1100 Bursic 2:00
L05
Ethics of Mind Prosthetics: Technology, Economics, and the Future
Arielle Iacocca (ari14@pitt.edu)
THE PROBLEM
Ethical issues are present in all engineering topics and
fields. Bioengineering is one that has a variety of ethical
issues since it deals directly with people. One of the major
bioengineering fields today, aside from tissue engineering, is
prosthetics. Prosthetics play an important role in helping the
disabled live a normal life. There are research teams
developing prosthetics that use electrodes attached to the
nervous system to control them. These prosthetics are
extremely helpful for those people who need a fully
functioning arm or leg. But, what if these mind prosthetics
become better that an actual human limb? Will people want
these artificial limbs to replace already existing ones? Once
mind prosthetics become more wide spread and available for
people, should those people with the mind prosthetics be
allowed to do jobs like, firefighters, policemen and surgeons?
In essence should technology be replaced with natural skill?
Let’s imagine a future scenario.
I have developed fully functioning mind prosthetics. They
are about to go on sale for people who have lost a limb and
they functioning better than an actual human limb. So
essentially, I have created super-human limbs. People who are
not impaired in any way are starting to realize that these
prosthetics are more functional than their own limbs and they
want to get their own prosthetics. Should these people who
have fully functioning limbs and organs replace them with
mechanical ones and essentially become a cyborg? What
about the cost of the prosthetics for the people who actually
need them? These are just some of the ethical questions with
prosthetics in general.
MAJOR ETHICAL ISSUES
One of the major ethical issues I’ve come across in
bioengineering is the creation of something beyond the limits
of a species. With mind prosthetics, I can create people who
can run faster, are more precise, and stronger without the need
for skill. I can get to the point where I can enhance the senses
and create something more than human. “Prostheses such as
artificial hips, artificial limbs, pacemakers, speech
synthesizer’s and retinal implants are used to restore
function” [1]. But what if they restored function vastly
improved from the original? Again, would the resulting
person be fully human or not? The first thing to find is what
ethical value in the biomedical code of engineering do these
questions come close to violating. For biomedical engineering
in health care, the second rule is “consider the larger
consequence of their work in regard to cost, availability, and
delivery of health care” [2]. Since prosthetics are considered
to be part of heath care, they certainly should be considered
University of Pittsburgh, Swanson School of Engineering 1
Submission Date 2013-10-29
in an ethical scenario. My dilemma is such: should the mind
prosthetics be offered for people who don’t need them? If I
inspect the functionality of the prosthetics, I see that as the
prosthetics become more powerful, people who don’t need
them may want to possess them. The estimated value for mind
prosthetics is already rather high, but if more people called for
the prosthetics, from an economic standpoint the price would
increase proportionally to that demand. So for affordability
purposes, mind prosthetics should only be available for the
people who need them.
In the code of ethics for all engineering, Engineers are
meant to serve the public interest. “Engineers are encouraged
to adhere to the principles of sustainable development in order
to protect the environment for future generations” [3]. In a
way, mind prosthetics can go against this ethical principle.
Some people came to me willing to dismantle or injure their
own bodies to get prosthetics with advanced abilities. Those
people see the prosthetics as an improvement to what their
body was before. This issue doesn’t quite go against
sustainable development, but if I consider my own body as a
part of the public image, it goes against protecting
corresponding values for future generations by giving people
a false interpretation of themselves.
THE TECHNOLOGY
How to go about solving this ethical issue definitely is a
task within itself. The first issue I need to look at is the
technology of mind prosthetics. Mind prosthetics are a major
area of research, and the technology itself is rather
progressive. For example, a research team at the University
of Pittsburgh developed a prosthetic arm to replicate human
movement. The human arm has 29 degrees of freedom, while
the robot they created has 26 degrees. The robot is driven by
electrical impulses from the brain. With the attached
electrodes, the brain can signal the robotic arm to move and
grab objects. According to Andrew Schwartz, leader of the
research team, stated “The really satisfying part is that we’re
not just making the machine move. We are actually recreating
natural humanoid movements” [4].
From an ethical
standpoint, creating this machine is both good and bad.
Recreating human movement is difficult and people may take
advantage of being able to get one, especially if that prosthetic
is more functional than their own arm.
Another piece of mind prosthetic to look at is the bionic
leg. This research is going on at the rehabilitation institute of
Chicago. The leg functions similar to the mechanical arm, but
instead of attaching electrodes to the brain, they are attached
directly to the nerve endings in the thigh. When a person’s leg
is amputated, the brain still thinks and acts like the leg is still
there. So with the help of a computer, the machine can read
Arielle Iacocca
the intentions of the brain and move. Unlike Hector there are
no wires protruding from the patient. Everything is mobile.
“Some current prosthetic legs are purely mechanical; others
are robotic…These allow people to walk well but don’t allow
people to ascend or descend stairs with a normal gait or to
reposition their legs while sitting without manually moving
it” [5]. The leg almost completely functions on par with a
normal leg, and helps the patient walk normally as well. This
has the same ethical issue as the mechanical arm. As the
technology gets better, again people want to use the
prosthetics for their own personal profit.
nerve impulses is fairly lengthy. Even though the mind
prosthetics would greatly help disabled people, time is an
issue. It was the same issue with the prosthetic arm. The
companies today are trying to use the lowest cost components
wherever possible to make them more functional, but
affordability is an ethical issue in almost any engineering
topic.
THE DEBATE
The question that keeps being asked is: what if
functionality of prosthetics increases so much that people will
be willing to injure themselves for the new prosthetics? As an
engineer, I think it is a matter of importance to concern myself
with the consequences of what I made. “Engineers on the
frontline of research are not always prepared to think through
the impact of their work and the ethical dilemmas involved”
[10]. The artificial mind prosthetic arm that I created is
stronger than a living human arm, so should they actually be
offered to anyone, even those people who don’t need it or
injure themselves for it? Some specific cases include: an eye
that can see infrared or ultraviolet light, an ear that can hear
pitched a normal human can’t, a leg that can move faster, or
an arm that is steadier.
I believe that people will want these prosthetics to advance
themselves. That is the basis of human nature, and the fact
that there are always going to be people who want to increase
their own gain, even if that means inducing personal injury
for it. We will have a bunch of bionic people running around
doing whatever they want because they essentially become
super human. “Futurists have asked, is it only a matter of time
until amputees have limbs so superior to biological limbs that
amputees are able to out-perform able-bodied people? More
generally, will there come a day when only augmented
humans will be able to compete successfully” [11]?
Eventually, people may forgo their entire bodies and become
full robots with a human brain, ergo: cyborgs. Yet, where is
the loss of identity? When do people stop being people? What
about hacking? There are already people who developed a
device that messes with automatic insulin pumps. They send
a signal and the pump delivers a lethal dose of insulin to the
person. These hackers have the possibility to be able to
control mind prosthetics because they are controlled a
computer in a way. If people become fully bionic hackers
could have a fun time taking control over other people. That
would not be a good thing. So, should the prosthetics be out
in the market if hackers have the ability to take over people’s
bodies?
ECONOMIC STANDPOINT
From an economic standpoint, prosthetics are already
extremely expensive. “Who is entitled to prostheses that have
the price –tag of a luxury car? Solders who loose limbs while
serving get the latest technology, but civilians who lose an
arm in a car accident only receive pre-2009 version through
their insurance” [6]. This isn’t quite fair is it? If someone is in
a car accident and it is not their fault, why doesn’t their
insurance cover a better prosthetic? A large number of
military personnel get injured on duty, but people who aren’t
in the military get injured in accidents that were not their fault.
Therefore, they should be allowed the same access to
prosthetics that the injured military are. “By late January of
this year, there had been 1,585 amputations involving troops
who’d served in Afghanistan or Iraq. Of those, nearly one in
five involved a portion of the arm or hand” [7]. This is a lot
of military personnel that need the prosthetics but there are an
even greater number of non-military personnel who need
them. The only problem is that “Some amputees avoid hightech gadgetry in their prosthetics to survive professionally”
[8]. Right now prosthetics aren’t advanced enough in
functionality for professional work. Besides the ones being
researched, there aren’t any prosthetics that respond to nerve
impulses. And the most advanced ones today cost anywhere
from $20,000 to $120,000 dollars. Seeing how expensive the
prosthetics are, the mind controlled prosthetics are just going
to cost more. If the technology gets to the point that it
surpasses what it was meant to replace, humans may
inevitably subscribe to an ideology where they wish to
become increasingly more “super”. Which again is my issue,
along with the cost of the prostheses rising drastically.
The necessary actions for lowering the price are
decreasing the demand for that product, and finding the most
inexpensive way of producing the prosthetics. The first item
to examine is the time of rehabilitation after the prosthetic is
created. Time is money, so the less time is required to do
something, the less expensive it will be. The related problem
with mind prosthetics is that they take a great amount of
rehabilitation time. The man who had the bionic leg “Spent
countless hours with his thigh wired up with electrodes,
imagining making certain movements on command with his
missing knee, ankle, and foot” [9]. So the amount of time to
program one of these machines to respond properly to the
HOW DO WE GO ABOUT SOLVING THE
ETHICAL ISSUES?
I have produced cheap and efficient mind prosthetic limbs,
and they are about to go out into the market. The first thing I
would do with the company is talk about the rehabilitation
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Arielle Iacocca
time. As mentioned before, mind prosthetics take a decent
amount of time to adjust computer so it understands the
electrical impulse coming from the patents body. Thinking
economically, the easier the computer can understand the
patient’s electrical impulses, the faster the rehabilitation time
and the less expensive the prosthetic is. The next thing to look
at would be if this prosthetic be offered to everyone? After
consideration, bionic people could become a major problem.
In the Olympic there was an entire debate on if Oscar Pistorius
was even allowed to compete. If he had a leg that was a mind
prosthetic, and it gave him an extra speed boost, that situation
wouldn’t be entirely fair and he probably wouldn’t have been
allowed to compete. The next thing I would look at is alright
if people are willing to injure themselves so they can get the
prosthetic and advance their own bodies. For that issue
specifically, I would look at my moral values. According to
my own personal beliefs and my spiritual orientation, I think
that it is morally and ethically wrong to injure yourself or
others for personal gain. I would end up consulting someone
close to me and my collegues in the company about this one.
http://www.voanews.com/content/paralyzed-woman-movesprosthetic-arm-with-her-brain/1569664.html. p. 1
[5] B. Mantel. (2013). “First Mind-Controlled Bionic Leg a
‘Groundbreaking’ Advance.” NBC News health. (Online
article).
http://www.nbcnews.com/health/first-mindcontrolled-bionic-leg-groundbreaking-advance-8C11257732.
P. 1-3
[6] B. Meyer. (2013). “Ethical questions are looming for
prosthetics”.
Wired.
(Online
article).
http://www.wired.co.uk/magazine/archive/2013/09/ideasbank/now-we-need-to-talk-about-our-bionic-future. p. 1-2
[7] C. Huff. (2013). “Revolutionizing Prosthetics.” American
Way. (Online article). http://hub.aa.com/en/aw/prostheticsrobotic-skynet-arm. p. 1-6
[8] N. Parmar. (2012). “Mind-Controlled Bionic Limbs Bring
Giant Strides in Prosthetics.” The National. (Online article).
http://www.thenational.ae/business/industryinsights/technology/mind-controlled-bionic-limbs-bringgiant-strides-in-prosthetics. p. 1-2
[9] M. Healy. (2013). “Bionic Leg is Controlled by Brain
Power.”
Los
Angeles
Times.
(Online
article).
http://www.latimes.com/science/la-sci-robotic-leg20130926,0,7310017.story. p. 1-2
[10] Dennis. (2012). “Oscar Pistorius and the Ethics of
Prosthetics” Thought Leadership presented: Technology.
(Online
article).
http://saportareport.com/leadership/technology/2012/08/13/o
scar-pistorius-and-the-ethics-of-prosthetics/. p. 1-2
[11] V. Thorpe. (2013). “Bionic man’ warns of ethical
minefield”.
The
Observer.
(Online
article).
http://www.psfk.com/2013/10/prosthetics-ethics.html. p. 1-2
CONCLUSION
Overall when I look at the ethical scenario of my company
selling prosthetic limbs, and the ethical issues being where
they stand, I must determine if people who injure themselves
to gain prosthetics should be able to get them. Seeing in how
the price of the prosthetics would increase exponentially if
people just got them because they wanted them. The people
who would actually need the prosthetics would most likely
not be able to get a prosthetic of their own. The prosthetics
would become a privilege of the rich. We would also have the
issue of a number of super human bionic people running
around. So in my mindset, the prosthetics should only be
available to anyone who needs them and didn’t injure
themselves for the purpose of gaining said limbs. I would also
allow people who weren’t military personnel have the ability
to get the technology. Ultimately, I would solve this ethical
issue by thinking through all the facts and consequences of
what I created.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
I would like to thank the engineering department. Without this
paper I never would have gotten to explore benedum. I would
also like to thank my grandfather for getting me interested in
prosthetics, and all of my friends for putting up with my rants
while writing this paper.
REFERENCES
[1] P. Brey. (2009). “Biomedical Engineering Ethics.” A
Companion
to
Philosophy
of
Technology.
http://www.utwente.nl/gw/wijsb/organization/brey/Publicati
es_Brey/Brey_2009_Biomed_Engineering.pdf. p. 1-4
[2] (2004). Biomedical Engineering Society Code of Ethics.
(Online).
http://bmes.org/files/2004%20Approved%20%20Code%20o
f%20Ethics(2).pdf
[3] (2007). III, 2d. NSPE Code of Ethics. (Online).
http://www.nspe.org/Ethics/CodeofEthics/index.html
[4] J. Berman. (2012). “Paralyzed Woman Moves Prosthetic
Arm with Her Brain.” Voice of America. (Online article).
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