Topoi DOI 10.1007/s11245-017-9472-x

Moral Deficits, Moral Motivation and the Feasibility of Moral Bioenhancement Fabrice Jotterand1,2 · Susan B. Levin3 

© Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht 2017

Abstract  The debate over moral bioenhancement has incrementally intensified since 2008, when Persson and Savulescu, and Douglas wrote two separate articles on the reasons why enhancing human moral capabilities and sensitivity through technological means was ethically desirable. In this article, we offer a critique of how Persson and Savulescu theorize about the possibility of moral bioenhancement, including the problem of weakness of will, which they see as a motivational challenge. First, we offer a working definition of moral bioenhancement and underscore some of the challenges in determining whether moral bioenhancement, as conceptualized by Persson and Savulescu, falls into the category of enhancement or constitutes a type of therapeutic intervention. Second, we provide a critical analysis of the way Persson and Savulescu pathologize human behavior in relation to what they see as the main threat to the survival of the human species: weak moral motivation. Next, we critique the claim that the use of genetic manipulation and drug treatment will increase moral motivation. We argue that Persson and Savulescu mischaracterize the nature of human moral psychology because moral motivation includes affective and cognitive dimensions. The type of interventions they envision focus * Fabrice Jotterand [email protected] Susan B. Levin [email protected] 1

Center for Bioethics & Medical Humanities, Medical College of Wisconsin, Milwaukee, WI, USA

2

Institute for Biomedical Ethics, University of Basel, Basel, Switzerland

3

Department of Philosophy, Smith College, Northampton, MA, USA



almost exclusively on the former. In the final two sections, we outline three main criticisms of moral bioenhancement and offer a more robust account of moral psychology and moral development than what Persson and Savulescu recommend, through the lens of Aristotle’s work on virtue ethics. Ultimately, we argue that what Persson and Savulescu, and Douglas consider as moral bioenhancement is a misnomer because they do not fully account for the complexity of moral agency. Keywords  Moral bioenhancement · Moral motivation · Moral psychology · Virtue ethics · Ingmar Persson · Julian Savulescu · Weakness of will · Neuroscience

1 Introduction The debate over moral bioenhancement has incrementally intensified since 2008, when Persson and Savulescu, and Douglas wrote two separate articles on the reasons why enhancing human moral capabilities and sensitivity through technological means was ethically desirable (Persson and Savulescu 2008; Douglas 2008). Traditional methods such as education and socialization, through parental supervision and social institutions, are deemed insufficient to ensure the improvement of human character and ultimately, due to threats from weapons of mass destruction, climate change and environmental degradation, the survival of the human species (Persson and Savulescu 2008, 2012, 2013). As Persson and Savulescu argue, “human beings are not by nature equipped with a moral psychology that empowers them to cope with the moral problems that these new conditions of life create.…[T]he current predicament of humankind is so serious that it is imperative that scientific research explore every possibility of developing effective

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means of moral bioenhancement, as a complement to traditional means” (Persson and Savulescu 2012, pp. 1–2). They are committed to requiring moral bioenhancement should pertinent means become available and demonstrate safe and effective usage (Persson and Savulescu 2008, p. 174). However, among proponents of moral bioenhancement, the claim that it should be mandatory is somewhat tempered by Douglas, who “argue[s] for a weaker conclusion: that, under certain conditions that may come close enough to obtaining, individuals may permissibly use biomedical technologies to morally enhance themselves” (Douglas 2013, p. 161; see also 2008, p. 242). Persson and Savulescu’s narrative has been challenged on the ground that human moral psychology is a complex phenomenon beyond the reach of utter biotechnological control (Jotterand 2011; Harris 2016a, b). Moral judgments are the product of an interaction between one’s ability or disposition to respond morally (moral capacity) and a set of beliefs and ideas about notions of the just, the right and the good (moral content) (Sadler 2008; Jotterand 2011). In other terms, human moral psychology comprises three main dimensions: affective (desire), motivational (motivation) and cognitive (reason). Each dimension reflects mental attributes or behavioral characteristics of human conduct. Desire reflects the capacity of an individual to act morally based on moral beliefs (affective), whereas reason is the anchor that justifies grounds for action (cognitive). However, the question remains as to whether desires to act morally, based on the evaluation of particular situations, themselves have enough weight to motivate an individual to act accordingly. Philosophers have conceptualized this issue in terms of internalism versus externalism. It is not our intention to provide an analysis of the internalism–externalism debate. Rather, we offer a critique of how Persson and Savulescu theorize about the possibility of moral bioenhancement, including the problem of weakness of will, which they see as a motivational challenge. In the following, first we offer a working definition of moral bioenhancement and underscore some of the challenges in determining whether moral bioenhancement, as conceptualized by Persson and Savulescu, falls into the category of enhancement or constitutes a type of therapeutic intervention. Second, we provide a critical analysis of the way Persson and Savulescu pathologize human behavior in relation to what they see as the main threat to the survival of the human species: weak moral motivation. Next, we critique the claim that the use of genetic manipulation and drug treatment will increase moral motivation. We argue that Persson and Savulescu mischaracterize the nature of human moral psychology because moral motivation includes affective and cognitive dimensions. The type of interventions they envision focus almost exclusively on the former. In the final two sections, we outline three

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main criticisms of moral bioenhancement (inability to provide a threshold of acceptable motivation; undefined aim of motivation; and lack of a substantive account of how to achieve an augmented sense of altruism and justice) and offer a more robust account of moral psychology and moral development than what Persson and Savulescu recommend, through the lens of Aristotle’s work on virtue ethics. Ultimately, we argue that what Persson and Savulescu, and Douglas consider as moral bioenhancement is a misnomer because they do not fully account for the complexity of moral agency.

2 Moral Bioenhancement Providing a straightforward definition of moral bioenhancement is more challenging than it appears. The main reason is that it is not clear whether moral bioenhancement falls into the category of enhancement proper or whether, on Persson and Savulescu’s account, moral bioenhancement is a type of therapeutic intervention. In Unfit for the Future, for example, Persson and Savulescu make it clear that the environmental and geopolitical problems we are facing as a species can be resolved only through an additional biotechnological intervention to secure the future of subsequent generations. From their perspective, moral education cannot overpower our biases and impulses such as selfishness, xenophobia, and nepotism (Persson and Savulescu 2012, p. 117). Consequently, such behaviors should be addressed through biomedical treatment. Using the example of smoking and unhealthy diet for purposes of comparison, they argue that techniques like cognitive psychotherapy might help but not be sufficient. In some cases, people are genetically predisposed to nicotine or sugar addiction, and therefore biomedical treatment is warranted. By analogy, Persson and Savulescu cite the use of the neurotransmitter and hormone oxytocin1 for moral bioenhancement since it has been demonstrated that the administration of oxytocin to subjects via nasal spray increases cooperation and trusting behavior (Persson and Savulescu 2012, pp.  118–119; see also Kosfeld et  al. 2005). Persson and Savulescu also cite the effects of Selective Serotonin Reuptake Inhibitors (SSRIs) on moral behavior (2012, pp. 120–121). SSRIs are antidepressants prescribed for the treatment of major depressive disorder, anxiety, and obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD). Some studies indicate that the administration

1

  On the distinction of oxytocin from “classical neurotransmitters,” see Bethlehem et al. (2013, p. 964).

Moral Deficits, Moral Motivation and the Feasibility of Moral Bioenhancement

of the SSRI citalopram increases willingness to cooperate and fairness in healthy subjects (Tse and Bond 2002).2 Persson and Savulescu recognize that the examples they provide (oxytocin and serotonin) do not constitute biomedical means to enhance morality. However, they are eager to stress that both illustrations “show that manipulations of biology can have moral effects. There are then prospects of moral bioenhancement, even if so far no biomedical means of moral enhancement with sufficiently precise effects have been discovered” (Persson and Savulescu 2012, p. 121; see also Savulescu and Persson 2012; Douglas 2008). While it might be the case that the magic pill for moral bioenhancement will never be developed, research in this area is only recent and limited in scope; consequently, it might just be a question of time until pertinent biotechnologies emerge (Persson and Savulescu 2012, p. 121). Another challenge is how to construe moral bioenhancement if we define enhancements as “interventions designed to improve human form or functioning beyond what is necessary to sustain or restore good health” (Juengst 1998, p.  29). Based on Juengst’s definition, moral bioenhancement does not fall in the category of enhancement per se. Persson and Savulescu do not see humanity as being in a healthy state in terms of moral acumen since most of the human population could benefit from moral bioenhancement. A definition of enhancement that refers to the “augmentation of biological capacities beyond what is speciestypical” in healthy subjects (Jotterand 2016) would simply undermine Persson and Savulescu’s claim that “drug treatment” is necessary because such an intervention would fall in the therapeutic domain. One way to disentangle the therapy-enhancement discourse would be to introduce the notion of enhancement in clinical language without a contrast with the language of therapy (Jotterand 2017), but such an approach would require the assumption that some (most) individuals have “moral capacities” below what is species-typical and that an acceptable threshold of moral behavior had been predetermined. This claim about some (most) people would be difficult to support unless we

specifically referenced individuals with psychiatric disorders exhibiting moral pathologies (e.g., psychopathy).3 That being said, and for the sake of clarity, we can state that moral bioenhancement refers to the use of biotechnology for the improvement of moral capacities or character traits such as justice, shame, forgiveness, empathy, and solidarity (Persson and Savulescu 2012; Harris 2011; Douglas 2008) or the treatment of psychiatric conditions with moral pathologies (Jotterand and Giordano 2015). The aim of biotechnological means to our moral betterment would be enhancement of the affective, motivational and cognitive faculties that bear on human moral behavior (Harris’s critiques of Persson and Savulescu focus on the last of these [Harris 2011, 2016a]).

3 Moral Deficits as Weakness of Will The question of the basis of moral deficits in people has been examined in psychiatry. Mental disorders with moral pathologies, such as psychopathy, were described in early accounts as “derangement of the moral faculties” or “moral insanity” (King 1999, p.  10). The current definition has moved away from the idea of moral deficit to signify a personality disorder characterized by emotional dysfunction and anti-social behavior (Blair 2001). While Persson and Savulescu do not employ medical language to describe immoral conduct, they nonetheless pathologize human behavior,4 as they see its cause as a deficiency, among other things, in human biology (genetics and neurobiology) that can be remedied through biotechnological interventions. In their view, traditional means of moral education are limited because “it is quite hard to internalize moral doctrines to the degree that they determine our behavior” (Persson and Savulescu 2012, p.  106). In other words, Persson and Savulescu consider “moral doctrines” to lack the motivational weight to ensure that people will act morally. The role of moral education is to promote knowledge of the

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2  The overall results concerning citalopram are, however, mixed. According to Kamarck et  al. (2009, p.  184), the drug lowers hostility on the part of subjects “with initially elevated hostility scores,” as gauged by subjects’ self-assessments. Such a phenomenon is quite different from and may not lead to an augmentation of actively prosocial feelings and conduct. Further, per the findings of Crockett et  al. (2010, p.  17436), citalopram heightens empathy “by boosting an already-present neural signal…rather than being the source of empathic responses.”

 For discussion of biomedical enhancement within the normal range of human capacities, see Kahane and Savulescu (2015). The focus of their analysis is “forms of biomedical enhancement that are almost certainly feasible, and in fact likely to be available soon – the forms of enhancement that operate within the existing range of human capacities and dispositions. We call this normal range human enhancement” (p. 133). 4  The use of therapeutic language reflects the pathologizing of human behavior. Persson and Savulescu (2012, p.  107) state that “it is th[e] motivational internalization of moral doctrines that we think could be sped up by means which the scientific exploration of the genetic and neurobiological bases of our behaviour might put into our hands. We call moral enhancement by such means moral bioenhancement; possible examples of moral bioenhancement would be drug treatment and genetic engineering.”

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moral good, but in their view, it is not sufficient for moral betterment because, in order “to be morally good,” an individual must be strongly motivated to act morally to overpower selfishness, biases, lack of empathy, etc. (Persson and Savulescu 2012, pp. 116–117). To this end, recourse to biotechnologies, in their estimation, is a promising approach. Considering that human behavior has a genetic and neurobiological basis,5 it would be possible, in principle, to alter people’s moral conduct through genetic manipulations or “drug treatment” (Persson and Savulescu 2012, p.  107). They go as far as to argue that since, in general, women are more empathetic and men tend to be more aggressive, “it seems that in principle we could make men in general more moral by biomedical methods through making them more like the men who are more like women in respect of sympathy and aggression, but without the tendency to social forms of aggression” (Persson and Savulescu 2012, pp. 111–112, 2016). Whether Persson and Savulescu’s claim is reasonable, feasible and desirable is beyond the scope of this article. The point is to illustrate their willingness to take radical, biotechnological steps toward addressing behavioral problems in society. While Persson and Savulescu go some way toward recognizing human biological and moral diversity, in their view, many individuals have deficient moral acumen and motivation, hence they suffer from weakness of will and require the strengthening of their moral motivation. As they write, clearly the problem of weakness of will is a problem of motivation: it occurs because we are not sufficiently motivated to do what we are convinced that we ought to do, for instance, we do not feel sufficient sympathy for the global poor to aid them when we come up against temptations to satisfy our selfregarding desires. To enhance the capacity to feel such sympathy would be to enhance the probability that we do what we believe that we ought. This is an instance of moral enhancement, according to our view. (Persson and Savulescu 2016, p. 2) The above quote sums up Persson and Savulescu’s project. There is certainly nothing wrong with promoting the moral betterment of the human species. In addition, they are correct in their assessment that, in terms of human history and techno-scientific development, we are at a stage of great ecological and sociopolitical uncertainties. The elaboration of strategies to ensure a secure and environmentally friendly world for future generations constitutes a moral imperative that should concern not only a select group of

5   For a critique of a neuroreductionistic approach to morality, see Jotterand (2016).

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individuals with expertise in human behavior and ethics but the public in general. The problem with the rhetoric used by Persson and Savulescu is that it does not reflect the realities of human moral psychology, which they misconstrue in three different ways that will be addressed in Sect. 5. For now, we will focus briefly on providing a deeper analysis of the concept of moral motivation.

4 Moral Content, Moral Capacity and Moral Motivation Before we can go further in our analysis, we must define the phrase “moral motivation”. Motivation is “a property central in motivational explanations of intentional conduct” that involves an interaction between two attitudes: desire and belief (Mele 1999, p.  591). Desire is an inclination (having, as such, an emotional dimension) to bring about the satisfaction of that very attitude, whereas a belief provides a justification to pursue the desire. It follows that motivation is constituted by cognitive and affective dimensions of human psychology. Let us illustrate this claim. Imagine you are walking in downtown Milwaukee during a blizzard, and you encounter a homeless person begging for change in order to be able to buy some food. A compassionate response might incite you to buy that person a hot meal based on your desire to do the right thing (emotional response to human need and misery) but also on your evaluation of the predicament of an individual in the middle of a winter storm (justification for your action). In this case, your motivation is the product of moral emotions regarding human misery and rational deliberation as to why a course of action is justified (“It is dangerous to be outside in cold weather without warm clothes, shelter and food”). In other words, compassion as a moral emotion needs a framework for its justification; otherwise a constant emotional response would lead to moral blindness.6 In the above case, the response to homelessness must avoid two extremes: a disproportionate emotional response that would result in a constant state of emotional distress when witnessing misery and a disproportionate rational response such as a rationalization for not intervening or always taking care of every individual in need regardless of the situation.

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  Emotion on its own can lead to behavior that is defective in various other ways, too: short-sighted from a prudential standpoint, as in giving well beyond one’s means due to a surge of pity; disproportionate to the impetus, for instance, rushing heedlessly into a burning building to rescue an important but replaceable item or becoming enraged and lashing out, rather than simply being disappointed, if someone else receives a prize that one had sought; escapism via, e.g., powerful nostalgia; and consumption by jealousy or envy, issuing in conduct that is destructive to oneself and others.

Moral Deficits, Moral Motivation and the Feasibility of Moral Bioenhancement

In light of these remarks, we can now provide a fuller picture of human moral psychology and assess it with regard to how proponents of moral bioenhancement conceptualize it. First, it is important to stress that the presence of a desire to act morally is not sufficient for one’s acting upon that very desire. The moral capacity (affective dimension) to bring about a particular outcome can be considered moral insofar as moral content (cognitive aspect) provides reasons for action. The synergy between affective and cognitive processes leads to moral motivations. Furthermore, moral emotions can be modified or manipulated by various means, which can lead to the alteration of moral judgments. To ensure a continuous shaping of these moral emotions, an epistemic framework is necessary to provide the moral justification for these emotions. Without such a justification, it becomes difficult to delineate when emotional uproar is justified or even necessary to communicate moral indignation. On the other side, a cold moral detachment and cultural rationalization when witnessing, for instance, what we would deem the abuse of a child is likewise inadequate because, as we know too well, such explanatory frames can always justify, or purport to warrant, the most atrocious deeds. In sum, moral motivation includes affective and cognitive dimensions of human psychology that interact in the shaping of moral emotions and in the determination of a set of beliefs, values and ideas of the nature of the good that moral agents develop through their life experience.

5 Reason versus Emotion: A False Dichotomy To further elaborate our earlier claim concerning the role of reason and emotion in moral motivation, it is worth examining the work of James Woodward (2016). What he calls the “rationalist dichotomy” (RD) position, featuring a sharp distinction between rational and emotional capacities, foregrounds the place of reason in moral judgments in a way that well outpaces the findings of current brain research (Woodward 2016, pp.  87–88, 106–108). This stance remains popular with many philosophers, including utilitarians and deontologists such  as Immanuel Kant, Joshua Greene, Peter Singer, and Derek Parfit, who are committed to the view that moral judgments are grounded in reason (cognition), a faculty separate from emotion. In contrast to the RD stance, Woodward has developed an alternative view called the “integrative nondichotomist” (IND) position, which states that emotion and cognition ought not to be viewed as two distinct dimensions of mental life but as two co-existing processes in moral decisionmaking and moral judgments. As Woodward writes,

“emotion and cognition are not sharply distinct, and emotional processing, properly understood, plays (and ought to play, on virtually any plausible normative theory, including utilitarianism) a central role in moral judgment” (Woodward 2016, p. 87). The neural structures usually associated with “emotional processing”—including the ventromedial prefrontal cortex (VMPFC), orbital frontal cortex (OFC), anterior cingulate cortex (ACC), insula, amygdala, and other structures associated with reward processing (ventral striatum)—are not limited to emotion; they also do cognitive work (Woodward 2016, pp. 87–89, 114n9).7 This point meshes well with the latest neuroscientific research. Neural structures such as the OFC and the VMPFC engage in information processing and computation, and “are highly flexible and capable of sophisticated forms of learning, particularly in social contexts, which are often informationally very complex” (Woodward 2016, p. 89). In addition to their learning potential, these structures participate in calculation and computation, and are representational in the sense of providing the ability to quantify reward in moral judgments (Woodward 2016, pp. 91–95). The conceptualization of morality by proponents of moral bioenhancement focuses mostly on the control or alteration of moral emotions, that is, on the emotional dimensions of moral motivation. However, in light of current brain research and scholarship in human moral psychology, morality is a process whereby moral agency requires a synergy between cognition (i.e., understanding the nature of the good) and the formation of right moral emotions that shape a person’s responses to moral dilemmas. From this standpoint, Persson and Savulescu’s account of moral bioenhancement is subject to at least three main criticisms: (a) the inability to provide a precise threshold of acceptable motivation for people to be considered fully moral; (b) the failure to establish an explanation of the ultimate end of motivation other than external dimensions of human existence (environment, geopolitical threats), as opposed to internal dimensions of human existence (human flourishing, moral development, etc.); and (c) the lack of a substantive account of the means to achieve an augmented sense of justice and altruism, which Persson and Savulescu deem essential to our being wholly moral. Each critique is developed separately in what follows.

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 For this reason, Woodward declines to use “reason” and “cognition” interchangeably: on his account, both brain areas focused on reason and those devoted to “emotional processing…are doing ‘cognitive’ processing simply in virtue of doing information processing” (2016, p. 114n9).

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5.1 The Threshold Issue First, Persson and Savulescu are unable to provide an indication of what threshold or level of motivation is adequate for a person to be wholly moral other than stating that some individuals ought to go through a treatment that increases their moral motivation. Their claim is that “those of us” who are less morally motivated should become as strong as “those of us” who are by nature strongly motivated to act morally (Persson and Savulescu 2012, pp.  112–113). However, the dual dimension of moral judgments requires an equal development of emotional (emotional intelligence) and cognitive (cognitive intelligence) capacities for adequate moral growth. For instance, some might view moral courage as a character trait that is necessary for the betterment of our society. However, what level of courage is satisfactory and necessary for moral progress? The lack of courage can be seen in some instances as cowardliness, but, in others, too much courage can reflect plain stupidity. Indeed, courage may no longer be in play at all, having given way to recklessness. Depending on what dimension bearing on morality is enhanced, individuals might give excess weight to emotions in moral judgments, leading to a lack of prudence in acting courageously, or indulge in too much rationalization before acting, which would impede their acting in a timely fashion. 5.2 The Aim of Motivation Second, properly addressing the issue of adequacy in levels of motivation necessitates that one answer the following question: motivation toward what? As Persson and Savulescu adamantly contend (Persson and Savulescu 2008, 2012, 2013), the aim of moral bioenhancement is the survival of the human species. This purpose diverges markedly from what enhancement proponents, in general, maintain, namely, that mere survival is not required or suitably elevated to be human beings’ governing aspiration at our current developmental stage. Persson and Savulescu must provide an account of the values, endeavors, and goals that would guide and justify bioenhancement. Not only do they fail to do this, but their very focus on destructive actions’ nonperformance leaves them without the argumentative resources to provide a robust framework of this sort. Far from tackling these matters head on, with the avoidance of Ultimate Harm as their governing lens, Persson and Savulescu assume that moral bioenhancement should accompany the movement of current democracies “from a social liberalism, which acknowledges the need for state interference to neutralize the glaring welfare inequalities within a society, to a global(ly responsible) liberalism, which extends welfare concerns globally and into the remote future” (Persson and Savulescu 2012, p. 102).

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The issue of the biopolitical dimension of the moral bioenhancement, though a key topic, falls outside the scope of our main argument here because the focus of our analysis is the nature of motivation and how Persson and Savulescu mischaracterize it. Motivation is a matter of having some dispositions, based on reasons to act, that justify a particular desire. Such desires provide a sense of pleasure, fulfill the conditions of a good action or simply reflect one’s behavioral disposition to act in a certain way. Without a particular (or broader, albeit defined and defended) end for moral action determined in advance (i.e., moral identity), increased motivation is blind. For dispositions are always established according to the moral agent’s comprehension of what it means to be moral and the meaning of the good life (aka human flourishing). 5.3 Defining Altruism and Justice Finally, Persson and Savulescu contend that altruism and a sense of justice are two indispensable attributes for an individual to be fully moral (Persson and Savulescu 2012, pp.  108–109). They doubt the idea advanced by Pinker (Pinker 2011, p.  656) that “enhanced powers of reason” would bring about the moral betterment of our society. On Pinker’s account, “[t]he kind of reasoning relevant to moral progress” is precisely that recorded by the Flynn Effect involving IQ: “the cultivation of abstract reasoning…particularly [the] ability to set aside immediate experience, detach [our]selves from a parochial vantage point, and think in abstract terms” (Pinker 2011, pp. 656, 660). Pinker is optimistic that a pronounced reduction in violence and a dramatic increase in trust and cooperation would accompany further augmentation of reasoning ability (Pinker 2011, pp. 661–662, 669). Persson and Savulescu reject Pinker’s account on the basis that reason is unable to expand a “circle of concern… without the assistance of the moral dispositions of altruism and a sense of justice” (Persson and Savulescu 2012, p. 107). Rather than banking on the powers of reason, and to address the pressing issues of our time related to human survival, Persson and Savulescu advocate for a vigorously enhanced “feel[ing of] sympathy and a sense of justice” concerning people and the environment, alongside a “reduction of both the temporal bias and the commitment to a causally-based conception of responsibility” (Persson and Savulescu 2012, pp.  108–109). Furthermore, in their view, augmented justice (and presumably altruism) will be achieved only if liberal democracies “inculcate norms that are conductive to the survival and prosperity of a worldcommunity of which their societies are integral parts” (Persson and Savulescu 2012, p.  102). This may sound good in the abstract, until we are reminded that, in defending moral bioenhancement, they shifted from a focus on

Moral Deficits, Moral Motivation and the Feasibility of Moral Bioenhancement

augmenting values like justice to ridding us of disruptive tendencies. Apart from survival, for whose sake their elimination would be requisite, Persson and Savulescu mention only prosperity. This is a thin reed to cling to as, apart from survival, the purpose of moral bioenhancement. What is more, the inherently biopolitical dimension of neuroscience and neuroethics (Henry and Plemmons 2012, p. 574; Jotterand and Ienca 2017) should warn us of the potential imposition, without any justification, of a particular philosophical interpretation of what it means to be fully moral and what a just society would look like.

6 The God Machine and the Virtues Regarding this potential political trajectory, the following thought experiment is suggestive. Persson and Savulescu envision a world where advances in the science of morality have made it possible for immoral behavior to be forestalled through a supercomputer that they call the God Machine: The Great Moral Project was completed in 2045. This involved construction of the most powerful, self-learning, self-developing bioquantum computer ever constructed called the God Machine. The God Machine would monitor the thoughts, beliefs, desires, and intentions of every human being. It was capable of modifying these within nanoseconds, without the conscious recognition [of this intervention] by any human subjects. The God Machine was designed to give human beings near complete freedom. It only ever intervened in human action to prevent great harm, injustice, or other deeply immoral behavior from occurring.…The God Machine would not intervene in trivial immoral acts, like minor instances of lying or cheating. Only when a threshold insult to some sentient being’s interests was crossed would the God Machine exercise its almighty power. (Savulescu and Persson 2012, pp. 412–413) In this narrative, the God Machine serves as an instrument to assess the desires and intentions of individuals, the official target area of human mental capacities determined by Persson and Savulescu (or moral emotions, per Douglas 2008) to need enhancement. In terms of our earlier discussion, desires and intentions can be clustered under the notion of moral motivation. Persson and Savulescu’s fundamental goal here, however, is to stamp out the very possibility of acts that would constitute “Ultimate Harm.” With the forestalling of said harm in view, expediency matters most: “it is a matter of such urgency to improve humanity morally to the point that it can responsibly handle the powerful resources of modern technology that we should seek whatever means there are to effect this” (Persson and

Savulescu 2013, p. 130; italics in original). Crucially, and as they effectively concede (Savulescu and Persson 2012, p. 417), avoiding Ultimate Harm not only does not require, but would not be accomplished most expediently by, the heightening of humans’ moral dispositions. Persson and Savulescu speak as though one acts in either the right or the wrong way, where the direction is effectively programmable internally, via technological interventions (e.g., genetic, pharmacological), or constrained by external factors such as the God Machine so that people behave in non-disruptive ways without exception (or nearly so, with the God Machine intervening if need be). Persson and Savulescu’s talk of right and wrong in the expression of feelings and desires all but ignores the subtlety of discernment required for suitably calibrated responses to the panoply of situations that we confront (cf. Harris 2014, p.  254). Relatedly, they presume a too-simple model of moral judgments and of what it means for people to possess and exercise good qualities or virtues. We underscore and illustrate these shortcomings through a brief discussion of Aristotle.8 According to his Doctrine of the Mean, the crux of his account of moral virtue, merely “experienc[ing] fear, confidence, desire, anger, pity, and generally any kind of pleasure and pain” is no achievement (Nicomachean Ethics 1106b18–21).9 “But to experience all this at the right time, toward the right objects, toward the right people, for the right reason, and in the right manner— that is the mean and the best course, the one that is a mark of virtue” (1106b21–23). Crucially, the moral mean is rooted not in the action itself but rather in the agent’s own character (Urmson 1980, p. 161). For Aristotle, the subject matter of practical endeavors, including ethics, precludes a priori, or deductive, specification of what being correct will entail in particular instances; the contrast here is with strictly abstract work in metaphysics or mathematics (Nicomachean Ethics II 2, VI 8). That said, in ethics there is just one objectively right response in every case, arriving at which requires that “the agent…consider on each occasion what the situation demands” (Nicomachean Ethics 1104a8–9). As strong expressions of anger are among the mental phenomena that greatly worry Persson and Savulescu from the standpoint of rogue deployments of atomic and biological weapons, we briefly elaborate by reference to it (on bioenhancement advocates’ handling of anger, see further Levin 2016, p.  61, 2017). In Aristotle’s view, “our condition in relation to anger is [not] bad” merely because the

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  For Aristotle’s bearing, by way of critique, on advocacy of vigorous cognitive enhancement, see Levin (2017). 9   Translations of the Nicomachean Ethics are from Ostwald (1962), with some adjustments; line numbers are those of Bywater (1894).

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anger is strong (Nicomachean Ethics 1105b26–27): we err “if our anger is either too violent or not violent enough.… A man does not receive…blame simply for being angry, but for being angry in a certain way” (Nicomachean Ethics 1105b27–1106a1, cf. 1109a28–30). Persson and Savulescu’s picture of moral bioenhancement does not and cannot obviously account for the human fact that “in some cases, it is necessary that we be angry” (Nicomachean Ethics 1111a30–31), even powerfully so; thus, both excess and deficiency in the experience of anger are morally blameworthy (Nicomachean Ethics 1126a3–6). Since determinations of what is fitting in the way of feelings and actions “depend upon particular circumstances, the decision resting with our [moral] sense” (Nicomachean Ethics 1109b22–23), they cannot be reached in advance of one’s being in a given situation or, once a setting exists, in a rote or formulaic manner. It should be pointed out that the second nature of morally virtuous persons’ responses is the hard-won product of decades of life experience (Nicomachean Ethics VI 8). It is thus the furthest thing from pure instinct, where the person is unaware of alternatives because the mind has been simplified by tools of moral bioenhancement such that, if Persson and Savulescu were making the choice, the very mental threads that could produce mental conflict would eventually cease to exist. For Persson and Savulescu, it is crucial that “the majority…under[go] a moral enhancement which rectifies [i.e., removes] the psychological shortcomings…that mar human nature” lest human existence come to an end (Persson and Savulescu 2012, p.  99). The gap between their sometime focus on heightening prosocial emotions (e.g., a sense of justice) and their more urgent occupation with removing those deemed negative is wide, indeed. On balance, Persson and Savulescu’s notion of moral bioenhancement as therapeutic fits particularly well with the latter occupation. This state of affairs, however, calls into question its very status as moral enhancement. Ultimately, it is a misnomer for Persson and Savulescu, and Douglas to speak of their accounts as defending moral enhancement, if one has in view under this head a heightening of one’s moral faculty/ies (see also Harris 2013, p.  172). Tellingly, these avowed proponents of moral enhancement through biotechnology themselves admit that the changes they advocate would not qualify as moral augmentation. Douglas downplays a significant change in his position between 2008 and 2013: moral bioenhancements “will expectably leave an individual with more moral (viz., morally better) motives or behaviour than she would otherwise have had. This deviates from my earlier formulation only in allowing that moral enhancement could consist in the moral improvement of behaviour even where there is no moral improvement in motives” (Douglas 2013, p.  162, with n12). Savulescu and Persson frankly admit

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F. Jotterand, S. B. Levin

that what concerns them is what we do (or refrain from), not who and what we are apart from this: “interventions, such as the God Machine…do indeed produce more moral behaviour but by controlling the moral agent, subjugating that person to the will of another.…Such interventions and such control are not plausibly moral enhancements of that person.…Nonetheless, they might be justified if they prevent grave suffering” (2012, p. 417; emphasis added). What matters, finally, is well-being, in particular, harm-avoidance expansively construed (see further Levin 2016). Thus, having argued vigorously for moral bioenhancement starting with their initial forays into the topic in 2008, Persson and Savulescu, and Douglas concede that the very changes they endorse may not and likely will not constitute moral enhancement at all.

7 Concluding Remarks In conclusion, our account supports the view that, from the standpoint of moral improvement, the point is not to advocate for a focus on emotion or, for that matter, cognition, with the other absent or radically downplayed. Crucially, in tandem with addressing both, we should reflect carefully on our values and that for the sake of which efforts, if any, in the broad domain of moral bioenhancement would be undertaken. Thus far, too little attention has been devoted to this endeavor. In this article, we hope to have shed some light on why greater attunement to and engagement with a comprehensive picture of this kind is needed.

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