Four researchers from the Mind-Brain project of the Institute for Culture and Society (ICS) reflect on the scope and impact of technological applications to improve human beings in the Cuadernos de Bioética. José Ignacio Murillo (ICS, Philosophy), Fran Güell (ICS), Miguel García Valdecasas (ICS, School of Humanities and Social Sciences) and Luis Echarte (ICS, Faculty of Medicine) authored three open-access articles. The Mind-Brain project receives funding from La Caixa's Obra Social.

This issue of the publication focuses on the post-humanism topic of study, which has been discussed throughout the international bioethics community for several years. This question "involves the application of technologies to man to achieve not only his improvement, but also to form a different man or create new conscious entities," as the editors of the issue, Vittoradolfo Tambone (Institute of Philosophy of Scientific Practice and Technology, Biomedical Campus Rome) and Luis Miguel Pastor (Faculty of Medicine, University of Murcia) claim.

"The thinkers that defend it," they add, "claim that society will gradually accept the introduction of these new transformative technologies. For them, this position stems from a technological imperative that implies certain rights that man has over himself and an obligation to the future of humanity."

According to these experts, this thought must be evaluated because "it affects the possible limits of the use of various technologies that are emerging right now in various areas of medicine, computer science, robotics, nanotechnology and biomedical engineering." It should also be examined because "it implies an approach that can change human nature in that it can alter the identity of human beings by affecting our most intimate realms."

The articles published by the Mind-Brain project members include:

• Necesita el posthumanismo la ética? La Normatividad de una naturaleza abierta (Does post-humanism need ethics? The normativity of an open nature) (José Ignacio Murillo, principal investigator of the Mind-Brain project and Professor of Philosophy)

ABSTRACT: The post-humanism of our time usually take two forms. One of them is akin to postmodern thought and to the critique of Enlightenment ideals, while the other, which is usually called transhumanism, declares itself heir to optimism in the technological progress of modernity.

Both appear as two new forms of the struggle between the individualistic version of individualistic liberalism and its critics. As far as ethical proposals, they can be attributed with the vagueness of objectives they propose since their moral proposal seems to be reduced to advocating, each in its own way, emancipation and removing any barriers that hinder the increase of human power. This defect is not independent of their rejection of the notion of nature. Against these proposals, classical ethics does not focus so much on power or on emancipation as it does on the nature of ends and true human growth. Only by starting from there does classical ethics get involved with the means to achieve it.

• El embrión post-humano: manipulación genética, reproducción asistida y el principio de beneficencia procreativa

(The post-human embryo: genetic engineering, assisted reproduction and the principle of procreative beneficence) (Francisco Güell Pelayo, a Mind-Brain research team member)

ABSTRACT: The principle of procreative beneficence (PPB), proposed by Julian Savulescu, states that parents have a moral obligation to use available techniques of genetic manipulation and assisted human reproduction to create children with the best opportunity to enjoy the best life possible. The aim of this paper is to analyze, first, to what extent genetic manipulation to obtain specific traits takes into account the current paradigm of science and, on the other hand, if the proposed techniques involved in embryo selection meet PPB objectives. In addition, this article aims to show the importance of engaging the scientific community in the discussion of enhancement. Given scientific knowledge on genetic and epigenetic developmental processes and the risks associated with assisted reproductive techniques, we find sufficient reasons to decide not to subject children to current techniques of manipulation and embryo selection.

• Identidad y conflicto en la ética de los implantes neuroprostéticos (Identity and conflict in the ethics of neuro-prosthetic implants (Luis Enrique Echarte, Professor of Medicine and Mind-Brain research team member, and Miguel Garcia Valdecasas, Professor of Philosophy and Mind-Brain research team member)

ABSTRACT: The development of neuro-prosthetics technology is generating important theoretical and practical problems related to personal identity. In this context, the Extended Mind Theory (EMT) is a theory that provides an answer to these problems, noting that the mind is coextensive with the world and, as such, the mind and the world are intertwined, forming a single entity. EMT also assumes that physical states determine the nature of mental states.

In this article, we propose a non-deterministic and even less locationist version of mental states than EMT proposes; we call it iEMT. We first defend the idea that the coextension of the mind and the world does not justify the dissolution of the mind and, as a result, of human identity in the middle. Second, it is unjustifiable to think that neuro-implants are mere replacement parts in the context of an identity we label as weak. Third, there are no strong reasons to believe— and, to that extent, to fear— that the use of neuro-prosthetic technology can alter personal identity.

About the Journal

Cuadernos de Bioetica (The Journal of Bioethics), an official part of the Spanish Association of Bioethics and Medical Ethics, is a quarterly publication that includes articles and book reviews on all areas of bioethics, including its foundations, the ethics of research, clinical bioethics, juridical topics, etc.

These articles and reviews are accepted in the review undertaken by the editors of the magazine, as well as others that the editorial board commissions its authors to write.