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NIck Bostrom on the Status Quo Bias

Philosophy Bites

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The Evolutionary Argument Against Cognitive Enhancement

In the case of cognitive enhancement, it seems that this argument from transition cost is implausible. For a start, the transition cost would be a one-off price we would pay and then we couldn't doy the benefits for an indefinite period of time after. Smart kids sometimes are born into downward families, and although that might cause problems in some cases, it's notSomething that would make us think that on balance it would have been better if all these kids had just been dumber. These would be costs to be paid, but they seem utterly trivial in comparison to the benefits. I mean, schoolbooks are constantly rewritten for all kinds of trivial reasons. So much for the evolutionary argument

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