Taking unfair advantage of your brain

One of our favorite stories by the late Kurt Vonnegut is "Harrison Bergeron," a salty little fable on the perils of equality. The story begins,

THE YEAR WAS 2081, and everybody was finally equal. They weren’t only equal before God and the law. They were equal every which way. Nobody was smarter than anybody else. Nobody was better looking than anybody else. Nobody was stronger or quicker than anybody else. All this equality was due to the 211th, 212th, and 213th Amendments to the Constitution, and to the unceasing vigilance of agents of the United States Handicapper General.

After his son Harrison is arrested by the agents of the Handicapper General for being athletic and a genius and under-handicapped, George finds it difficult to think about what just happened.

And George, while his intelligence was way above normal, had a little mental handicap radio in his ear. He was required by law to wear it at all times. It was tuned to a government transmitter. Every twenty seconds or so, the transmitter would send out some sharp noise to keep people like George from taking unfair advantage of their brains.

Taking unfair advantage of one's brain is one thing. But how about brain enhancement? Doping scandals are common in the professional sports world. But what if there were drugs which enabled you to do for the brain what performance enhancing drugs do for the body?

Well, it turns out there are. And so far, at least, there seems to be little in the way of negative side effects from their use. In a 9 March 2008 article entitled "Brain Enhancement Is Wrong, Right?" New York Times writer Benedict Carey reports

In a recent commentary in the journal Nature, two Cambridge University researchers reported that about a dozen of their colleagues had admitted to regular use of prescription drugs like Adderall, a stimulant, and Provigil, which promotes wakefulness, to improve their academic performance. The former is approved to treat attention deficit disorder, the latter narcolepsy, and both are considered more effective, and more widely available, than the drugs circulating in dorms a generation ago.

Dr. Anjan Chatterjee, of the University of Pennsylvania, argues that public attitudes towards the practice will likely follow the path of public attitudes towards cosmetic surgery. Public attitude, he says, will likely be framed this way: " ‘Look, we want smart people to be as productive as possible to make everybody’s lives better. We want people performing at the max, and if that means using these medicines, then great, then we should be free to choose what we want as long as we’re not harming someone.’ "

In the meantime, he notes, it's not like we have a culture opposed to performance enhancing substances, from antidepressants to improve mood to "high-octane cafe Americanos." The problem, he says, will come when someday an employer expects employees to take Adderall to make sure they have the necessary edge for the job.