https://orcid.org/0000-0002-8319-4458
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Abstract
There has been a growing interest in research concerning memory modification technologies (MMTs) in recent years. Neuroscientists and psychologists are beginning to explore the prospect of controllable and intentional modification of human memory. One of the technologies with the greatest potential to this end is optogenetics—an invasive neuromodulation technique involving the use of light to control the activity of individual brain cells. It has recently shown the potential to modify specific long-term memories in animal models in ways not yet possible with other MMTs. As the therapeutic potential of optogenetics has already prompted approval of the first human trials, it is especially important and timely to consider the opportunities and dangers this technology may entail. In this article, we focus on possible consequences of optogenetics as an MMT by analyzing fundamental threats potentially associated with memory modifications: the potential disruption of personality and authenticity.
Notes
1 Most generally, memory relies on the encoding, storage, and retrieval of the content of the experience (Klein Citation2015a, Citation2015b). The process of forming memories is called “consolidation.” In the process of consolidation, new memories gradually transfer from an initial, labile state to a more permanent state via a complex process of stabilization of the memory trace (also called “memory-engram”) (see, e.g., De Brigard Citation2014a; Squire Citation1984).
3 A synapse is a structure that permits a neuron (or nerve cell) to pass an electrical or chemical signal to another neuron or to the target effector cell. Synaptic plasticity is the ability of synapses to strengthen or weaken over time in response to increases or decreases in their activity. Since memories are postulated to be represented by vastly interconnected neural circuits in the brain, synaptic plasticity is one of the important neurochemical foundations of learning and memory.
4 LTP is a probable neuronal mechanism for memory consolidation. It is a process whereby brief periods of synaptic activity can produce a long-lasting increase in the strength of a synapse, as shown by an increase in the size of the excitatory postsynaptic current (Lisman, Yasuda, and Raghavachari Citation2012).
5 LTD is a process of selective weakening of the strength of a synapse. It is used to facilitate making use of increase in the strength of a synapse produced by LTP. LTD is necessary to this end as it enables encoding new information (e.g., memories) by preventing a synapse from reaching its ceiling level of efficiency.
6 Cf. DeGrazia (Citation2005) for another influential narrative theory.
7 In the context of memory systems the notion of functional independence means that: “one system can operate independently of the other, though not necessarily as efficiently as it could with the support of the other intact system” (Tulving Citation1985, 66).
8 More precisely, the conceptual self consists of narrative scripts, possible selves, self-with-other units, internal working models, attitudes, self-attributed traits, values, and beliefs.
9 However, as we will argue in the penultimate section, characteristic adaptations can be also be grounded in implicit (non-declarative) knowledge.
10 Self-defining memories add an evaluative dimension to other memories.
11 According to (Tomkins Citation1978) narrative scripts are “an individual’s rules for predicting, interpreting, responding to, and controlling a magnified set of scenes.”
12 See also Varga (Citation2013, 77), Ferrara (160 Citation1997, 50–52) and Pugh, Maslen, and Savulescu (Citation2017b).
13 Or, rather “the truth of extreme existentialism”; or, more precisely, “the truth of early Sartre of Being and Nothingness.” It would be obviously overstatement to identify above “truth” as representative for such a diverse philosophical tradition as existentialism. Here, we are not attempting to give justice to the massive literature on this topic, but merely presenting an “ideal type” of existentialist’s concept of authenticity to outline oppositional spectrum of conceptualizations of authenticity. We think that radicalness of Sartre’s early work in that regard work well to this end.
14 As Lucas (Citation2014) points out although “Heidegger and Sartre disagree on many points […] they agree on the idea that the historicity of the self should be conceived in terms of thrown projection.” In a nutshell, thrownness (Heidegger Citation1962 [1927], §29) refers to the contingency of our facticity and its recalcitrance in the face of projective character of human choices in the process of self-creation. Although we lack the space to further discuss it, we think that Sartre’s early view should be nonetheless positioned further on the spectrum of existentialists accounts of authenticity than Heidegger’s conception, as Sartre emphasizes the far greater (radical) freedom in the process of self-creation.
15 A similar dual-basis account of authenticity can be found in Elliott (Citation2011), Nyholm and O’Neill (Citation2017) as well as Erler and Hope (Citation2014a).
16 Mackenzie and Walker (Citation2015) also argue that “the appeal to authenticity is redundant and blurs the distinction between narrative identity and autonomy.” For a diffrent perspective, see Zawadzki (Citation2020). However, as this is not relevant to the argument that we outlined above, we set this issue aside.
17 For a similar conclusion, but considering somewhat different case (not in the context of optogenetics), and with different theoretical background see Gligorov (Citation2016, 90–92).
18 Synchronicity means that authenticity can be assessed in an isolated time-slice (Pugh, Maslen, and Savulescu Citation2017b). According to one of the most influential synchronic accounts of authenticity—Frankfurt’s (Citation1988) wholeheartedness approach (authenticity is a part of a broader “Frankfurtian” account of autonomy), elements of the self are authentic if endorsed wholeheartedly. More precisely, a person is authentic when she identifies her second-order desires with her first-order desires and this identification is made without reservations—the person who makes it must believe that further inquiry cannot change her mind (Frankfurt Citation1988, 21; 163; 168). Thus, if a person’s actions and choices are guided by the desires and preferences with which she identifies wholeheartedly, these actions and choices are authentic. To access a person’s authenticity in a synchronic account such as Frankfurt’s, one cannot appeal to enduring elements of the person’s self and personality; one simply asks whether the person commits herself wholeheartedly to whatever she decides here and now. The problem with this approach is that it is not clear “what basis there could be for grounding the authenticity of elements of the agent’s self, including that agent’s present values, other than the values that the agent exhibits here and now; however, this is the very element of the self whose authenticity is under question” after interventions, such as those involving optogenetic memory-modifications” (Pugh, Maslen, and Savulescu Citation2017b). For this reason, Pugh, Maslen and Savulescu postulate that diachronicity is crucial for neuroethical accounts of authenticity.