Boosting the performance of the brain is an old dream which remains unfulfilled. Visions of radically improving the capabilities of the human brain and thereby transcending natural boundaries have informed science fiction stories as well as academic debates. At the same time, ever more elderly people suffer from mental decline, which raises the demand for new restorative drugs.
Many different approaches
Approaches to enhance its capabilities range from drugs to brain stimulation or brain-computer interfaces. Aside from therapeutic success with long-known drugs in ill people, almost no effects have been proven.
A question of fairness
To avoid abuse and to address both safety concerns and societal consequences, medical regulations are mandatory, following a fundamental rights approach to ensure that in the future users balance benefits and risks.
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