Information Under the Skin: the European Union Worries

EUROPA reports on the EU European Union Ethics in Science and New Technologies (EGE) opinion on the ethics of implanting information and communication technologies (ICT):

"The idea of placing ICT devices “under our skin” in order not just to repair but even to enhance human capabilities gives rise to science fiction visions with threat and/or benefit characteristics. However, in some cases, the implantation of microchips with the potential for individual and social forms of control is already taking place.

The intimate relation between bodily and psychic functions is basic to our personal identity. Neurosciences are developing very quickly. The brain implants developed to alleviate tremors in Parkinson’s disease are only one example. They show that ICT implants may influence the nervous system and particularly the brain and thus human identity as a species as well as individual subjectivity and autonomy.

These are the essential reasons why ICT implants in the human body have large and important ethical consequences. Not surprisingly, the respect for human dignity has been the fundamental basis of EGE discussions of where the limits should be drawn for different applications of ICT implants."