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An argument that moral functioning is immeasurably complex, mediated by biology but not determined by it. Throughout history, humanity has been seen as being in need of improvement, most pressingly in need of moral improvement. Today, in what has been called the beginnings of “the golden age of neuroscience,” laboratory findings claim to offer insights into how the brain “does” morality, even suggesting that it is possible to make people more moral by manipulating their biology. Can “moral bioenhancement”—using technological or pharmaceutical means to boost the morally desirable and remove the morally problematic—bring about a morally improved humanity? In The Myth of the Mor...
The topic of intelligence involves questions that cut deep into ultimate concerns and human identity, and the study of intelligence is an ideal ground for dialogue between science and religion. This volume investigates the notion of spiritual intelligence from a variety of perspectives, bringing together contributions from theology, computer science, linguistics, psychology, biology, and cognitive science. It defines spiritual intelligence as “processing things differently, not processing different things” and aims to describe it in naturalistic terms. Spiritual intelligence is not regarded as a separate mental module or a magical ability to interact with the supernatural but rather as a specific, more spiritual way of engagement with reality, which has observable cognitive, phenomenal, and linguistic characteristics. The book is valuable reading for those working at the interface between science and spirituality.
This book brings together selected papers from scientists, theologians and philosophers who took part in the 2021 conference of the European Society for the Study of Science and Theology based in Madrid, Spain. The contributions constitute a cutting-edge resource for considering questions from interdisciplinary perspectives, covering both the crucial role played by images and models in our thinking and also the limitations which are inherent in these linguistic devices. Questions addressed include: Can this use of images and models generate a creative pluralism, enabling us to think outside the disciplinary silos which are a feature of academic discourse? Can they enable fruitful, synergistic, interdisciplinary conversations? This book will appeal to students and academics alike, particularly those working in the fields of philosophy, theology, ethics and the history of science.
This book surveys the distinctions that underlie the unbound potential and existential risks of life expansion and radical modifications posed by a transhuman world. Humanness is in flux as human bodies are being hacked and altered in their quest for super wellness, super intelligence and super longevity. Now is the time to discuss how best to think about dealing with bodies that have been hacked to exceed natural physical limits or more technically, species typical functioning. Enter the advent of transhumanism to take uncertainty by the horns. According to transhumanists, death is unnecessary and medical conventions undermine the possibility to radically evolve. To biohackers, there is no need to wait to explore the risks that conventional medicine dares not. This book is of interest to anyone interested in tapping into this growing movement of modifying the human body as it is right now.
An exploration of moral stress, distress, and injuries inherent in modern society through the maps that pervade academic and public communications worlds. In Ethics in Everyday Places, ethicist and geographer Tom Koch considers what happens when, as he puts it, “you do everything right but know you've done something wrong." The resulting moral stress and injury, he argues, are pervasive in modern Western society. Koch makes his argument "from the ground up," from the perspective of average persons, and through a revealing series of maps in which issues of ethics and morality are embedded. The book begins with a general grounding in both moral stress and mapping as a means of investigation....
What if human reproduction was always elective? A prominent bioethicist speculates about the possibilities—and the likely consequences. What would the world be like if all pregnancy was intended, not unintended as it is nearly half the time now? Considerably better, Margaret Pabst Battin suggests in Sex and the Planet, a provocative thought experiment with far-reaching real-world implications. Many of the world’s most vexing and seemingly intractable issues begin with sex—when sperm meets egg, as Battin puts it—abortion, adolescent pregnancy, high-risk pregnancy, sexual violence, population growth and decline. Rethinking reproductive rights and exposing our many mistaken assumptions ...
The Routledge Handbook of the Ethics of Human Enhancement provides readers with a philosophically rich and scientifically grounded analysis of human enhancement and its ethical implications. A landmark in the academic literature, the volume covers human enhancement in genetic engineering, neuroscience, synthetic biology, regenerative medicine, bioengineering, and many other fields. The Handbook includes a diverse and multifaceted collection of 30 chapters—all appearing here in print for the first time— that reveal the fundamental ethical challenges related to human enhancement. The chapters have been written by internationally recognized leaders in the field and are organized into seven ...
This collection vigorously addresses the religious implications of extreme human enhancement technology. Topics covered include cutting edge themes, such as moral enhancement, common ground to both transhumanism and religion, the meaning of death, desire and transcendence, and virtue ethics. Radical enhancement programs, advocated by transhumanists, could arguably have a more profound impact than any other development in human history. Reflecting a range of opinion about the desirability of extreme enhancement, leading scholars in the field join with emerging scholars to foster enhanced conversation on these topics.