scholarly journals The Case Against Cognitive Enhancement: Responding to the Reversal Test

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
◽  
Alice Monro
Keyword(s):  
Cognitive Biases ◽  
Cognitive Enhancement ◽  
Burden Of Proof ◽  
Status Quo ◽  
Cognitive Capacity ◽  
Status Quo Bias ◽  
Unequal Distribution ◽  
The Status ◽  
The Individual ◽  
Reversal Test

<p>In this thesis I argue against the use of genetic technologies to enhance human cognitive capacities. More specifically, I respond to Nick Bostrom and Toby Ord's "Reversal Test", which they use to argue in favour of genetic cognitive enhancement. The Reversal Test is a burden of proof challenge designed to diagnose status quo bias in arguments against enhancement. By noting that most of those who oppose raisingintelligence would also oppose lowering intelligence, the Reversal Test puts the onuson opponents of enhancement to explain why both increases and decreases in our cognitive capacity would be worse than the status quo (our current level of intelligence). Bostrom and Ord claim that if no good reasons can be provided, this indicates that the opposition to enhancement is influenced by status quo bias. Since cognitive biases cannot provide a moral reason against enhancement, opposition to genetic cognitive enhancement shown to be affected by status quo bias canaccordingly be discounted. The aim of my thesis, then, is to overcome the Reversal Test' s burden of proof challenge by showing that my reasons for opposing cognitive enhancement are notinfluenced by status quo bias. However, I do not argue that enhanced intelligence could not be beneficial to the individual. Instead, I claim that the probable unequal distribution of enhancements between the best- and worst-off would be likely to cause serious injustices to those who are unable to afford them.</p>

scholarly journals The Case Against Cognitive Enhancement: Responding to the Reversal Test

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
◽  
Alice Monro
Keyword(s):  
Cognitive Biases ◽  
Cognitive Enhancement ◽  
Burden Of Proof ◽  
Status Quo ◽  
Cognitive Capacity ◽  
Status Quo Bias ◽  
Unequal Distribution ◽  
The Status ◽  
The Individual ◽  
Reversal Test

<p>In this thesis I argue against the use of genetic technologies to enhance human cognitive capacities. More specifically, I respond to Nick Bostrom and Toby Ord's "Reversal Test", which they use to argue in favour of genetic cognitive enhancement. The Reversal Test is a burden of proof challenge designed to diagnose status quo bias in arguments against enhancement. By noting that most of those who oppose raisingintelligence would also oppose lowering intelligence, the Reversal Test puts the onuson opponents of enhancement to explain why both increases and decreases in our cognitive capacity would be worse than the status quo (our current level of intelligence). Bostrom and Ord claim that if no good reasons can be provided, this indicates that the opposition to enhancement is influenced by status quo bias. Since cognitive biases cannot provide a moral reason against enhancement, opposition to genetic cognitive enhancement shown to be affected by status quo bias canaccordingly be discounted. The aim of my thesis, then, is to overcome the Reversal Test' s burden of proof challenge by showing that my reasons for opposing cognitive enhancement are notinfluenced by status quo bias. However, I do not argue that enhanced intelligence could not be beneficial to the individual. Instead, I claim that the probable unequal distribution of enhancements between the best- and worst-off would be likely to cause serious injustices to those who are unable to afford them.</p>

scholarly journals The reversal test, status quo bias, and opposition to human cognitive enhancement

2016 ◽  
Vol 46 (3) ◽  
pp. 369-386 ◽  
Author(s):  
Steve Clarke
Keyword(s):  
Cognitive Enhancement ◽  
Burden Of Proof ◽  
Status Quo ◽  
Status Quo Bias ◽  
Reversal Test

AbstractBostrom and Ord’s reversal test has been appealed to by many philosophers to substantiate the charge that preferences for status quo options are motivated by status quo bias. I argue that their characterization of the reversal test needs to be modified, and that their description of the burden of proof it imposes needs to be clarified. I then argue that there is a way to meet that burden of proof which Bostrom and Ord fail to recognize. I also argue that the range of circumstances in which the reversal test can be usefully applied is narrower than they recognize.

scholarly journals Cognitive Bias in Emissions Trading

2019 ◽  
Vol 11 (5) ◽  
pp. 1365 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jae-Do Song ◽  
Young-Hwan Ahn
Keyword(s):  
Cognitive Bias ◽  
Emissions Trading ◽  
Cognitive Biases ◽  
Status Quo ◽  
Endowment Effect ◽  
Status Quo Bias ◽  
Cap And Trade ◽  
Significant Difference ◽  
The Status

This study investigates whether cognitive biases such as the endowment effect and status quo bias occur in emissions trading. Such cognitive biases can serve as a barrier to trade. This study’s survey-based experiments, which include hypothetical emissions trading scenarios, show that the endowment effect does occur in emissions trading. The status quo bias occurs in only one of the three experiments. This study also investigates whether accumulation of experience can reduce cognitive bias as discovered preference hypothesis expects. The results indicate that practitioners who are supposed to have more experience show no evidence of having less cognitive bias. Contrary to the conventional expectation, the practitioners show significantly higher level of endowment effect than students and only the practitioners show a significant status quo bias. A consignment auction situation, which is used in California’s cap-and-trade program, is also tested; no significant difference between general permission trading and consignment auctions is found.

scholarly journals I Have, Therefore I Love: Status Quo Preference in Mate Choice

2017 ◽  
Vol 44 (4) ◽  
pp. 589-600 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gul Gunaydin ◽  
Emre Selcuk ◽  
Cansu Yilmaz ◽  
Cindy Hazan
Keyword(s):  
Mate Choice ◽  
Status Quo ◽  
Endowment Effect ◽  
Status Quo Bias ◽  
Total N ◽  
Trade Offs ◽  
Current Partner ◽  
The Status ◽  
The Individual ◽  
A Current

Decades of research indicate that individuals adhere to existing states (“status quo bias”) and value them more (“endowment effect”). The present work is the first to investigate status quo preference within the context of trade-offs in mate choice. Across seven studies (total N = 1,567), participants indicated whether they would prefer remaining with a current partner possessing a particular set of traits (e.g., high trustworthiness, low attractiveness) or switching to an alternative partner possessing opposite traits. Preference for a given trait was highest when the individual representing the status quo (one’s romantic partner or an interaction partner) possessed that trait. Concerns about hurting the partner, ambiguity avoidance, and biased construal of the partner and the alternative predicted status quo preference and disapproval of the current partner by network members eliminated this effect. These findings indicate that when it comes to matters of the heart, we tend to love what we currently have.

Numerical Information Format and Investment Decisions: Implications for the Disposition Effect and the Status Quo Bias

2005 ◽  
Vol 6 (1) ◽  
pp. 19-26 ◽  
Author(s):  
Enrico Rubaltelli ◽  
Sandro Rubichi ◽  
Lucia Savadori ◽  
Marcello Tedeschi ◽  
Riccardo Ferretti
Keyword(s):  
Investment Decisions ◽  
Status Quo ◽  
Disposition Effect ◽  
Status Quo Bias ◽  
Numerical Information ◽  
The Status ◽  
Information Format

scholarly journals Vocationalization of education in Kenya: the Classroom Practice and the Learners’ Responsibilities for Change in the 21st Century

2011 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 142
Author(s):  
Samson Ondigi ◽  
Henry Ayot ◽  
Kiio Mueni ◽  
Mary Nasibi
Keyword(s):  
Political Development ◽  
Classroom Practice ◽  
History Of Education ◽  
Status Quo ◽  
Knowledge And Skills ◽  
Successful Recovery ◽  
Common Practices ◽  
The Status ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Individual

Abstract The essence of education is to prepare an individual for lifelong experiences after schooling. Education as offered in schools today is expected to give the teacher a chance to impart knowledge and skills in the learner, and for the learner to be informed and be able to put into practice what has been gained in the course of time. The Kenyan curriculum and goals of education are clearly stipulated if followed to the latter. Basically, the classroom practice by both the teachers and the learners exhibit an academic rather than a dual system that is expected to meet the needs of both the individual and those of the communities which form subsets of the society at large. It is upon this premise that education of a given country must prepare its individuals in schools so as to meet the goals of education at any one given time of a country’s history. This paper looks at the perspective of vocationalization of education in Kenyan at this century. The history of education ever since independence in 1963 by focusing on the Ominde commission through the Koech report of 1999 have been emphatic that education must meet the national goals of education as stipulated in the curriculum. But what is edging the practice that has not revolutionalized the socio-economic, cultural and political development of Kenya? Differentiated Instruction is a teaching theory based on the premise that instructional approaches should vary and be adapted in relation to individual and diverse students in classroom aimed at achieving diversified learning and common practices in the career. The challenges herein are: where have we gone wrong as a nation, what is the practice in the classroom, when can the nation be out of this dilemma, who is to blame for the status quo and finally what is the way forward? By addressing these questions, the education system will be responsive to the changes in time and Kenya will be on the path to successful recovery.

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