Restoring Responsibility: Promoting Justice, Therapy and Reform Through Direct Brain Interventions

Vincent, Nicole A.

doi:10.1007/s11572-012-9156-y

Cited by 17 publications

(17 citation statements)

References 32 publications

(17 reference statements)

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“…For example, think of the use of moral bioenhancement within criminal justice settings, should we hold the criminal justice system or the offender responsible for adverse, unwanted behavioral effects, or both? [see, e.g., 45,54,55] that passive interventions ought to be accompanied by supportive interventions that actively involve the subject of the intervention. In general, passive interventions aimed at moral enhancement should be treated especially cautious compared to active interventions both with respect to their overall moral acceptability and with respect to their potential use within the criminal justice and public health domain.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Moral Enhancement: Do Means Matter Morally?

Focquaert

Schermer²

2015

Neuroethics

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One of the reasons why moral enhancement may be controversial, is because the advantages of moral enhancement may fall upon society rather than on those who are enhanced. If directed at individuals with certain counter-moral traits it may have direct societal benefits by lowering immoral behavior and increasing public safety, but it is not directly clear if this also benefits the individual in question. In this paper, we will discuss what we consider to be moral enhancement, how different means may be used to achieve it and whether the means we employ to reach moral enhancement matter morally. Are certain means to achieve moral enhancement wrong in themselves? Are certain means to achieve moral enhancement better than others, and if so, why? More specifically, we will investigate whether the difference between direct and indirect moral enhancement matters morally. Is it the case that indirect means are morally preferable to direct means of moral enhancement and can we indeed pinpoint relevant intrinsic, moral differences between both? We argue that the distinction between direct and indirect means is indeed morally relevant, but only insofar as it tracks an underlying distinction between active and passive interventions. Although passive interventions can be ethical provided specific safeguards are put in place, these interventions exhibit a greater potential to compromise autonomy and disrupt identity.

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Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…We use the terms direct/indirect similar to other authors in the bioenhancement debate [e.g., [27,30,[43][44][45]. For example, Butblitz and Merkel [30] describe indirect interventions as interventions over which we have more control compared to direct interventions.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Moral Enhancement: Do Means Matter Morally?

Focquaert

Schermer²

2015

Neuroethics

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“…Nevertheless, it might be argued that forced MDNs in criminal justice would be more problematic than either incarceration or psychological rehabilitation programs, perhaps because more intrusive or manipulative. There is a burgeoning literature on this topic (Rosati 1994;Bomann-Larsen 2011;Ryberg and Petersen 2011;Vincent 2012;Shaw 2012;Bublitz and Merkel 2012).…”

Section: Further Questionsmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Morality of Moral Neuroenhancement

Douglas

2014

Handbook of Neuroethics

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Abstract. This chapter reviews recent philosophical and neuroethical literature on the morality of moral neuroenhancements. It first briefly outlines the main moral arguments that have been made concerning moral status neuroenhancements. These are neurointerventions that would augment the moral status of human persons. It then surveys recent debate regarding moral desirability neuroenhancements: neurointerventions that augment that the moral desirability of human character traits, motives or conduct. This debate has contested, among other claims (i) Ingmar Persson and Julian Savulescu's contention that there is a moral imperative to pursue the development of moral desirability neuroenhancements, (ii) Thomas Douglas' claim that voluntarily undergoing moral desirability neuroenhancements would often be morally permissible, and (iii) David DeGrazia's claim that moral desirability neuroenhancements would often be morally desirable. The chapter discusses a number of concerns that have been raised regarding moral desirability neuroenhancements, including concerns that they would restrict freedom, would produce only a superficial kind of moral improvement, would rely on technologies that are liable to be misused, and would frequently misfire, resulting in moral deterioration rather than moral improvement.

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“…Some courts already prescribe certain medical interventions, such as libido suppressants for sexual offenders, as part of criminal sentences. 1 Echoing the character-improvement agenda of moral enhancement, philosophers including Vincent (2014), Shaw (2013Shaw ( , 2014, Douglas (2016, 2017), have all entertained and debated the prospect that future neuroscience would make it possible to improve the characters and capabilities of convicted felons. According to both Vincent and Shaw, one such capability to be modulated is responsibility.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…While neurointerventions in criminal rehabilitation in general have been under somewhat wider discussion (see, e.g., Pugh and Douglas 2017;Greely 2008;Ryberg 2012), court-mandated improvement of a convict's capacity responsibility, specifically, has been discussed by Vincent (2014) and Shaw (2014). Resting on the idea that responsibility tracks mental capacity, both Vincent and Shaw suggest that the improvement of mental abilities necessary for responsible agency improves capacity responsibility.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Self-Control in Responsibility Enhancement and Criminal Rehabilitation

Koi

Uusitalo

Tuominen

2017

Criminal Law, Philosophy

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Ethicists have for the past 20 years debated the possibility of using neurointerventions to improve intelligence and even moral capacities, and thereby create a safer society. Contributing to a recent debate concerning neurointerventions in criminal rehabilitation, Nicole Vincent and Elizabeth Shaw have separately discussed the possibility of responsibility enhancement. In their ethical analyses, enhancing a convict's capacity responsibility may be permissible. Both Vincent and Shaw consider self-control to be one of the constituent mental capacities of capacity responsibility. In this paper, we critically examine the promise of improving convicts' capacity responsibility by neuroenhancements of self-control to see whether the special characteristics of the inmate population make a difference in the analyses. As improving self-control by means of neurointerventions seems plausible, we then ask whether it is or could be a justified measure in court rulings. We conclude that, even if there are cases in which neurointerventions were warranted in the context of the stated goals of the criminal court, i.e., decreasing recidivism and rehabilitating the offenders to the society, due to the range of individual variability in the constitution of self-control, the prescription of specific neurointerventions of self-control falls outside the scope of legitimate court rulings.

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Restoring Responsibility: Promoting Justice, Therapy and Reform Through Direct Brain Interventions

Cited by 17 publications

References 32 publications

Moral Enhancement: Do Means Matter Morally?

Moral Enhancement: Do Means Matter Morally?

The Morality of Moral Neuroenhancement

Self-Control in Responsibility Enhancement and Criminal Rehabilitation

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