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Is it ‘more normal’ to enhance than to restore our nature? Cover

Is it ‘more normal’ to enhance than to restore our nature?

By: Martin Hähnel  
Open Access
|Jun 2017

Abstract

In this paper I give a short overview about the general implications of issues of human nature within the field of human enhancement. The first section of my contribution deals with a certain intertwining of human enhancement and the intrinsic claims of human nature, showing that a non-statistical concept of human nature can play a crucial role in the debate on human enhancement. After that, my aim is to validate that particular enhancements (e.g. neuro-enhancement) fall under the same normative criteria as “normal enhancement”, only requiring a special contextual awareness to co-exist with it ethically. Methodically, my intention is to draw on quasi-naturalist approaches, which argue that our nature as humans is not a “mixed bag”, but seems to be wholly constituted by its species-related characteristics. As a result, we can state that our evaluations of living beings or life forms, which are also evaluations of our methods of medical treatments and of our ethical attitudes, depend on our picture of human nature.

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1515/ebce-2017-0001 | Journal eISSN: 2453-7829 | Journal ISSN: 1338-5615
Language: English
Page range: 105 - 113
Published on: Jun 26, 2017
Published by: University of Prešov
In partnership with: Paradigm Publishing Services
Publication frequency: 2 issues per year

© 2017 Martin Hähnel, published by University of Prešov
This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 3.0 License.