A considerable body of evidence now documents, beyond reasonable doubt, biological and health risk factors for crime and violence. Nevertheless, intervention and prevention efforts with offenders have avoided biological interventions, in part due to past misuses of biological research and the challenges that biological predispositions to crime raise. This article reviews the empirical literature on two biological intervention approaches, omega-3 supplementation and transcranial direct current stimulation. Emerging research on these relatively benign interventions suggests that increased omega-3 intake through dietary intervention (...) and prefrontal upregulation using non-invasive brain stimulation may show some initial promise in reducing antisocial behavior. The ethical issues related to mandated and offered biological interventions within the criminal justice system are discussed. (shrink)

In moral bioenhancement (MBE) discourse, aggression has been identified as one potential target of biomedical intervention. Early suggestions that aggression might be modulated to improve moral outcomes were met with strong opposition from those claiming it is impossible to modulate aggression without harming traits of distinct social and agential value. If we are to preclude (or endorse) particular paths to moral enhancement then we ought to establish sound reasons for doing so. However, in paying due consideration to contemporary aggression studies (...) we will see that current efforts to rule out aggression as one such path are untenable. I argue that the rejection of aggression-reduction as a viable target of MBE is a mistake, and that this arises from a rudimentary view of aggression which is incompatible with current scientific consensus. Drawing on contemporary psychological views I argue that it is necessary to distinguish subtypes of aggression, and that once these distinctions are recognised there is a potential space for MBE to target the biological correlates of specific kinds of aggressive behaviour. Ultimately, I suggest that aggression remains a legitimate target of inquiry, and that mitigating deleterious manifestations may yet offer one prospect for MBE. (shrink)

In the context of debates on psychiatry issues pertaining to moral dimensions of psychiatric health care are frequently discussed. These debates invite reflection on the question whether forensic practitioners have a role in stimulating patients’ moral development and moral growth in the context of forensic psychiatric and psychological treatment and care. We conducted a qualitative study to examine to what extent forensic practitioners consider moral development and moral growth to be a part of their current professional practices and to what (...) extent they think that stimulating moral development is a legitimate objective in the context of forensic psychiatric treatment. In addition, we asked how forensic practitioners balance pubic safety and risk management concerns with the interests and wellbeing of the individual patient. We conclude that: elements of moral development and moral growth in forensic psychiatric care practices are to a certain extent inevitable and not necessarily questionable or undesirable; yet, as in similar debates these elements need to be made explicit in order to discuss the accompanying ethical challenges and boundaries. An open academic, professional and public debate on aspects of stimulating moral betterment within current practices is therefore desirable. (shrink)

Moral agential neuroenhancement can transform us into better people. However, critics of MB raise four central objections to MANEs use: It destroys moral freedom; it kills one moral agent and replaces them with another, better agent; it carries significant risk of infection and illness; it benefits society but not the enhanced person; and it’s wrong to experiment on nonconsenting persons. Herein, I defend MANE’s use for prisoners of war fighting unjustly. First, the permissibility of killing unjust combatants entails that, in (...) cases where MANE is equally or more likely as termination to reduce moral recidivism in unjust combatants, then MANE is morally justified. Second, the relevant infections and illnesses caused by MANE are less bad than death, so MANE leaves unjust POWs better off than the alternative. Third, just as incarceration is often permissible despite benefitting society but not the incarcerated, the same holds for unjust POWs. Fourth, we should accept a broader construal of “benefit” that includes moral benefits. Thus, 3 and 4 are false when applied to unjust POWs. Fifth, medical experimentation likely to help nonconsenting persons is sometimes permissible. Because MANE is likely to help unjust POWs irrespective of their consent or lack thereof, its use is permissible. Sixth, basic principles of proper medical care support the use of MANE on unjust POWs as pro tanto morally obligatory. I conclude that militaries should therefore begin to employ MANE for unjust POWs. (shrink)

How should ethics help decide the morality of enhancing morality? The idea of morally enhancing the human brain quickly emerged when the promise of cognitive enhancement in general began to seem realizable. However, on reflection, achieving moral enhancement must be limited by the practical challenges to any sort of cognitive modification, along with obstacles particular to morality’s bases in social cognition. The objectivity offered by the brain sciences cannot ensure the technological achievement of moral bioenhancement for humanity-wide application. Additionally, any (...) limited moral enhancement will not easily fulfil ethical expectations. Three hypothetical scenarios involving putative moral enhancement help illustrate why. Philosophical concerns about the “Does-Must Dichotomy” and the “Factor-Cause Plurality,” as I label them, forbid easy leaps from views about morality on to conclusions about ways to enhance morality, and then further on to ethically justifying those enhancements. A modest and realistic approach to moral enhancement emerges from exploring these issues. (shrink)

Enhancements for morality could become technologically practical at the expense of becoming unethical and uncivil. A mode of moral enhancement intensifying a person's imposition of conformity upon others, labeled here as “moral righteousness”, is particularly problematic. Moral energies contrary to expansions of civil rights and liberties can drown out reasoned justifications for equality and freedom, delaying social progress. The technological capacity of moral righteousness in the hands of a majority could impose puritanical conformities and override some rights and liberties. Fortunately, (...) there cannot be a human right or a civil right to access righteous moral enhancement, and governments would be prudent to forbid such technology for moral righteousness. From an enlarged perspective, less righteousness could lead to a more just society. Going further, if a neurological intervention for moral righteousness could be invented, so too could moral de-enhancement, here labeled as “moral toleration”. Perhaps moral toleration deserves as much commendation as so-called moral enhancement. Justice with less delay can be justice enhanced. (shrink)