Our Grandchildren Redesigned: Life in the Bioengineered Society of the Near Future, by Michael Bess
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Our Grandchildren Redesigned: Life in the Bioengineered Society of the Near Future, by Michael Bess
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A panoramic overview of biotechnologies that can endlessly boost human capabilities and the drastic changes these “superhuman” traits could trigger Biotechnology is moving fast. In the coming decades, advanced pharmaceuticals, bioelectronics, and genetic interventions will be used not only to heal the sick but to boost human physical and mental performance to unprecedented levels. People will have access to pills that make them stronger and faster, informatic devices will interface seamlessly with the human brain, and epigenetic modification may allow people to reshape their own physical and mental identities at will.Until recently, such major technological watersheds—like the development of metal tools or the industrialization of manufacturing—came about incrementally over centuries or longer. People and social systems had time to adapt: they gradually developed new values, norms, and habits to accommodate the transformed material conditions. But contemporary society is dangerously unprepared for the dramatic changes it is about to experience down this road on which it is already advancing at an accelerating pace.The results will no doubt be mixed. People will live longer, healthier lives, will fine-tune their own thought processes, and will generate staggeringly complex and subtle forms of knowledge and insight. But these technologies also threaten to widen the rift between rich and poor, to generate new forms of social and economic division, and to force people to engage in constant cycles of upgrades and boosts merely to keep up. Individuals who boost their traits beyond a certain threshold may acquire such extreme capabilities that they will no longer be recognized as unambiguously human.In this important and timely book, prize-winning historian Michael Bess provides a clear, nontechnical overview of cutting-edge biotechnology and paints a vivid portrait of a near-future society in which bioenhancement has become a part of everyday life. He surveys the ethical questions raised by the enhancement enterprise and explores the space for human agency in dealing with the challenges that these technologies will present.Headed your way over the coming decades: new biotechnologies that can powerfully alter your body and mind.The possibilities are tantalizing:• Rejuvenation therapies offering much longer lives (160 and even beyond) in full vigor and mental acuity • Cognitive enhancement through chemical or bioelectronic means (the rough equivalent of doubling or tripling IQ scores) • Epigenetic tools for altering some of your genetically influenced traits at any point in your lifetime (body shape, athletic ability, intelligence, personality) • Bioelectronic devices for modulating your own brain processes, including your “pleasure centers” (a potentially non-stop high) • Direct control of machines by thought, and perhaps direct communication with other people, brain-to-brain (a new dimension of sharing and intimacy) But some of the potential consequences are also alarming: • A growing rift between the biologically enhanced and those who can’t afford such modifications • A constant cycle of upgrades and boosts as the bar of “normal” rises ever higher—“Humans 95, Humans XP, Humans 8” • The fragmentation of humankind into rival “bioenhancement clusters” • A gradually blurring boundary between “person” and “product” • Extreme forms of self-modification, with some individuals no longer recognized as unambiguously human
Our Grandchildren Redesigned: Life in the Bioengineered Society of the Near Future, by Michael Bess- Amazon Sales Rank: #701137 in Books
- Published on: 2015-10-13
- Released on: 2015-10-13
- Original language: English
- Number of items: 1
- Dimensions: 9.29" h x 1.16" w x 6.23" l, 1.25 pounds
- Binding: Hardcover
- 320 pages
Review “In the future, accelerating technology and unexpected, revolutionary events—most of which will never be predicted by futurists—may produce a society as alien as some of our tools. Bess delivers an insightful philosophical analysis of how we must adjust.”—Kirkus Reviews“Rejuvenation therapies that could potentially extend human lifespans to 160 years or more, chemical or bioelectronic cognitive enhancement that could double or triple IQ scores, bioelectronic devices for modulating brain processes including ‘pleasure centers,’ so-called ‘designer babies,’ and much more are poised to cross the threshold from science fiction to reality in the near future. Michael Bess offers a sober prediction of how such advances will directly affect human society, and the ethical dilemmas that could result. Our Grandchildren Redesigned is fascinating from cover to cover and near-impossible to put down. Highly recommended!”—The Midwest Book Review
About the Author Michael Bess is the Chancellor’s Professor of History at Vanderbilt University. He has received major fellowships from the J. S. Guggenheim Foundation, the American Council of Learned Societies, the National Human Genome Research Institute, the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, and the Fulbright program. His previous books include Choices Under Fire and The Light-Green Society.
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5 of 5 people found the following review helpful. Pragmatic and Balanced Examination of Human Enhancement Technologies By Kevin Joseph Our Grandchildren Redesigned offers a comprehensive and balanced look at the inevitable future of human enhancement. Unlike some futurists, who tend to approach these issues with a strong pro-enhancement or anti-enhancement bias, Michael Bess brings an unwaveringly pragmatic viewpoint to the subject matter. His thesis is that our best hope for integrating enhancements into our society, without creating undesirable gaps between the haves and have-nots, compromising our values, or losing touch with what it means to be human, is to create a worldwide regulatory framework that keeps tabs on enhancement technologies and ensures they progress in a measured and sensible way, ensuring access to basic enhancements by all and banning certain technologies that pose too great of a threat to our values. He effectively uses hypothetical scenarios to show how various types of genetic, pharmaceutical and bioelectric enhancements would impact our day-to-day lifestyles, and draws upon these examples to frame important questions about justice and identity.While the challenges he identifies are daunting, and the solutions he proposes are often complex, in the end he leaves us with an optimistic message that the human race can influence its future evolution by making careful choices about what enhances and detracts from important human values. I can only hope that leaders in these fields read this book and consider its important message.-Kevin Joseph, author of The Champion Maker
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful. Looking to the Future By James Banzer Predicting the future usually turns out tricky at best and otherwise an exercise in futility. Rarely do guesses years in advance of what is coming turn out reasonably accurate. This new book by Michael Bess propels us few generations into the future. Time will tell how well he has hit the mark.Our Grandchildren Redesigned: Life in the Bioengineered Society of the Near Future is a scholarly projection of where science might take humankind. It presumes that humans will become drastically different. Bess posits that the journey has already begun into the kind of future he discusses. He cites a 2011 survey indicating that as many as 30% of students were already employing cognitive enhancers fairly regularly on some campuses.Here are a few things that could be coming in the author's view. The future may see people able to transmit thoughts brain-to-brain. Human technology may overcome practical limits to a human lifespan. In one of several vignettes in his book, the possibility is raised of average human lifespans of 155 years for men, and 160 years for women. With much longer lifespans coupled with good health, a person might be able to have multiple careers over their life. An “enhancement industry” could arise to package human traits.There's much food for thought there. The book is best devoured at a slow read.
0 of 0 people found the following review helpful. Thinkers like Voltaire, Diderot By john messerly (from reasonandmeaning.com)Vanderbilt University's Michael Bess has written an extraordinarily thoughtful new book: Our Grandchildren Redesigned: Life In The BioEngineered Society Of The Near Future. The first part of the book introduces the reader to the technologies that will enhance the physical, emotional, and intellectual abilities of our children and grandchildren: pharmaceuticals, bioelectronics, genetics, nanotechnology, robotics, artificial intelligence, synthetic biology, and virtual reality.In the second part of the book Bess sets out the pro and cons of human enhancement. The arguments against bioenhancement are that doing so: 1) plays god or interferes with nature; 2) destroys the qualities that make us human; 3) subverts dignity by commodifying human traits; 4) displays hubris and robs life of its meaning; and 5) rejects the limitations that define humanity. In these multiple ways enhancement will lead to disaster. The arguments for bioenhancement are that doing so: 1) continues the long process of controlling ourselves and our world; 2) expresses our natural desires for new capabilities and richer experiences; 3) rejects the legacy of blind evolution and advocates directing the evolutionary process; 4) will reduce suffering and other constraints on our being; and 5) pursues our potential to be more than we are now, which is what gives life meaning.Bess argues that the differences between the pro and anti-enhancement camps reflect the tension between conservative and romantic reactions to the Enlightenment. Thinkers like Voltaire, Diderot, Locke, and Kant emphasized progress and perfectibility combined with an optimism about human social and moral evolution. Progress could continue indefinitely, as humans used reason to unlock their inner potential. But conservatives like Edmund Burke saw human nature as limited and more fixed. Instead of progressive social evolution, they saw recurring patterns of greed and violence.Bess suggests a via media between these two visions. He sees the human condition as characterized by change, innovation and novelty, as well as by continuity, preservation and order. Wisdom combines the two visions: "hope ... tempered by humility ... an attitude of openness to the future, chastened by the sobering lessons of past experience. The resulting moral maxim would be: embrace innovation, but proceed critically, incrementally, and cautiously in adopting it; explore new possibilities, but remain acutely cognizant of the historical track record as you go." Bess refers to his view as "chastened optimism." (78)Chastened optimism considers various forms of enhancement on a case-by-case basis, but what moral framework should we use to make these assessments? SInce human beings differ regarding their moral beliefs, Bess argues that the best we can do is to combine the ancient concept of human flourishing with today's positive psychology and the "capabilities approach" in economic theory. Together these two fields have come to a consensus about the personal traits and social conditions that contribute to human flourishing, and Bess believes that this provides a framework for assessing enhancement technologies. The key factors in human flourishing from the individual perspective are: security; dignity; autonomy; personal fulfillment; authenticity; and pursuit of practical wisdom. From a societal perspective the key factors are: fairness; interpersonal connectedness; civic engagement; and transcendence. This framework helps us answer questions about whether a particular enhancement will or will not contribute to human flourishing, although in most cases the answer will not be straightforward.Other questions will arise as well. Who gets enhanced? Will this create a new caste system? What of those who reject enhancement? Bess thinks it unlikely that first world democracies would tolerate a biological class system, and that violence may accompany the desire for universal access to enhancement technologies. As for those who reject these technologies, it is unclear whether the non-modified will be able to live peaceably beside the modified as the Amish do today. But when large numbers of individuals choose to adopt bioenhancement, there will be tremendous pressure on others to do so as well. But the implications are startling. By the end of this century non-modified humans will be at a distinct disadvantage. Given enough time, modified and non-modified humans will be different species.In the third part of the book explores the more ethereal effects enhancements will have on individual humans. Do pharmaceuticals enhance our experiences by disconnecting us from reality? Do enhancements mechanize the self by eliminating the messy and unpredictable aspects of human experience? And if the answer is yes to these questions are enhancements worth the price?Similar questions arise regarding moral enhancement. Suppose we can give people a "morality pill" to increase the likelihood that people would make ethical choices, an idea that is becoming increasingly realistic. This pill (or chemical we put in the water) wouldn't completely override free will; rather it would increase the proclivity toward altruism. Bess says we should reject the pill because intention is a large part of what makes an act moral and the pill too heavily influences moral intention. In short he believes that free will is worth the price of whatever negative outcomes follow from it. I think that this is a very large price to pay for an idea, free will, that may be illusory anyway. Still Bess maintains that moral enhancement, to the extent it undermines free will, removes moral meaning from the world. But I would reply that who cares about discarding the idea moral meaning if a better world would result. No doubt I am revealing my utilitarian preferences.Other ethereal problems relating to human identity include: the possible monitoring and sharing of our intimate thoughts; the development of better virtual reality; and the extension of human lifespans. In addition enhancement technologies will bring about unforeseen consequences. What will be the future of sex, food, privacy, the arts, and war? No doubt the future will be weird in ways that are at present inconceivable. Bess thinks we should be a bit scared. "If you think your iPhone is a transformative device, just wait til they turn on your brain-machine interface." (174)The last section of the book explores the ethical questions raised by the pursuit of human enhancement. How far should we go with enhancements? What modifications should embrace and which should we reject? Will we even have a say in determining such matters? What is generally better, modest or radical enhancements? What sorts of creatures do we want to become, and what sort do we to avoid becoming?Bess doubts that we can "just say no" to these technologies for even if we did some would pursue them in a black market or in countries that approve of such technologies. Thus complete relinquishment of enhancement technologies is a non-starter. So the real question is whether we want to pursue enhancements at a low-level, increasing today's capabilities; at a mid-level, capabilities beyond today's levels but still recognized as human; or a high level, capabilities we would classify as transhuman or posthuman.It is the transhumanist vision that Bess especially fears. He argues that you cannot have a radically expanded cognitive architecture with transforming identity. Such a consciousness would no longer be anything like the consciousness it used to be. Thus, to transform ourselves in this manner would be to terminate ourselves and become a new kind of sentient being. But we should not do this because of the potential for posthumans to harm others. "Until we know a great deal more than we do today about what such entities would be like ... it would be the height of folly and irresponsibility to proceed with the project of creating them ... The potential rewards are too uncertain, and the risks are far too great." Furthermore, the societal consequences of some of us becoming posthuman might tear the fabric of civilization apart.While Bess admits that the temptation to pursue radical enhancements will be great, he counsels restraint. He hopes that as we adapt to low-level changes, we can gradually relax the constraints on mid-level and high-level ones. Of course he admits that enforcing these moratoriums would be difficult, and international cooperation would be difficult to achieve, but arms control provides a model of how this might be accomplished. Still trying to control technologies that may spell our doom is worth the effort. While we may not be able to control where enhancement technology leads, we can still influence the path it takes.Bess' book is one of the most thoughtful meditations on the future that I have encountered. Moreover, the book is carefully and conscientiously crafted, and meticulously argued. He is impartial to the end, giving a fair hearing to contradictory arguments. In the end I would situate Bess' views a bit more toward the conservative side of the argument. While he is optimistic that we can muddle our way through the coming storm, which demands a large dose of optimism indeed, I sense more fear than excitement. I think Bess overestimates how good life is now, and underestimates how good it can be.Bess concludes that in the future: "the most potent deed of all will still take the form of a smile, a silent nod of empathy, a hand gently laid on someone's arm. The merest act of kindness will still remain the Ultimate Enhancement." This is touching, and it reminds us that remaking the world demands more than just engineering. But Iet us hope that Bess doesn't mean this literally; let us hope that in the future we can do more for human suffering than smile, nod and touch. Let us hope that someday there will be more than just kindness to ameliorate the reality of our descendents.
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