The predictions and thoughts of the Institute for the Future
Nowadays, there are already pills that help people stay awake for longer hours, focus better on their work, and who knows how much more.
But something that may sound good on an individual level can create social unrest, or at least that's what the think tank Institute for the Future in Palo Alto, California, predicts.
The Institute, as Alexis C. Madrigal reports in an article in The Atlantic, proposes that the citizens of the world should acquire a "Magna Cortica.".
“Magna Cortica is the argument that we need a guide, both for design and for ethical rules around the increasing power and diversity of cognitive expansion,” explained Jamais Cascio from the Institute. “There are many pharmaceutical and digital tools that enhance our ability to think,” he continued.
Back in 2008, 20% of scientists reported using drugs to enhance their brain function.
"We are not teenagers trying to get through a tough day after an endless night of drinking and partying. We are responsible people trying to find an edge in an incredibly competitive and cognitively demanding field," said a researcher from the Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research, affiliated with the world-renowned Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).
There is also what is called transcranial brain stimulation, which many people try, despite limited clinical evidence for its effectiveness.
So what do we do as a society – the columnist wonders – with all these possibilities offered to us, from pharmaceuticals to smart, digital media?
“As technology improves, the potential for abuse and harm becomes increasingly stronger,” Cascio said, adding: “There are many examples that have had very bad results, such as doping in sports. What is it that we want to see happen? What is it that we should and should not do? But these are not questions that can be answered by the development of technologies. They require new social perceptions.”.
He proposed five simple principles:
1. The right to self-knowledge
2. The right to self-modification
3. The right to refuse the modification
4. The right to amend and refuse to amend your children's
5. The right to know who has been modified
The point, as with the Institute's other predictions, is not to solve these complex problems of the future, but for people to start thinking about them a little closer to our present, so that technologists and critics don't think about them when it's already too late.
The Institute makes predictions on many levels. While many futurists focus on predictions about technical changes, researchers at the Institute for the Future have begun to focus on circumstances that could lead to large-scale social change, such as the massive shift in public opinion around same-sex marriage in the United States, or the problems the idea of the European Union has faced in recent years.
One of the issues they highlight is what they call "The End of Prisons.".
Prisons cost a lot of money and it is not clear how well they work in reducing crime. In addition, there are now better methods of rehabilitation and correction. These factors, combined with others, could lead to a change in the way public opinion views putting people in prison.
The ideas proposed by the Institute, of course, are as much challenges and arguments as they are predictions. They provide a framework for thinking about what the future might hold. They attempt to synthesize emerging technological capabilities, social movements, and cultural connections.
