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An Afro-Communitarian Relational Approach to Brain Surrogates Research

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Abstract

Carrying out research on brains is important for medical advances in various diseases. However, such research ought not be carried out on human brains because the benefits do not outweigh the potential risks. A possible alternative is the use of brain surrogates. Nevertheless, some scholars who uphold a threshold account of moral status suggest the possibility that, with technological advances in the near future, more advanced brain surrogates will have very similar features to humans. This may suffice for these having the same moral status as humans, and as a result, the situation may have implications for brain research, indeed, leading to the implication that this ought also not to be carried out upon brain surrogates. In this article, we present a relational approach to moral status which upholds that brain surrogates do not have the same moral status as human beings. Hence, brain research ought not be rejected on the grounds of equality of moral status between humans and brain surrogates.

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Notes

  1. At least for Henry Greely, Nita Farahany and other scientists who have raised this question, the important thing to consider is not this or that brain surrogate. They all confirm that no brain surrogate currently possesses the relevant characteristic for moral status. The core question for them is what would be the status of a surrogate that attains this characteristic? This is the core question this article also addresses.

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Funding

Luís Cordeiro-Rodrigues wishes to thank the funding for his research. His research has been funded by Hunan University’s Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities, fund number 531118010426. 本 文受湖南大学“中央高校基本科研业务费”专项资金资助(531118010426).

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  1. Philosophy Department, Yuelu Academy, Hunan University, Changsha, China

    Luís Cordeiro-Rodrigues

  2. Department of Medicine, Faculty of Health Sciences, University of Cape Town, Cape Town, South Africa

    Cornelius Ewuoso

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  1. Luís Cordeiro-Rodrigues
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Correspondence to Luís Cordeiro-Rodrigues.

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Cordeiro-Rodrigues, L., Ewuoso, C. An Afro-Communitarian Relational Approach to Brain Surrogates Research. Neuroethics 14, 561–574 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12152-021-09475-7

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