Ought we to enhance our cognitive capacities?

Bioethics

Volumn 23, Issue 7, 2009, Pages 421-432

  Tännsjö, Torbjörn ^a  

^a NONE

Author keywords

Cognitive enhancement; Happiness studies; Hedonism; Perfectionism; Personal identity; Preferentialism

Indexed keywords

ARTICLE; BIOETHICS; COGNITION; HUMAN; INTELLIGENCE; PHILOSOPHY;

BIOETHICAL ISSUES; COGNITION; HUMANS; INTELLIGENCE; PHILOSOPHY;

EID: 70350345244     PISSN: 02699702     EISSN: 14678519     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1111/j.1467-8519.2008.00721.x     Document Type: Article

References (42)

1. This article was written in connection with the EU research project Enhance and was finalized during a stay as research fellow at the Swedish Collegium for Advanced Study at Uppsala University.
2. Lars Bergström, 1994, has argued that we would all have been happier, had there been no science. Notes on the Value of Science. In Logic, Methodology and Philosophy of Science.
3. D. Prawitz, B. Skyrms & D. Westerstahl, eds. Amsterdam: Elsevier. I defend the opposite view in: T. Tännsjö, 1994. In Defence of Science.
4. Defence of Science, Ibid. But in my defence of science and our high brainpower I do not rely on any idea that people today lead better lives than hunter-gatherers who walked the savannah. My point is that more people live now, and that more is better. In the present context this kind of speculation is left to one side.
5. See: T. Tännsjö. 1993. Should We Change the Human Genome? Theoretical Medicine; 14: 231-247 for a discussion of the notion of enhancement.
6. I have not been able to find any reference here but I believe I remember having read this in some of his books.
7. W.E. Jones. 1997. Why Do We Value Knowledge? Am Philos Q 1997; 34: 426.
8. R. Swinburne. 1999. Providence and the Problem of Evil. Oxford: Oxford University Press: 58. For an overview of the ancient and recent discussion.
9. D. Prichard. 2007. The Value of Knowledge. Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Available at http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/knowledge-value/. [Accessed 17 September 2008] I thank Erik Olsson for drawing my attention to the relevance of this discussion in the present context.
10. Even in D. Kahneman, P.P. Wakker & R. Sarin. 1997. Back to Bentham? Explorations of Experienced Utility. QJE; 112: 375-405 (Pubitemid 127344008)
11. perhaps the most theoretically advanced discussion of the relation between classical hedonistic utilitarianism and empirical happiness studies, the problem is simply glossed over. For a suggested solution to the problem of the hedonic unit, see: T. Tännsjö. 1998. Hedonistic Utilitarianism. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press/Columbia University Press.
12. R. Veenhoven. 1984. Conditions of Happiness. Dordrecht:
13. Reidel; & M. Argyle. 2001 The Psychology of Happiness. 2nd edn. London: Routledge.
14. E. Diener & R.E. Lucas. 1999. Personality and Subjective Well-being. In Well-being: The Foundations of Hedonic Psychology. D. Kahneman, E. Diener & N. Schwarz, eds. New York: Russell Sage: 213-229
15. F. Heylighen & J. Bernheim. Global Progress I: Empirical Evidence of Ongoing Increase in Quality-of-Life. Journal of Happiness Studies 2000; 1: 323-349
16. M.E.P. Seligman. 2002. Authentic Happiness: Using the New Positive Psychology to Realize Your Potential Deep Fulfillment. London: Brealey; Veenhoven, op. cit. note 8.
17. Veenhoven, op. cit. note8;
18. M.Argyle ,op. cit. note 8;
19. D. Goleman. 1996 Emotional Intelligence: Why it can matter More Than IQ. London: Bloomsbury.
20. See an interview with an expert in the field, psychologist Per Gjerde, published on the net. Available at http://www.ucsc.edu/oncampus/ currents/98-99/11-16/depression.htm [Accessed 22 May 2006].
21. E. Diener & F. Fujita. 1995. Resources, Personal Strivings, and Subjective Well-Being: A Nomothetic and Idiographic Approach. J Pers Soc Psychol 1995; 68: 926-935.
22. A.Verri et al. An Italian-Australian Comparison of Quality of Life among People with Intellectual Disability Living in the Community. Journal of Intellectual Disability Research 1999; 43: 513-522.
23. K.E. Stanovich & R.F. West. On the Relative Independence of Thinking Biases and Cognitive Ability. J Pers Soc Psychol 2008; 94: 672-695.
24. Diener & Fujita, op. cit. note 12.
25. S. Frederick & G. Loewenstein. 1999. Hedonic adaptation. In Well- being: The Foundations of Hedonic Psychology. D. Kahneman, E. Diener & N. Schwartz, eds. New York: Russell Sage: 302-329
26. C. Kim-Prieto et al. Intergrating the Diverse Definitions of Happiness: A Time-Sequential Framework of Subjective Well-being. Journal of Happiness Studies, 2005; 6: 261-300;
27. K.S. Sheldon & S. Lyubomirsky. Achieving Sustainable Gains in Happiness: Change Your Actions, Not Your Circumstances. Journal ofHappiness Studies 2006; 7: 55-86.
28. J.J. Kleinschmidt et al. The Role of Control in Depression, Anxiety, and Life Satisfaction among Visually Impaired Older People. Journal of Health Education 1995; 26: 26-36
29. M. Werngren-Elgstrom, O. Dehlin & S. Iwarsson. Aspects of Quality of Life in Persons with Pre-lingual Deafness Using Sign Language: Subjective Wellbeing, Ill-health Symptoms, Depression and Insomnia. Archives of Gerontology and Geriatrics 2003; 37: 13-24.
30. In this paragraph I draw to some extent on things I have published elsewhere, e.g. T. Tännsjö. Narrow Hedonism. Journal of Happiness Studies, 2007; 8: 79-98.
31. J.S. Mill, 1886/1962. Utilitarianism. In Utilitarianism. Mary Warnock, ed. London & Glasgow: Collins/Fontana: 260.
32. I owe this objection to an anonymous reviewer for the journal.
33. See Tännsjö, Utilitarianism, op. cit. note 7, ch. 6.
34. Aristotle. 1985. Rhetoric. Trans. W. Rhys Roberts. In The Complete Works of Aristotle. Vol.2. Jonathan Barnes, ed. Princeton: Princeton University Press: 1360b; 19-24.
35. D Parfit. 1984/1991. Reasons and Persons. Oxford: Clarendon Press: 499.
36. This has been suggested to me as a promising candidate for cognitive enhancement by an anonymous reviewer for the journal.
37. I owe this objection to an anonymous reviewer for the journal.
38. Aristotle. 1953. Ethics. The Ethics ofAristotle. The Nicomachean Ethics. Trans. J.A.K. Thomson. Harmondsworth: Penguin: 305.
39. Parfit, op. cit. note 23, p. 306.
40. Parfit, op. cit. note 23, p. 306. Ibid.
41. See for example D.L. Delahanty et al. Management of Posttraumatic Stress Disorder: Diagnostic and Therapeutic Issues. JCP 1999; 60: 33-38.
42. The Dana Foundation, for example, provides some information about this at their website http://www.dana.org/news/cerebrum/detail.aspx?id=76&p=5.