Author: M. Eilers Publisher: Springer ISBN: 1137405538 Category : Social Science Languages : en Pages : 368
Book Description
Improving human characteristics goes beyond compensating for an impairment. This book explores the rich and complex relationship between enhancement and impairment, showing that the study of disability offers new ways of thinking about the social and ethical implications of improving the human condition.
Author: Steve Clarke Publisher: Oxford University Press ISBN: 019875485X Category : Medical Languages : en Pages : 292
Book Description
We humans can enhance some of our mental and physical abilities above the normal upper limits for our species with the use of particular drug therapies and medical procedures. We will be able to enhance many more of our abilities in more ways in the near future. Some commentators have welcomed the prospect of wide use of human enhancement technologies, while others have viewed it with alarm, and have made clear that they find human enhancement morally objectionable. The Ethics of Human Enhancement examines whether the reactions can be supported by articulated philosophical reasoning, or perhaps explained in terms of psychological influences on moral reasoning. An international team of ethicists refresh the debate with new ideas and arguments, making connections with scientific research and with related issues in moral philosophy.
Author: Melinda Hall Publisher: Lexington Books ISBN: 1498533493 Category : Philosophy Languages : en Pages : 193
Book Description
In a critical intervention into the bioethics debate over human enhancement, philosopher Melinda Hall tackles the claim that the expansion and development of human capacities is a moral obligation. Hall draws on French philosopher Michel Foucault to reveal and challenge the ways disability is central to the conversation. The Bioethics of Enhancement includes a close reading and analysis of the last century of enhancement thinking and contemporary transhumanist thinkers, the strongest promoters of the obligation to pursue enhancement technology. With specific attention to the work of bioethicists Nick Bostrom and Julian Savulescu, the book challenges the rhetoric and strategies of enhancement thinking. These include the desire to transcend the body and decide who should live in future generations through emerging technologies such as genetic selection. Hall provides new analyses rethinking both the philosophy of enhancement and disability, arguing that enhancement should be a matter of social and political interventions, not genetic and biological interventions. Hall concludes that human vulnerability and difference should be cherished rather than extinguished. This book will be of interest to academics working in bioethics and disability studies, along with those working in Continental philosophy (especially on Foucault).
Author: Thompson, Steven John Publisher: IGI Global ISBN: 1466660112 Category : Computers Languages : en Pages : 349
Book Description
With rapid advancements in human enhancement technologies, society struggles with many issues, such as definition, effects, participation, regulation, and control. Current and future initiatives in these technologies may not be in the participants best interests; therefore, it is imperative for research on humanitarian considerations to be available to those affiliated with this field. Global Issues and Ethical Considerations in Human Enhancement Technologies compiles prestigious research and provides a well-rounded composite of the fields role in emerging technologies. Addressing both present and future concerns, this publication serves as a valuable reference work for researchers, students, professionals, and practitioners involved in computer science and the humanities, as well as many engaged in a humanities approach to metasystems, new artificial life, and robotics.
Author: Julian Savulescu Publisher: Oxford University Press on Demand ISBN: 0199299722 Category : Medical Languages : en Pages : 432
Book Description
To what extent should we use technological advances to try to make better human beings? Leading philosophers debate the possibility of enhancing human cognition, mood, personality, and physical performance, and controlling aging. Would this take us beyond the bounds of human nature? These are questions that need to be answered now.
Author: Nicholas Agar Publisher: MIT Press ISBN: 0262318989 Category : Philosophy Languages : en Pages : 233
Book Description
A nuanced discussion of human enhancement that argues for enhancement that does not significantly exceed what is currently possible for human beings. The transformative potential of genetic and cybernetic technologies to enhance human capabilities is most often either rejected on moral and prudential grounds or hailed as the future salvation of humanity. In this book, Nicholas Agar offers a more nuanced view, making a case for moderate human enhancement—improvements to attributes and abilities that do not significantly exceed what is currently possible for human beings. He argues against radical human enhancement, or improvements that greatly exceed current human capabilities. Agar explores notions of transformative change and motives for human enhancement; distinguishes between the instrumental and intrinsic value of enhancements; argues that too much enhancement undermines human identity; considers the possibility of cognitively enhanced scientists; and argues against radical life extension. Making the case for moderate enhancement, Agar argues that many objections to enhancement are better understood as directed at the degree of enhancement rather than enhancement itself. Moderate human enhancement meets the requirement of truly human enhancement. By radically enhancing human cognitive capabilities, by contrast, we may inadvertently create beings (“post-persons”) with moral status higher than that of persons. If we create beings more entitled to benefits and protections against harms than persons, Agar writes, this will be bad news for the unenhanced. Moderate human enhancement offers a more appealing vision of the future and of our relationship to technology.
Author: Julian Savulescu Publisher: John Wiley & Sons ISBN: 1444393545 Category : Medical Languages : en Pages : 811
Book Description
Enhancing Human Capacities is the first to review the very latest scientific developments in human enhancement. It is unique in its examination of the ethical and policy implications of these technologies from a broad range of perspectives. Presents a rich range of perspectives on enhancement from world leading ethicists and scientists from Europe and North America The most comprehensive volume yet on the science and ethics of human enhancement Unique in providing a detailed overview of current and expected scientific advances in this area Discusses both general conceptual and ethical issues and concrete questions of policy Includes sections covering all major forms of enhancement: cognitive, affective, physical, and life extension
Author: Adam Cureton Publisher: Oxford University Press ISBN: 019062289X Category : Philosophy Languages : en Pages : 846
Book Description
Disability raises profound and fundamental issues: questions about human embodiment and well-being; dignity, respect, justice and equality; personal and social identity. It raises pressing questions for educational, health, reproductive, and technology policy, and confronts the scope and direction of the human and civil rights movements. Yet it is only recently that disability has become the subject of the sustained and rigorous philosophical inquiry that it deserves. The Oxford Handbook of Philosophy and Disability is the first comprehensive volume on the subject. The volume's contents range from debates over the definition of disability to the challenges posed by disability for justice and dignity; from the relevance of disability for respect, other interpersonal attitudes, and intimate relationships to its significance for health policy, biotechnology, and human enhancement; from the ways that disability scholarship can enrich moral and political philosophy, to the importance of physical and intellectual disabilities for the philosophy of mind and action. The contributions reflect the variety of areas of expertise, intellectual orientations, and personal backgrounds of their authors. Some are founding philosophers of disability; others are promising new scholars; still others are leading philosophers from other areas writing on disability for the first time. Many have disabilities themselves. This volume boldly explores neglected issues, offers fresh perspectives on familiar ones, and ultimately expands philosophy's boundaries. More than merely presenting an overview of existing work, this Handbook will chart the growth and direction of a vital and burgeoning field for years to come.
Author: Jonathan Anomaly Publisher: Routledge ISBN: 100076978X Category : Philosophy Languages : en Pages : 142
Book Description
Creating Future People offers readers a fast-paced primer on how new genetic technologies will enable parents to influence the traits of their children, including their intelligence, moral capacities, physical appearance, and immune system. It deftly explains the science of gene editing and embryo selection, and raises the central moral questions with colorful language and a brisk style. Jonathan Anomaly takes seriously the diversity of preferences parents have, and the limits of public policy in regulating what could soon be a global market for reproductive technology. He argues that once embryo selection for complex traits happens it will change the moral landscape by altering the incentives parents face. All of us will take an interest in the traits everyone else selects, and this will present coordination problems that previous writers on genetic enhancement have failed to consider. Anomaly navigates difficult ethical issues with vivid language and scientifically informed speculation about how genetic engineering will transform humanity. Key features: Offers clear explanations of scientific concepts Explores important moral questions without academic jargon Brings discoveries from different fields together to give us a sense of where humanity is headed
Author: Jonathan Glover Publisher: OUP Oxford ISBN: 0191037117 Category : Philosophy Languages : en Pages : 128
Book Description
Progress in genetic and reproductive technology now offers us the possibility of choosing what kinds of children we do and don't have. Should we welcome this power, or should we fear its implications? There is no ethical question more urgent than this: we may be at a turning-point in the history of humanity. The renowned moral philosopher and best-selling author Jonathan Glover shows us how we might try to answer this question, and other provoking and disturbing questions to which it leads. Surely parents owe it to their children to give them the best life they can? Increasingly we are able to reduce the number of babies born with disabilities and disorders. But there is a powerful new challenge to conventional thinking about the desirability of doing so: this comes from the voices of those who have these conditions. They call into question the very definition of disability. How do we justify trying to avoid bringing people like them into being? In 2002 a deaf couple used sperm donated by a friend with hereditary deafness to have a deaf baby: they took the view that deafness is not a disability, but a difference. Starting with the issues raised by this case, Jonathan Glover examines the emotive idea of 'eugenics', and the ethics of attempting to enhance people, for non-medical reasons, by means of genetic choices. Should parents be free, not only to have children free from disabilities, but to choose, for instance, the colour of their eyes or hair? This is no longer a distant prospect, but an existing power which we cannot wish away. What impact will such interventions have, both on the individuals concerned and on society as a whole? Should we try to make general improvements to the genetic make-up of human beings? Is there a central core of human nature with which we must not interfere? This beautifully clear book is written for anyone who cares about the rights and wrongs of parents' choices for their children, anyone who is concerned about our human future. Glover handles these uncomfortable questions in a controversial but always humane and sympathetic manner.
Author: M. Eilers
Author: Steve Clarke
Author: Melinda Hall
Author: Thompson, Steven John
Author: Julian Savulescu
Author: Nicholas Agar
Author: Julian Savulescu
Author: Adam Cureton
Author: Jonathan Anomaly
Author: Jonathan Glover