Free To Be... Cosmetic Neurology

(This one's for the 'friend' who recently offered me some of her prescription drugs.)

"We live in a culture that believes medication can solve almost any problem."

"The last thing a person concerned with brain power should do is gamble with using chemicals that influence her brain in ways that we do not understand."

- From a November 2009 Glamour article on 'sharing' prescription drugs.

Ignore the really large cup of coffee on my desk. I don't need it to write well, but it helps. This is the extent of my sympathy with chemically-tailored cognition.

The irony is that I will argue long and hard for cognitive liberty - your right to "the absolute sovereignty of [your] own consciousness." But the current trends towards accepting the expanded use of 'smart drugs' make me nervous.

Maybe it's because I was inundated with anti-drug messages during my formative years. There was a war on drugs that included some fairly-effective propaganda aimed at teenagers and young people. Apparently that message doesn't apply to these drugs.

In her Glamour article on the (apparently) common practice of sharing prescription drugs, the author includes statements like this - "While most experts agree that unsupervised pill popping is always risky, some have actually suggested that stimulants such as Adderall, Ritalin and Provigil should eventually become more available to people as study and work aids. In an editorial published last year in the scientific journal Nature, seven leading experts in medicine, science and law argued that using these drugs to boost mental performance was the way of the future. 'Cognitive enhancement has much to offer individuals and society,' they said." While the article continues on to describe the potential downfall of this type of drug use, we are left with the feeling that the scientific 'stamp of approval' has already been given via the quote from Nature. (That Nature article gets around.)

And the cover story of the current issue of Scientific American tackles the same issue. (Boo! for not making the whole article available online.)

On principle, I object to the fact that the average reader has no access to the actual science that is being used to support various arguments for or against cosmetic neurology, and must rely on secondhand reports and media coverage for information.

But my stronger objection is this... The current practices of cosmetic neurology and cognitive enhancement include plenty of unregulated activity, as illustrated by the Glamour article. The danger is that this activity will/has become so prevalent that it establishes new norms to which others are then obliged and/or pressured to conform.

And therein lies a paradox - How do you argue for the cognitive liberty of the individual when the exercise of that liberty may result in a decrease in liberty for those who follow? Should my children by obligated to take 'smart drugs' to stay competitive in school? Should I be obligated to take antidepressants to maintain a new standard of 'normal' behavior in my workplace?

And while there may currently be no explicit policies in place to mandate this type of drug use, our ideas about what is 'normal' are slowly and surely being altered to conform to new ideas about what is possible. "Our boss has started getting on my case for not being as productive... [as the guy] using unprescribed modafinil to work crazy hours..." (q) Hidden in every article referenced in this post are warnings about the unknown consequences of long-term, unprescribed, or unapproved use of prescription drugs for cosmetic (non-disease treating) purposes. Yet who will have the patience to wait for definitive scientific findings? And who will want to accept that s/he does not have the right to 'dope' his/her brain, especially if the practice is prevalent among peers?

"If we can improve cognitive systems in disease, can we also do so in health? Should we?" - Cosmetic neurology: The controversy over enhancing movement, mentation, and mood. Anjan Chatterjee, MD (2004).

I like my current state of cognition. I'd like the freedom to keep it as it is. If your freedom to change your state of mind interferes with my freedom to not change my state of mind, then we'll have to throw down. In the meantime, let's all make informed choices.

Six-Word Memoirs

"What is better than telling stories?"

The human condition in six words.

"Six-Word Memoirs: The Legend

Legend has it that Hemingway was once challenged to write a story in only six words. His response? “For sale: baby shoes, never worn.” Starting in 2006, SMITH Magazine re-ignited the recountre by asking our readers for their own six-word memoirs. They sent in short life stories in droves, from the bittersweet (“Cursed with cancer, blessed with friends”) and poignant (“I still make coffee for two”) to the inspirational (“Business school? Bah! Pop music? Hurrah”) and hilarious (“I like big butts, can’t lie”)."

Ooh, a challenge. Must write some.

• Sought knowledge. Bought college. Still searching.
• The word 'normal' no longer applies.
• Randomness refined. No equations. Pure mind.
• Honesty in anonymity. Scattered specificity. Hidden.
• This couldn't have been an accident.

Yours as comment; I dare you.

By Heresies Distressed (Pt I)

"Censorship is the height of vanity."

Yet yours truly has actually spent a great deal of time considering the idea that there are some things which perhaps should remain, let's say, 'out of sight' of the general public. I've been having this debate with myself for years with respect to certain ideas/areas in science. Not because I want to see science censored, but because the dissemination of scientific work doesn't always result in (immediate) progress in bettering the human condition. And if it has the potential to make social conditions worse, does the scientist bear a responsibility to censor his/her work?

The immediate impetus for this post was the realization that NOVA was airing a two-hour program tonight called Darwin's Darkest Hour, with the teaser "Charles Darwin must decide whether to make the theory of evolution public." And that reignited my internal debate about the responsibilities of science and the scientist.

Given the respect accorded to science in our society, the generally high inability to think critically about science possessed by a majority of people, and the tendency to apply scientific results inappropriately when creating public programs/policy, one can reasonably ask - Is there any area of the human condition which science should not explore and report upon with complete impartiality? Should social considerations have a role in determining what areas science is allowed to investigate, and how the results should be disseminated/used? (If you are a scientist, chances are that you found that last question offensive. Read on.)

A science journalist recently stated: "First, I think at least one topic is beyond the pale. Claims that certain races are innately less intelligent than others are so noxious—with so much potential to exacerbate racism–that I disapprove of their dissemination; in fact I’d like to see research on race and intelligence discontinued, because it has less than zero social value."

At first blush, I find the idea that any scientific knowledge should be censored to be offensive. I don't want anything to be kept or hidden from me because you think I can't handle it. I find it offensive when someone tells me that I shouldn't read The Bell Curve or The God Delusion. (Full disclosure: These are the only books that I have been actively hassled for reading. Hassled by well-educated friends, whose spontaneous reaction upon seeing me reading these books was 'I can't believe you're reading that', followed by an extensive rant on why that was unacceptable, and (in one case) a recommendation that I read something more 'normal', like Nora Roberts.)

But you don't truly understand a point of view until you can sympathize with it. An infamous hacker chick once vented about how the next 'Darwin' might be put off from going public with any similar ideological/scientific leap, because the social consequences might be a net negative. (If you are wondering how this has any relevance now, consider this essay about one area of science that is waiting to 'find its Darwin'.)

In a weird twist of irony, much of the fiction I've been reading lately also deals with the battle between knowledge and ignorance, and various rationales for failing to disseminate knowledge. I have resolved nothing new in my ongoing debate, save that I'll be watching NOVA tonight with this quote in mind...

"We wander through our lives and then we die. But for all of us there is one moment, one crucial point, where we have to make a decision between what's right and what's wrong, between different visions of who we might be."

The Courage to Become (Pt III)

"Man has eaten from the tree of knowledge; he has not died, as the serpent had correctly predicted; he has become as God."

I found it amusingly ironic that Kurtz, in his haste to establish secular humanism as a viable alternative to traditional religion, suggested that humanists should adopt Prometheus as their patron saint. His greatness? "He was a champion of human-kind known for his wily intelligence, who stole fire from Zeus and gave it to mortals."

If I'm not mistaken, stealing from God is the opener for 3 major religions. It is the first deed of note that Man performs after being created - stealing from God by eating forbidden fruit from the Tree of Knowledge.

If you're curious, no, there's no other (apparent) reason why Kurtz nominated Prometheus. Just the simple fact that he had the balls to steal something of value from a God who didn't want him/us to have it. Notably, Prometheus and Adam and Eve were all punished for their actions. Yet the stories of taking what we should not have from something greater than ourselves in order to advance have lived on, through the millennia of our collective history.

Which leads me to wonder if we don't retain the notion of 'God' as a cognitive marker of that which is greater than us. As a way to stoke our collective imaginations with stories of unlimited power and knowledge, and what one does with such abilities. Sure, but you can get that in good science fiction, you say. True, but good science fiction is rare, and perhaps we don't yet have enough of it to compete with the collective imaginings of our vast ancestry, who referred to what they imagined was greater than them simply as 'gods'.

For if we cannot imagine what is greater than us, what inspires us to strive and become something more? What holds back the apathy that accompanies the notion that we are simply a genetic program executing itself?

I was more than a little disappointed (for reasons I'll reveal in a future post) when The God Delusion began by seeking to establish Einstein's views on religion/God. As if Einstein would/could somehow invalidate or validate religion or atheism. A similar pattern followed throughout the book - seeking to establish the legitimacy of atheism by claiming various great scientific figures as atheists, or as sympathetic to atheism. These men did what, exactly? Oh, right, they teased the Universe into giving up Her secrets for the good of mankind. They found Knowledge that Man did not yet have, and they took it. (I doubt that Dawkins had in mind to give us a parallel story of Man's struggle to become something greater, but it's amusingly coincidental nonetheless.)

If you've read You Shall Be As Gods (and I hope you will, especially if you think that The God Delusion is the summit of the argument against traditional religion), then you may have come to see religion as (among other things) the story of Man's struggle to strive, challenge, and become that which is greater than He is. That struggle continues today, but we are in danger of missing the goal for all the fighting we do over the correct 'path' to the goal.

"What matters today is not the difference between believers and nonbelievers, but that between those who care and those who do not care."

You Shall Be As Gods

"For centuries the 'brightest minds' on earth had ignored the ancient sciences, mocking them as ignorant superstitions, arming themselves instead with smug skepticism and dazzling new technologies - tools that led them only further from the truth. Every generation's breakthroughs are proven false by the next generation's technology. And so it had gone through the ages. The more man learned, the more he realized he did not know."

"The stuff of magic and myth was fast becoming reality as the shocking new data poured in, all of it supporting the basic ideology of Noetic Science - the untapped potential of the human mind."

"The Buddha said, 'You are God yourself.' Jesus taught that 'the kingdom of God is within you' and even promised us, 'The works I do, you can do... and greater.' Even the first antipope - Hippolytus of Rome - quoted the same message, first uttered by the gnostic teacher Monoimus: 'Abandon the search for God... instead, take yourself as the starting place."

From The Lost Symbol, by Dan Brown (September 15th, 2009).

(quiet chuckle)

Humanism for the Individual

They told me to be a light in the darkness. They did not tell me to drag people kicking and screaming out of the darkness.

(I know, I know - you want the Erich Fromm-y goodness. It's cooking, I promise. But I need to clear something up first.)

If there's a foundation stone to my set of beliefs, it's individual responsibility. My feelings on individual responsibility could be a set of essays unto itself, but I bring it up now because it's critical to understanding what I said earlier. What I said earlier was, admittedly, phrased badly, as is wont to happen when one doesn't calm down before one writes something.

My objection to humanism being confounded with atheism and rabid skepticism was not born out of my feelings for those ideas, but rather of the images of the behavior that they conjure up. Those behaviors are things that I've witnessed, and at some level I know that they don't represent the behavior of all people who hold those beliefs. Nonetheless, they left a bad taste in my mouth, so to speak, when it comes to the ideas that were behind the behaviors.

At the heart of this is the idea that we need to 'save' people from bad ideas. We are justified in doing whatever it takes to 'save' them because we are right and they are wrong. We are fighting the good fight and they wallow in ignorance and will thank us someday. Even if they don't, we are fighting to make the world a better place for the future and the future will thank us. No one ever says 'Hey, I'm feeling cranky today and I'm gonna blow steam by picking on/mocking some (fill in group name). It's okay because I'm right.' The ideas behind these behaviors change, but the behaviors are always the same.

This way madness lies.

Core to the notion of individual responsibility is not only the idea that I take responsibility for my actions, but also that I don't take responsibility for your actions. I don't try to 'save' you, save that I might devote my life to creating something that can educate others. But I do that because of what I believe in, not because I think that I must assume responsibility for you, or that my voice is worth more than yours. (Here the idea of 'individual responsibility' meets the idea of 'equality'. And while no one will overtly say that they don't believe that all men are equal, they will frequently demonstrate that, by virtue of their education or social standing, they really think that they do know more and are therefore better in some critical way that allows them treat others as inferior.)

What I said was not about the ideas behind atheism or skepticism, although you wouldn't know it from what I actually said. :) It was about behavior, and the idea that we have to 'save' people from bad ideas by using whatever tactics we can.

Curiosity usually wins out in the end with me, and because I would like not to have such a visceral reaction to the words 'atheism' and 'skepticism', I'm going to try to engage those ideas in my own way - starting with finally reading The God Delusion, as I understand that Dawkins is the godfather (so to speak) of modern atheism. Who knows what I'll think after I've read that book. I probably won't talk about it here, because I don't think that the power of humanism is the result of rejecting the idea of a God, but rather of embracing the fact that we are all human, and we are all here now, and if we won't help ourselves, a deity probably shouldn't think enough of us to care either.

The Courage to Become (Pt II)

"Because we cannot tolerate greatness in our midst, we do all we can to destroy it."

"Others see their possibility in the reality of you. Be, therefore, a model to all the world."

Many years ago, during a summer internship, I learned 'The Rules' of Corporate America. Only two of those rules have remained with me through every subsequent job. They are - It's more important to be liked by your co-workers than it is to be good at your job. - and - Being good at your job can keep your from being liked by your co-workers. Presumably the second rule has something to do with the idea that stellar performance only serves to highlight less-adequate performance, and subsequently raises the bar for everyone else. (There's going to be a point in a minute. Hang in there.)

The other day I picked up a book called Tomorrow's God. (I am insatiably curious about alternative views of theology and spirituality.) Due to a well-placed library bar code, I did not realize (until I began reading it) that this book was written by the author of the Conversations with God series. Naturally it quickly became clear that this book was written as a dialogue with God. As far as I can tell so far, the author believes that he was having a conversation with God, or at least it wasn't ever made clear that the author was using dialogue simply as a literary technique. Okay. I occasionally like to indulge in the idea that I'm having a dialogue with the Universe. (The Universe is an amusing conversationalist, with very clever and subtle ways of letting me know that it knows more than I do.) So I'll read this book until I can't take it anymore, or until I reach the end.

I'm about 150 pages into it so far, and now I'm driven to read it because so much of what the author is saying (as 'God') is what any good humanist philosopher would say. (Indeed he has formed something called Humanity's Team, which I haven't investigated yet.) And I'm wondering, with increasing force - Why did the author feel the need to attribute this wisdom to God? Why couldn't he claim it as a legacy of his own thinking and studies? [Disclaimer: Apparently the 'proof' that this wisdom originates from God is in the last chapter, which I haven't read yet.]

I have a theory about this, which goes back to the idea that we don't easily tolerate greatness. If we do tolerate it, we do so by wanting to own it, dissect it, and understand it. And because we also have a tendency to equate greatness with infallibility, we are happy when 'greatness' self-destructs, and we armchair-quarterback the hell out of its mistakes. We also frequently judge our own self-worth by our proximity to greatness, rather than our own accomplishments and sense of satisfaction.

Indeed, Walsch (the author) discusses his perception of others expecting him to be in a place of "high consciousness" all the time. But perhaps this is related to his other fear - "... if I say that I am making this all up, they'll lose their faith in you, in me, and in this whole process." In other words, he fears that our reaction to these ideas is dependent upon our perception of their source. A humble man who claims to talk to God is more easily tolerated than a simple person who dares to say 'I think I might see a better way.' 'God' is more infallible than Man, therefore a more credible source. I don't claim to know what the author was experiencing while writing these books. I can only say that, so far, the ideas in this book frequently reflect the wisdom of our time, culture, and history, with no ideas that I haven't seen before. I don't doubt that the author wishes for a better future for Mankind.

And this brings me to the point. Perhaps one reason we cling to the notion of 'God' is because it provides an excuse for greatness and a defense against the hostility that man visits upon his fellows when he perceives them as a threat to himself. Of course, some have used the idea of being 'touched by God' as an excuse for vile acts as well. Somehow though, overall, we are usually more tolerant of that which makes us look good by comparison, than we are of that which makes us look bad. (Psychological threats - those which impact our beliefs about ourselves and our world - are frequently met with more hostility than purely physical threats.) I would also argue that we frequently suppress our everyday abilities for 'greatness' out of similar fears.

Fans of Erich Fromm may be able to guess where this line of thinking is going next, but for now I'll end with this quote...

"Your friends need what you can be when you are no longer afraid, when you know who you are, and why you are, and what you want. When you are no longer looking for reasons to live, but can simply be."