Human enhancement and technological uncertainty

It's hard to know where the knowledge we acquire and the technology we develop may take us. Sometimes it is not until after several years that we learn how these skills or technologies can benefit - or harm us. This is the subject of Karim Jebari's dissertation.

New technologies are now being developed in several areas at a very high rate, and it is evident that these technologies can have great impact on our lives. If we want to be able to make assessments of whether the development is desirable or not before the impact is already reality, it is imperative to keep up.

Karim Jebari at the Institute for Futures Studies has just finished his doctoral thesis, Human Enhancement and Technological Uncertainty. Essays on The Promise and Peril of Emerging Technology. As a graduate student in philosophy, he studies technological development from an ethical perspective, especially through the example of human enhancement.

In seven chapters, he studies the use of brain implants and its future applications, the ability to improve our cognitive abilities and strengthen our propensity to act morally right, our duty to resurrect extinct species of animals, and the possibility of a future healthcare that is not all about diseases. He is also considering the limits of development of human enhancement and how we should relate to the risks of technologies that do not yet exist.

Karim will defend his thesis on the 12th of December at KTH.

Listen to an interview with Karim on his thesis (in Swedish).