https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7262-3915
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ABSTRACT
The idea of moral bioenhancement has been discussed in recent years by ethicists and philosophers. While such discussion covers many different issues on Earth, they have not yet been considered in the context of future human space missions. In this paper, we discuss the bioethics of biomedical moral enhancement for space whether it is possible, probable, and preferable. We show that the ethical context of moral bioenhancement for space differs from analogical contexts on Earth. We point out that space exploration policy should take into account the possibility of moral bioenhancement.
Disclosure Statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.
Notes
1 Editorial, “Editing the Human Genome: Balancing Safety and Regulation,” Lancet (2018) 391, 402; Jarrod Bailey, “CRISPR-Mediated Gene Editing: Scientific and Ethical Issues,” Trends in Biotechnology 37:9 (2019), 920–921.
2 Megan D. Hoban, Gregory J. Cost, Matthew C. Mendel et al., “Gene Therapy: Correction of the Sickle Cell Disease Mutation in Human Hematopoietic Stem/Progenitor Cells,” Blood 125:17 (2015), 2597–2604.
3 Faith Lagay, “Gene Therapy or Genetic Enhancement: Does it Make a Difference?,” Virtual Mentor 3:2 (2001), virtualmentor.2001.3.2.gnth1-0102.
4 Rachel L. Mintz, John D. Loike and Ruth L. Fischbach, “Will CRISPR Germline Engineering Close the Door to an Open Future?,” Science and Engineering Ethics 25:5 (2019), 1409–1423.
5 Mark Walker, “Genetic Engineering, Virtue-First Enhancement, and Deification in Neo-Irenaean Theodicy,” Theology and Science 16:3 (2018), 1–22.
6 Arvin M. Gouw, “Genetic Virtue Program: An Unfeasible Neo-Pelagian Theodicy?,” Theology and Science 16:3 (2018), 273–278.
7 Braden Molhoek, “Raising the Virtuous Bar: The Underlying Issues of Genetic Moral Enhancement,” Theology and Science 16:3 (2018), 1–9.
8 Arvin M. Gouw, “CRISPR Challenges and Opportunities for Space Travel,” in Human Enhancements for Space Missions, ed. K. Szocik (Springer, Cham, 2020), 19–34.
9 Tim Squire, Grant Buchanan and Hany Elsaleh, “Mission to Mars: Radiation Safety or Radiation Disaster? Space Transit and Mars Radiation Exposure Risks – The Potential Shielding Effect of an Intravehicular Graphene Space Suit and a Storm Shelter During Space Travel,” Journal of the Australasian Society of Aerospace Medicine 11 (2020), 1–9.
10 Maurizio Balistreri and Solveig Lena Hansen, “Moral and Fictional Discourses on Assisted Reproductive Technologies: Current Responses, Future Scenarios,” Nanoethics 13 (2019), 199–207.
11 Arianna Ferrari, Christopher Coenen and Armin Grunwald, “Visions and Ethics in Current Discourse on Human Enhancement,” Nanoethics 6 (2012), 215–229.
12 Only one paper in a peer-reviewed journal discusses the idea of moral bioenhancement for space: Konrad Szocik, “Biomedical Moral Enhancement for Human Space Missions,” Studia Humana 8:4 (2019), 1–9.
13 Konrad Szocik, “Space Bioethics: Why We Need it and Why it Should be a Feminist Space Bioethics,” Bioethics 35:2 (2021), 187–191.
14 Rayna Elizabeth Slobodian, “Selling Space Colonization and Immortality: A Psychosocial, Anthropological Critique of the Rush to Colonize Mars,” Acta Astronautica 113 (2015), 89–104.
15 Ibid., pp. 92–93.
16 Ibid., p. 98.
17 Jacques Arnould, “The Emergence of the Ethics of Space: The Case of the French Space Agency,” Futures 37:2 (2005), 245–254.
18 Thomas C. Scott-Phillips, Thomas E. Dickins and Stuart A. West, “Evolutionary Theory and the Ultimate-Proximate Distinction in the Human Behavioral Sciences,” Perspectives on Psychological Science 6:1 (2011), 38–47.
19 Ibid., p. 39.
20 Ibid., pp. 40–41.
21 Ibid., p. 41.
22 Cody T. Ross and Peter J. Richerson, “New Frontiers in the Study of Human Cultural and Genetic Evolution,” Current Opinion in Genetics & Development 29 (2014), 103–109.
23 Peter J. Richerson, “Human Cooperation is a Complex Problem with Many Possible Solutions: Perhaps All of Them Are True!” Cliodynamics 4:1 (2013), 139–152.
24 Ibid., p. 145.
25 Matthew R. Zefferman and Peter J. Richerson, “Many Important Group-Level Traits are Institutions,” Behavioral and Brain Sciences 37:3 (2014), 280–281.
26 Martin A. Nowak, Corina E. Tarnita and Edward O. Wilson, “The Evolution of Eusociality,” Nature 466:7310 (2010), 1057–1062.
27 Christian Hilbe, Krishnendu Chatterjee and Martin A. Nowak, “Partners and Rivals in Direct Reciprocity,” Nature Human Behaviour (2018), doi:10.1038/s41562-018-0320-9.
28 Patrick Kennedy, Andrew D. Higginson, Andrew N. Radford and Seirian Sumner, “Altruism in a Volatile World,” Nature 555 (2018), 359–362.
29 Ibid.
30 Erle C. Ellis, Peter J. Richerson, Alex Mesoudi, Jens-Christian Svenning, John Odling-Smee and William R. Burnside, “Evolving the Human Niche,” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 113:31 (2016), E4436.
31 Peter J. Richerson, “Cultural Evolution and Gene-Culture Coevolution,” Evolutionary Studies in Imaginative Culture 1:1 (2017), 89–92.
32 Konrad Szocik and Tomasz Wójtowicz, “Human Enhancement in Space Missions: From Moral Controversy to Technological Duty,” Technology in Society 59 (2019), 101156; Konrad Szocik, Riccardo Campa, Margaret Boone Rappaport and Christopher Corbally, “Changing the Paradigm on Human Enhancements: The Special Case of Modifications to Counter Bone Loss for Manned Mars Missions,” Space Policy 48 (2019), 68–75; Konrad Szocik, “Is Human Enhancement in Space a Moral Duty? Missions to Mars, Advanced AI and Genome Editing in Space,” Cambridge Quarterly of Healthcare Ethics 29:1 (2020), 122–130.
33 Konrad Szocik and Martin Braddock, “Why Human Enhancement is Necessary for Successful Human Deep-Space Missions,” The New Bioethics 25:4 (2019), 295–317.
34 Ingmar Persson and Julian Savulescu, Unfit for the Future: The Need for Moral Enhancement (Oxford University Press, 2014).
35 Allen Buchanan and Russell Powell, The Evolution of Moral Progress. A Biocultural Theory (Oxford University Press, 2018).
36 Gregory Mark Conan, “Frequently Overlooked Realistic Moral Bioenhancement Interventions,” Journal of Medical Ethics 46:1 (2019), 43–47.
37 Arvin M. Gouw, “Challenging the Therapy/Enhancement Distinction in CRISPR Gene Editing,” in The Palgrave Handbook of Philosophy and Public Policy (2018), 493–508.
38 Laura Y. Cabrera, Rethinking Human Enhancement: Social Enhancement and Emergent Technologies (New York: Palgrave McMillan, 2015).
39 Cameron C. Smith, Principles of Space Anthropology. Establishing a Science of Human Space Settlement (Springer, Cham, 2019).
40 Ibid.
41 Arvin M. Gouw, “Introducing the Brave New CRISPR World,” Zygon 55:2 (2020), 421–429.
42 Neil Levy, Neuroethics (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007).
43 Massimo Reichlin, “The Moral Agency Argument Against Moral Bioenhancement,” Topoi 38 (2019), 53–62.
44 Jonathan Pugh, “Moral Bio-enhancement, Freedom, Value and the Parity Principle,” Topoi 38 (2019), 73–86.
45 Karim Jebari, “What to Enhance: Behaviour, Emotion or Disposition?,” Neuroethics 7 (2014), 253–261.
46 Rafael Ahlskog, “Moral Enhancement Should Target Self-Interest and Cognitive Capacity,” Neuroethics 10 (2017), 363–373.
47 Kasper Raus, Farah Focquaert, Maartje Schermer, Jona Specker and Sigrid Sterckx, “On Defining Moral Enhancement: A Clarificatory Taxonomy,” Neuroethics 7:3 (2014), 263–273.
48 Parker Crutchfield, “Compulsory Moral Bioenhancement Should be Covert,” Bioethics 33 (2019), 112–121; Parker Crutchfield, “It is Better to be Ignorant of Our Moral Enhancement: A Reply to Zambrano,” Bioethics 34:2 (2019), 1–5.
49 Alexander Zambrano, “Covert Moral Bioenhancement, Public Health, and Autonomy,” Bioethics 33 (2019), 725–728.
50 Molly J. Crockett, “Moral Bioenhancement: A Neuroscientific Perspective,” Journal of Medical Ethics 40:6 (2014), 370–371.
51 Robert Sparrow, “Egalitarianism and Moral Bioenhancement,” American Journal of Bioethics 14:4 (2014), 20–28; Robert Sparrow, “Better Living through Chemistry? A Reply to Savulescu and Persson on ‘Moral Enhancement,’” Journal of Applied Philosophy 31:1 (2014), 23–32.
52 Arvin M. Gouw, “CRISPR Challenges and Opportunities for Space Travel.”
53 Felix Bubeck et al., “Engineered Anti-CRISPR Proteins for Optogenetic Control of CRISPR-Cas9,” Nature Methods 15:11 (2018), 924–927.
54 Konrad Szocik, “Is Human Enhancement in Space a Moral Duty? Missions to Mars, Advanced AI and Genome Editing in Space.”
55 Michelle Ciurria, “Is there a Duty to Use Moral Neurointerventions?,” Topoi 38 (2019), 37–47.
56 Julian Savulescu, “Rational Freedom and Six Mistakes of a Bioconservative,” The American Journal of Bioethics 19:7 (2019), 1–5.
Additional information
Funding
Notes on contributors
Konrad Szocik
Konrad Szocik is a visiting fellow at the Yale Interdisciplinary Center for Bioethics and an assistant professor at the University of Information Technology and Management in Rzeszow, Poland. Department of Social Sciences, University of Information Technology and Management, Sucharskiego 2 Street, 35–225, Rzeszów, Poland. E-mail: [email protected]
Arvin M. Gouw
Arvin Gouw PhD is working in the field of theology and science at the University of Cambridge Faculty of Divinity. His most recent book is Religious Transhumanism and Its Critics, co-edited with Brian Green and Ted Peters (Lexington, 2022) and his research has been published in academic journals including Cell Metabolism, Nature Biotechnology, Science, PNAS, Zygon, Theology and Science. University of Cambridge Faculty of Divinity, 25 West Rd, Cambridge CB3 9DP, United Kingdom. E-mail: [email protected]