organisations ::: ressources ::: texts ::: critics and …
Von Heiko Oldörp, Boston | © ZEIT ONLINE 9.1.2009 – 20:33 Uhr
„Viele amerikanische Schüler manipulieren ihre sportliche Leistung mit verbotenen Mitteln. Es geht ihnen vor allem um die Chance auf ein bezahltes Studium.” [zum Artikel]
Voodoo-Korrelationen in den Neurowissenschaften? (Jörg Auf dem Hövel, Telepolis, 03.01.09)
Eine Forschergruppe zweifelt die diversen Studien an, die starke Zusammenhänge zwischen menschlichen Verhalten und Aktivitätsmustern im Gehirn nachgewiesen haben wollen
„Seit einigen Jahren ist es möglich, dem Menschen mittels bildgebender Verfahren quasi beim Denken zuzusehen. Es entstand das Feld der sozialen Neurowissenschaften: Wissenschaftler bringen sichtbare Vorgänge im Gehirn in Zusammenhang mit Verhalten, Entscheidungen und Emotionen. Eine Forschergruppe um Edward Vul vom MIT und Harold Pashler von der Universität von Kalifornien in San Diego hat nun 54 der wichtigsten solcher Studien aus den vergangenen Jahren untersucht und behauptet in einem Aufsatz für die Perspectives on Psychological Science, der vorab online veröffentlicht wurde: Eine Vielzahl dieser Leitstudien beinhaltet statistisch unmögliche oder falsche Korrelationen, die Autoren sollten nachbessern. [...]“
Freigabe von “smart drugs” für Schüler und Studenten? (Florain Rötzer, Telepolis, 03.01.09)
„Es gebe genügend Beweise, dass Medikamente wie Ritalin oder Provigil Konzentration und Leistung verbessern können, sagt der Bioethiker Harris. [...]“
Alexandra Frean, Education Editor, from Times Online, January 1, 2009
Let students take drugs to boost brainpower, says leading academic
„Students should be allowed to take “smart drugs”, such as Ritalin, to help boost their academic performance, a leading academic has suggested.
John Harris, professor of bioethics and director of the Institute for Science, Ethics and Innovation at the University of Manchester, said the government and medical profession should “seriously consider” making cognition-enhancing drugs available to students without prescription, or allowing them to be prescribed for non-therapeutic purposes, such as studying. [...]“
Researchers’ vision: restoring sight through artificial retinas
December 30th, 2008 By Robert S. Boyd in Technology / Engineering (PhysOrg.com)
„Scientists are testing artificial retinas that they hope can restore partial sight to people who’ve lost their vision to the most common causes of blindness. [...]“
By Judith Warner (Herald Tribune), Published: December 30, 2008
„What if you could just take a pill and all of a sudden remember to pay your bills on time? What if, thanks to modern neuroscience, you could, simultaneously, make New Year’s Eve plans, pay the mortgage, call the pediatrician, consolidate credit card debt and do your job – well – without forgetting dentist appointments or neglecting to pick up your children at school?
Would you do it? Tune out the distractions of our online, on-call, too-fast ADD-ogenic world with focus and memory-enhancing medications like Ritalin or Adderall? Stay sharp as a knife – no matter how overworked and sleep-deprived – with a mental-alertness-boosting drug like the anti-narcolepsy medication Provigil?
I’ve always said no. Fantasy aside, I’ve always rejected the idea of using drugs meant for people with real neurological disorders to treat the pathologies of everyday life. [...]“
Enhancing the species (Anjana Ahuja, Times online, May, 17.)
Our correspondent meets the controversial philosopher John Harris, who argues that we have a moral and ethical duty to improve the human race by biologically enhancing our children
The whiteboard in John Harris’s office declares: “John is cool.” Many hold a different opinion of one of the most controversial philosophers in Britain. Here are some of his views: abortion and euthanasia are both fine, desirable even; parents should be allowed to create designer or cloned babies; there’s nothing wrong with a drug-fuelled Olympics; scientists and medics should strive to make us immortal, even on a crowded planet; our bodies should be routinely plundered after death for organs, even if the dead and bereaved do not wish it; it is morally justified to compel people to participate in scientific trials, just as we compel them to do jury service. […]
Call for papers: Transhumanism? (Re-Public)
We invite contributions for our upcoming special issue entitled “Transhumanism?”. Is there a new challenge about to dominate our world? A challenge that appears more pressing than the fight against climate change, as demanding as the one against poverty, more complex than our current questions around bioethics.
Are we in a position to redefine, to drastically transform our very human nature?
This is a question formed in the last 20 years by an international movement, deriving from a scientific current, advocating that if the human is a result of an evolution process of millions of years time, nothing rationally preempts its conclusion. On the contrary, transhumanism proposes that the convergence of nanotechnologies, biotechnologies, information and cognitive sciences provide us with a new opportunity, as well as, the responsibility to collectively participate and assume this evolution: it is, more than ever, possible to “form a better humanity” meaning better health for individuals, longer life expectancy, a more effective control of themselves, through enhanced skills, capacities and capabilities.
The special issue will attempt to investigate the influence of transhumanism and the new questions that its poses. […]
The Future of Man – How Will Evolution Change Humans? By Peter Ward (Scientific American)
Contrary to popular belief, humans continue to evolve. Our bodies and brains are not the same as our ancestors’ were—or as our descendants’ will be
People commonly assume that our species has evolved very little since prehistoric times. Yet new studies using genetic information from populations around the globe suggest that the pace of human evolution increased with the advent of agriculture and cities.
If we are still evolving, what might our species look like in a millennium should we survive whatever environmental and social surprises are in store for us? Speculation ranges from the hopeful to the dystopian. [...]
Better than human – Why is the world’s most prestigious science journal peddling the snake oil of cognition-enhancing drugs? (Michael Cook, Mercator Net)
Publication in the British journal Nature is the acme of academic achievement, a byword for quality and the touchstone of scientific opinion. So when its editor co-authors an article putting the case for a technology which has been called the world’s most dangerous idea, you’ve got to ask: what have these dudes been smoking? […]
Oliver Krüger
Die Vervollkommnung des Menschen
Tod und Unsterblichkeit im Posthumanismus und Transhumanismus
Der Mensch ist unvollkommen. Neben den vielen kleinen körperlichen und geistigen Grenzen und den krankheitsbedingten Leiden haftet ihm vor allem ein Makel an: der Mensch ist sterblich. Seine Tage sind gezählt – herausragenden Exemplaren der Gattung Mensch gelingt es heutzutage immerhin, bis zu 38.000 mal das Werden und Vergehen eines Tages zu erleben, aber dann ist Schluss. Das wusste schon der mythische König Gilgamesh, der sich auf die Suche nach einem zauberhaften Unsterblichkeitskraut machte, und auch aus der Sicht des Soziologen Max Weber offenbarte sich im Faktum des Todes “die Sinnlosigkeit der rein innerweltlichen Selbstvervollkommnung zum Kulturmenschen”, die prägend sein sollte für eine sich säkular verstehende Moderne – denn trotz aller Sublimierungsversuche blieb der Tod. […]
Experten fordern Regeln für den Smart-Drugs Menschenpark (Telepolis)
Wie soll verantwortungsvoller Umgang mit den sogenannten “Cognitive Enhancern” aussehen?
Es überrascht, dass ausgerechnet das angesehene Wissenschaftsmagazin Nature der Diskussion um die sogenannten “cognitive Enhancer” so viel Raum gibt. Schon vor einem Jahr stellte man dort in die Frage Would you boost your brainpower?, eine nicht repräsentative Umfrage unter den Lesern wies auf eine gewisse Affinität der akademischen Elite zu Medikamenten hin, die das geistige Leistungspotential auf die eine oder andere Seite steigern sollen (siehe: Ritalin für Alle!). [...]
New Ways to Boost Memory – Enhancing neuron gene expression may improve memory.
By Emily Singer (Technology Review)
Scientists are developing new ways to selectively boost gene expression in the brain, in the hope of treating psychiatric and neurological disease. A growing pool of evidence shows that compounds that target this mechanism can improve learning and memory in rodents. But existing drugs, which were not developed for this purpose, are relatively weak and unselective, and their long-term safety is not yet clear. […]
Laurin Rötzer 08.12.2008 (TP)
Medikamente können unsere geistige Leistungsfähigkeit steigern. Ist das Einnehmen dieser „kognitiven Enhancer“ ethisch korrekt, sollte es jeder tun können?
Diese Fragen stellen sich die Autoren eines in Nature vorab online veröffentlichten Essays: [extern] Towards responsible use of cognitive-enhancing drugs by the healthy Es gibt einige Medikamente, die die geistige Leistungsfähigkeit steigern können. Das bekannteste dürfte Methylphenidat (Ritalin) sein, welches vor allem für Kinder mit dem Aufmerksamkeitsdefizitsyndrom (ADHS) verschrieben wird. Andere sind Amphetamine und Modafinil. Sie haben gemeinsam, dass sie die Konzentration von bestimmten Neurotransmittern im Gehirn variieren und so längere und intensivere Aufmerksamkeitsspannen ermöglichen. […]
Towards responsible use of cognitive-enhancing drugs by the healthy
Henry Greely, Barbara Sahakian, John Harris, Ronald C. Kessler, Michael Gazzaniga, Philip Campbell & Martha J. Farah
Society must respond to the growing demand for cognitive enhancement. That response must start by rejecting the idea that ‘enhancement’ is a dirty word, argue Henry Greely and colleagues.
Today, on university campuses around the world, students are striking deals to buy and sell prescription drugs such as Adderall and Ritalin — not to get high, but to get higher grades, to provide an edge over their fellow students or to increase in some measurable way their capacity for learning. These transactions are crimes in the United States, punishable by prison. […]
Never Say Die -Step aside, quacks. The search for longer life is a real science now.
By Anne Underwood | NEWSWEEK, Published Dec 6, 2008, From the magazine issue dated Dec 15, 2008
By the time it reaches the age of 18 days, the average roundworm is old, flabby, sluggish and wrinkled. By 20 days, the creature will likely be dead—unless, that is, it’s one of Cynthia Kenyon’s worms. Kenyon, director of the Hillblom Center for the Biology of Aging at the University of California, San Francisco, has tinkered with two genes that turn simple worms into mini-Methuselahs, with life spans of up to 144 days. “You can beat them up in ways that would kill a normal worm—exposing them to high heat, radiation and infectious microbes—and still they don’t die,” she says. “Instead, they’re moving and looking like young worms. It’s like a miracle—except it’s science.” [...]
By NICHOLAS D. KRISTOF, Published: December 4, 2008, RAWALPINDI, Pakistan
Travelers to Africa and Asia all have their favorite forms of foreign aid to “make a difference.” One of mine is a miracle substance that is cheap and actually makes people smarter.
Unfortunately, it has one appalling side effect. No, it doesn’t make you sterile, but it is just about the least sexy substance in the world. Indeed, because it’s so numbingly boring, few people pay attention to it or invest in it. (Or dare write about it!)
It’s iodized salt. […]
Telomerase verlängert das Leben
Florian Rötzer 21.11.2008 (Telepolis)
Spanische Wissenschaftler konnten an krebsresistenten transgenen Mäusen zeigen, dass diese eine bis zu 50 Prozent längere Lebenszeit haben, wenn das mit Telomerase verbundene Krebsrisiko unterdrückt werden kann
Wissenschaftler haben nicht nur Supermäuse geschaffen, die wesentlich leistungsfähiger sind ([local] Genveränderte Supermäuse) sie haben nun auch gentechnisch veränderte Mäuse entwickelt, die krebsresistent sind und weitaus langsamer als gewöhnliche Mäuse altern. Würden Menschen ebenso verändert werden, dann könnten sie mit einer [extern] durchschnittlichen Lebenszeit von 120 Jahren rechnen. [...]
Flux will give you a taste of the torrent of new technological developments advancing on us: from the energy issue to human enhancement, from information technology to nanotechnology. This magazine is compiled on the occasion of the conference ‘Inspiring Future Politics’ to be held by the EPTA (European Parliamentary Technology Assessment) on Monday 27 October and Tuesday 28 October in The Hague, the Netherlands. The keynote speakers at this conference – chemist Michael Braungart, toxicologist Ellen Silbergeld, sociologist Nikolas Rose and climate expert Pier Vellinga – are interviewed in Flux. No one is more aware of the shifts taking place in our society. They have, furthermore, succeeded in formulating these issues aptly and getting them on to the (political) agenda. More information about the conference is available at www.eptaconference.eu. Because we want you to share in the speakers’ stories and the conference themes, you’ll find inspiring interviews, background stories and columns in ‘Flux’. […]
Transhumanist Tech Is A Boner Pill That Sets Up a Firewall Against Billy Joel
Futurist, prankster, and one-time presidential candidate R.U. Sirius just launched his latest magazine, H+, which is devoted to a transhumanist vision of the future. Though a lot of futurism these days could easily be called dystopianism, the future that Sirius shows us in H+ is hopeful, full of cool futuristic gadgets and genetic cures for death. What exactly is transhumanism, anyway, and why do you keep hearing about it? Sirius dropped into the io9 lifepod from his space capsule to explain why you might already be a transhumanist — and what the ultimate transhumanist technology would be. [...]
h+ transhumanist magazine launched
Humanity Plus (formerly the World Transhumanist Association) has launched h+, a stylish, web-based quarterly magazine that focuses on transhumanism, covering the scientific, technological, and cultural developments that are challenging and overcoming human limitations.
Edited by the legendary RU Sirius, co-founder and editor of the seminal Mondo 2000 magazine, and beautifully designed by virtual worlds artist D.C. Spensley, the magazine’s first issue features cutting-edge ideas and interviews with leaders in longevity, neuroengineering, nanofabrication, open-source robotics, science fiction, and other breakthrough areas. [...]
Die Diskussion um Cognitive Enhancer
Jörg Auf dem Hövel 26.05.2008 (Telepolis)
Neuer Wein in alten Schläuchen
Geistig auf der Höhe zu sein wünscht sich jeder. Um den eigenen und sozialen Ansprüchen gerecht zu werden, greifen verschiedene Personengruppen zu Arzneimitteln, die in dem Ruf stehen Konzentration und Merkfähigkeit zu fördern. Die wissenschaftliche Basis für einen solchen Einsatz ist aber dürftig. Auch die neuen Chemo-Kandidaten aus den Biotech-Schmieden der USA versprechen mehr als sie halten. [...]
John Harris
In the future there will be no more human beings. This is not something we should worry about.
Much of today’s scientific research may enable us eventually to repair the terrible vulnerability to which our present state of evolution has exposed us. It is widely thought inevitable that we will have to face the end of humanity as we know it. We will either have died out altogether, killed off by self-created global warming or disease, or, we may hope, we will have been replaced by our successors.
The Human Fertilisation and Embryology Bill would allow for inter-species embryos that will not only enable medical science to overcome the acute shortage of human eggs for research, but would provide models for the understanding of many disease processes, an essential precursor to the development of effective therapies. [...]
Natasha Vita-More: Transhumanism on the Rise
March 07 2008 / by Venessa Posavec (Future Blogger)
Artificial intelligence, super-extended lifespans, colonies in outer space – the future seems like a weird (and sometimes, scary) place. Then again, it’s all about perspective. From a transhumanist point of view, the advances in technology and intelligence will give us the opportunity to be more fully human than ever before in history. To explore these views, we tracked down the authority: Natasha Vita-More, the “first female philosopher of transhumanism”, according to the New York Times. [...]
« Previous Page — « Previous entries « Previous Page · Next Page » Next entries » — Next Page »