in dealing with humans, don't start with intellect. 1st ask "who benefits, and how?"

you will invariably discover, when something is illogical, that you haven't grasped the motivation. someone is making a dollar from what seems to you to be illogical, or at least someone hopes to.

genetic and/or cyber enhancement of humans appeals to many people, particularly rich people for whom human frailty is the only blot on the horizon. they will reward someone who makes respectable what they want.

incidentally, since when does one need a licence to pontificate. amateur pontifexes abound on this site, i am responding to one.

None of the above. Savulescu makes good copy because he panders to the moral outrage that sells. The catch-cry of 'why not?' applies as equally to gleeful four year olds as to bioethicists.

It should be called the Germaine Greer syndrome - the world needs an intelligent someone to put their potentially absurd opinions out there so we can examine our vanilla ethics against them. The resulting incremental shift in opinion might make the world a better place.

Having someone logically analyse the ethics of a situation and provide reasoned opinions need not be accepted verbatim, but cannot be dismissed.

It is infinitely better than the Vatican's centuries old response of "thy shalt not" because we said so.

God help us from the "vanilla" mediocrity of those who bristle at anyone who challenges their prejudices.

Hooray! At last someone has seen that the emperor has no clothes. The end result of an ethics that relies only on rationalism is a nightmare. We have become mad with a kind of reason that does not recognize the human imperatives that our long history has taught us. The kind of ethics described in this article is thin gruel and deceptively easy because it is isolated from what we know about the human condition. Before the "why not?" question is asked we should ask the "why?" question situated in the context of all of the richness of human cultural consciousness.

Peter Sellick

Debates on bioethics are welcome and crucial, but this whole piece is just a personal attack on Professor Savulescu.

I can't find any pictures of Michael Cook online, but it's telling that he rails at "the sporty, good-looking, energetic Professor Savulescu", and his "sexy little prefix “bio”".

One suspects that Mr Cook might be motivated more by his own perceived lack of personal appeal and authority than by ethical concerns.

"Why shouldn’t we do transgressive action X? he demands. X hurts no one. X is an expression of autonomy. X is my right. Do you object that X is against human nature? No such thing, buddy. Therefore, X is ethical. Let us, then, be courageously transgressive."

Perhaps I have missed something, but this seems to me to be perfectly reasonable. Why should Michael Cook's manufactured outrage prevent us from making logical decisions favouring our own happiness? If Cook thinks that a particular action is deleterious to human welfare then he is obliged to demonstrate how and why -- making ad hominem attacks against a particular individual is no argument at all.

Unfortunately many religious believers still seem to take the view that if something is sensible and beneficial then there must be something wrong with it: they would far rather adopt futile and painful practices like abstention from sex and self-flagellation just to demonstrate how 'unnatural' rational commonsense behaviours really are. Well, smallpox vaccinations and antibiotics are 'unnatural' too, but they save a lot of lives.

And meanwhile another batch of Afghani children is sacrificed to the glorious irrationality of religion...

Oh the argument from common sense.

For the uninitiated: When you object to something, but have no idea why, have no strong arguments against it, or don't want to spend the time to actually think it out, just claim that this something violates COMMON SENSE! You win just like that, easy!!

I am all for thinking outside the square but Savalescu's ideas are rather extreme.

Bioethics is something we should be concerned with despite the input from extremists whether their ethics are guided by religious or non-religious dogma.

I would take questioning over blind faith anyday but in the end what happens is that which will be most acceptable to the populace. I cannot see a future where amputations will be available on demand for apotemnophilia sufferers no matter what Savelescu pontificates - rather a strong medical system that might provide care and support.

Empathy is biologically inbuilt and many of these philosphical debates will come down to simply caring about others with real compassion and understanding of our differences.

Having missed the philosopher in question I can’t comment in specifics but the author’s point is well made.

It appears the author’s primary point is that ‘bioethics’ as a discipline is simply specialization is for specialization sake and as such a point marketing differentiation.

This level of specialization tends to be myopic focused, intellectual navel gazing. Focusing on topics that (while serving popularism) have little practical or real academic value.

Much like marketing adding the wording “new” and or “with added ingredient X” to the packaging of a box of soap powder. In truth it is unlikely to be any real difference to the product (it’s still soap powder) and ingredient X was always there.

Disciplines need to be broader defined (hence vanilla) i.e. Philosophy Discipline, ethics the specialty. Bioethics are simply subtopics (ingredient X) and as such not worthy of PhD or specialty status.
(Shadow Minister is simply using a different context of ‘vanilla’ to the author.)

Today we are swamped with PhD’s who ‘pontificate’ on topics outside the scope of their discipline and certainly their specialty doctoral thesis whereby their authority with which they speak (inherent in PhD) is questionable.

Given that much of our most fundamental science discoveries where by multi discipline (polymaths) and today some discipline specialization is necessary because of the sheer amount of knowledge. I also wonder if PhD’s should be based more on a wider accumulation of knowledge on the broader discipline beyond that of a degree (honours) and then some singular (specialist) thesis.

In the case of the philosopher in question his preoccupying specialization would be of limited value to undergraduates who might want a different or broader approach to the discipline. (Teaching the new practitioners should be the primary focus of a university.) The institutions prestige should come from that not which high profile flavour of the month PhD holds which Chair. Which in turn give unwarranted significance to some esoteric sub, subset of a discipline.

Ethics is a vast field and like many others fields one aspect can have very little to do with another, such as reproductive ethics and corporate ethics. While Dentists and Neurologists are both doctors, the work they do is not the same.

To assume one "vanilla" set of guidelines will serve all is extremely naive.

Many assume because they have a strong sense of right and wrong, that they are in a position to seriously debate an ethical issue. However, as ethics not only has to take in the morals and feelings of the general populace, but has to consider the broader possible benefits, risks, and future social issues.

This requires in addition an in depth understanding of the scientific capabilities and the vision of the people pushing the research.

Bio ethics is such a huge field in itself that one can quite easily spend a huge amount of time on one subfield.

I'm not sure what your arguments are. You seem to be stating things which the viewer is expected to find offensive or extreme. But a gut reaction is not a good reason to object to something. Without some form of argument I can't really address your views, because I'm not really sure what they are.

The reason I'm commenting is I take issue with your branding transhumanism as a "loopy theory". Where else do you think the future could possibly take us (assuming we aren't annihilated by some form of apocalypse first).

We are already well on the path to being transhuman. Our culture/memes (call them what you will) already make us far more than what a pile of just born DNA could do on its own. Inoculation makes us stronger than we ever could be on our own. Cochlear implants restore our hearing. Do you really expect this trend to stop or even slow down?

The event horizon (the point in our future at which we can make no sensible predictions beyond) is predicted to take place this century. Technological singularity and transhumanism are accepted as the only logical future by those seriously engaged with the subject matter. Just look at singinst.org for more detail. If you have a problem with this idea, please propose an alternative, because I'm yet to see one.