Human enhancement and identity-affecting changes: The problem of controversial cases

Summary Imagine we are able to use biotechnology for the purpose of human enhancement. We have the ability to make individuals predisposed to increased intellectual or athletic abilities, or to produce physical characteristics we think are attractive. Consider two possible ways we might accomplish this. In the first case, we use a drug on an early term fetus that makes the resulting individual predisposed to the trait we want to produce. In the second case, we select a particular pair of gametes that will result in an individual who is predisposed to the trait. Further imagine that individuals in both types of cases disvalue their conditions, and complain that the interventions should not have been performed. Perhaps, they disvalue the trait itself because it makes their lives go worse in some way, or maybe the trait brings some negative side effect. What should we make of these individuals’ complaints? Specifically, should we compensate these individuals? Some say that the two cases should be treated differently. In the drug case, the intervention is identity preserving. Had the intervention not been performed, the individual would have existed without the disvalued trait. So this individual can be said to be worse off. In the selection case, however, the intervention is identity affecting. Had the intervention not been performed, some numerically different individual would have existed without the trait. Those who think the complaint of an individual in an identity preserving case should be given more weight than the complaint of someone in an identity affecting case accept what I call the difference thesis or DT. While some interventions such as those just mentioned are either clearly identity preserving or clearly identity affecting, we can imagine other cases in which there is debate over whether or not the intervention results in the numerically identical individual. I call these controversial cases. My goal in this paper is to explore how someone who accepts DT, as well as a basic principle of compensation C, which states that only those who suffer losses should be compensated, should deal with the complaints of individuals in these controversial cases. I refer to this view as DTC. I proceed as follows. First, I give a brief survey of the nonidentity problem. I explain why some philosophers are inclined to accept the implications of the non-identity problem and therefore DTC. I also point out that reasoning based on DTC has been influential in law. Next, I explore the distinction between clear and controversial cases of identity. Some interventions such as the earlier example of the drug administered to the fetus are clearly identity preserving. Others, such as the case of selecting one pair of gametes instead of another, are clearly identity affecting. I then discuss several interventions that I think are controversial. That is, there will be philosophical disagreement over whether these interventions are identity preserving or identity affecting. I discuss the relevant features of these controversial cases and argue that disagreement over them takes place on two levels. On the first level, there could be issues of vagueness in a given theory of personal identity. That is, the theory itself does not give a definitive answer to the question of whether the intervention is identity affecting. Controversy on this first level can also take place when there is disagreement between two rival theories of personal identity (animalism versus psychological views for example), such that one theory says that an intervention is identity preserving and the other says that it is identity affecting. The second level of disagreement, what I call “deep disagreement”, takes place over whether there is a matter of fact about whether a given intervention is identity affecting. This type of disagreement takes place between reductionist and nonreductionist views of personal identity. I then consider how the holder of DTC ought to deal with controversial cases. Suppose that an individual has a disvalued trait due to an enhancement intervention in a clear identity preserving case. And given the other relevant features of the case, suppose she were due compensation. According to DTC, an individual with that same disvalued trait in a clear identity affecting case is not due compensation (since she was not made worse off). How then should controversial cases be handled? There are three broad strategies: (1) controversial cases should be dealt with as if they were identity preserving and compensation should be given; (2) controversial cases should be dealt with as if they were identity affecting and no compensation should be given; or (3) controversial cases should be dealt with in some intermediate way, meaning some amount of compensation between whatever would be due in an identity preserving case and zero should be given. I argue that none of these three strategies is obviously superior to the others. Thus, I conclude that controversial cases of identity prove a serious challenge for anyone sympathetic to DTC.