author clarifie...
Source: Neuroethics - April 6, 2021 Category: Medical Ethics Source Type: research
Pessimism Counts in Favor of Biomedical Enhancement: A Lesson from the Anti-Natalist Philosophy of P. W. Zapffe
AbstractAccording to the Norwegian philosopher Peter Wessel Zapffe (1899 –1990), human life is filled with so much suffering that procreation is morally impermissible. In the first part of this paper I present Zapffe’s pessimism-based argument for anti-natalism, and contrast it with the arguments for anti-natalism proposed by Arthur Schopenhauer and David Benatar. In the second part I explore what Zapffe’s pessimism can teach us about biomedical enhancement. I make the (perhaps surprising) case that pessimism counts in favor of pursuing biomedical enhancements. The reason is that the worse we take the baseline human ...
Source: Neuroethics - March 27, 2021 Category: Medical Ethics Source Type: research
Next of kin ’s Reactions to Results of Functional Neurodiagnostics of Disorders of Consciousness: a Question of Information Delivery or of Differing Epistemic Beliefs?
AbstractOur recent publication inNeuroethics re-constructed the perspectives of family caregivers of patients with disorders of consciousness (DOC) on functional neurodiagnostics (Schembs et al., Neuroethics, 2020). Two papers criticized some of our methodological decisions (Peterson, Neuroethics, 2020; Andersen et al., Neuroethics, 2020) and commented on some conclusions. In this commentary, we would like to further explain our methodological decisions. Despite the limitations of our findings, which we readily acknowledged, we continue to think they entail valid hypotheses that need further investigation. We conclude that...
Source: Neuroethics - March 24, 2021 Category: Medical Ethics Source Type: research
What it Might Be like to Be a Group Agent
AbstractMany theorists have defended the claim that collective entities can attain genuine agential status. If collectives can be agents, this opens up a further question: can they be conscious? That is, is there something that it is like to be them? Eric Schwitzgebel (Philosophical Studies 172: 1697 –1721,2015) argues that yes, collective entities (including the United States, taken as a whole), may well be significantly conscious. Others, including Kammerer (Philosophia 43: 1047 –1057,2015), Tononi and Koch (Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences 370: 20140167 –20140167,2015) , and L...
Source: Neuroethics - March 2, 2021 Category: Medical Ethics Source Type: research
Sport, Neuro-Doping and Ethics
AbstractApart from a short clarification of what neuro-doping is, the aim of this article is twofold. First to give a few reasons in favour of having a special issue on neuro-doping. Second to present an overview of the articles in this issue. One reason for having this special issue, is that it needs to be established whether methods such as transcranial direct-current stimulation (tDCS) should be added to World Anti-Doping Agency’s (WADA) prohibited list or not, as it is currently under discussion by WADA. Another reason for dealing with the ethics of neuro-doping is that ethical analysis of the use or possible use...
Source: Neuroethics - March 2, 2021 Category: Medical Ethics Source Type: research
The Spectrum of Responsibility Ascription for End Users of Neurotechnologies
AbstractInvasive neural devices offer novel prospects for motor rehabilitation on different levels of agentive behavior. From a functional perspective, they interact with, support, or enable human intentional actions in such a way that movement capabilities are regained. However, when there is a technical malfunction resulting in an unintended movement, the complexity of the relationship between the end user and the device sometimes makes it difficult to determine who is responsible for the outcome – a circumstance that has been coined as “responsibility gap” in the literature. So far, recent accounts frame this issu...
Source: Neuroethics - February 28, 2021 Category: Medical Ethics Source Type: research
Trait Self-Control, Inhibition, and Executive Functions: Rethinking some Traditional Assumptions
AbstractThis paper draws on work in the sciences of the mind to cast doubt on some assumptions that have often been made in the study of self-control. Contra a long, Aristotelian tradition, recent evidence suggests that highly self-controlled individuals do not have a trait very similar to continence: they experience relatively few desires that conflict with their evaluative judgments and are not especially good at directly and effortfully inhibiting such desires. Similarly, several recent studies have failed to support the view that self-control capacities are constituted, at least in part, by excellent inhibitory executi...
Source: Neuroethics - January 20, 2021 Category: Medical Ethics Source Type: research
Neurodoping in Chess to Enhance Mental Stamina
This article discusses substances/techniques that target the brain in order to enhance sports performance (known as “neurodoping”). It considers whether neurodoping in mind sports, such as chess, is unethical and whether it should be a crime. Rather than focusing on widely discussed objections against doping based on harm/risk to health, this article focuses specifically on the objection that neurodoping, eve n if safe, would undermine the “spirit of sport”. Firstly, it briefly explains why chess can be considered a sport. Secondly, it outlines some possible substances/methods that could be used in order to enhance...
Source: Neuroethics - January 7, 2021 Category: Medical Ethics Source Type: research
Should Couch Potatoes Be Encouraged to Use Transcranial Direct Current Stimulation?
AbstractA very high percentage of the world population doesn ’t exercise enough and, as a consequence, is at high risk of developing serious health conditions. Physical inactivity paired with a poor diet is the second cause of death in high income countries. In this paper, I suggest that transcranial direct stimulation (tDCS) holds promise for “couch pota toes” because it could be used to make them more active, without causing any major side-effect. I also argue that other, less safe, tools could be used to achieve the goal of decreasing physical inactivity, insofar as they have overall fewer side-effects than physic...
Source: Neuroethics - November 12, 2020 Category: Medical Ethics Source Type: research
Would Nonconsensual Criminal Neurorehabilitation Express a more Degrading Attitude Towards Offenders than Consensual Criminal Neurorehabilitation?
AbstractIt has been proposed that reoffending could be reduced by manipulating the neural underpinnings of offenders ’ criminogenic mental features with what have been called neurocorrectives. The legitimacy of such use of neurotechnology – criminal neurorehabilitation, as the use is called – is usually seen to presuppose valid consent by the offenders subjected to it. According to a central criticism of non consensual criminal neurorehabilitation, nonconsensual use of neurocorrectives would express a degrading attitude towards offenders. In this article, I consider this criticism of nonconsensual criminal neurorehab...
Source: Neuroethics - November 6, 2020 Category: Medical Ethics Source Type: research
The Authenticity of Machine-Augmented Human Intelligence: Therapy, Enhancement, and the Extended Mind
AbstractEthical analyses of biomedical human enhancement often consider the issue of authenticity — to what degree can the accomplishments of those utilizing biomedical enhancements (including cognitive or athletic ones) be consideredauthentic orworthy of praise? As research into Brain-Computer Interface (BCI) technology progresses, it may soon be feasible to create a BCI device that enhances or augments natural human intelligence through some invasive or noninvasive biomedical means. In this article we will (1) review currently existing BCI technologies and to what extent these can be said to enhance or augment the capa...
Source: Neuroethics - October 24, 2020 Category: Medical Ethics Source Type: research
In Defence of the Hivemind Society
AbstractThe idea that humans should abandon their individuality and use technology to bind themselves together into hivemind societies seems both farfetched and frightening – something that is redolent of the worst dystopias from science fiction. In this article, we argue that these common reactions to the ideal of a hivemind society are mistaken. The idea that humans could form hiveminds is sufficiently plausible for its axiological consequences to be taken seriousl y. Furthermore, far from being a dystopian nightmare, the hivemind society could be desirable and could enable a form of sentient flourishing. Consequently,...
Source: Neuroethics - October 4, 2020 Category: Medical Ethics Source Type: research
