Saying so can make it so, J. L. Austin taught us long ago. Famously, John Searle has developed this Austinian insight in an account of the construction of institutional reality. Searle maintains that so-called Status Function Declarations, allegedly having a “double direction of fit”, synchronically create worldly institutional facts, corresponding to the propositional content of the declarations. I argue that Searle’s account of the making of institutional reality is in tension with the special theory of relativity—irrespective of whether the account (...) is interpreted as involving causal generation or non-causal grounding of worldly institutional facts—and should be replaced by a more modest theory which interprets the results of Status Function Declarations in terms of mere Cambridge change and institutional truth. I end the paper by indicating the import of this more modest theory for theorizing about the causal potency of institutional phenomena generated by declarations. (shrink)

Schon ein oberflächlicher Blick in die Tagespresse, in Printmedien und einschlägige Webressourcen zeigt, dass in vielen Industrieländern medizinethische Fragen zunehmend auf der Tagesordnung stehen. Auch ethische Expertise in Klinik, Lehre und Forschung hat mittlerweile ihren festen Stellenwert, ist etabliert, in zahlreichen Formen institutionalisiert und Teil eines ?bioethics biz?. Die Verbreitung von Medizinethik zeigt sich in vier Dimensionen: in der klinischen Praxis (Ethikberatung, Ethikkomitees, Ethik-Konsiliardienste, ethische Fallbesprechungen etc.), in der Lehre (im Medizinstudium und in vielen anderen gesundheitsbezogenen Ausbildungsgängen), in der Wissenschaft (...) (medizinethische Forschung, nationale und internationale Förderprogramme, medizinethische Institute und Forschungszentren) und in der Gesellschaft (Ethikkommissionen zu Humanforschung und für die Beratung von Politik und Öffentlichkeit). (shrink)

Over the last few decades, philosophers and social scientists have applied the so-called powers ontology to the social domain. I argue that this application is highly problematic: many of the alleged powers in the social realm violate the intrinsicality condition, and those that can be coherently taken to be intrinsic to their bearers are arguably causally redundant. I end the paper by offering a diagnosis of why philosophers and social scientists have been tempted to think that there are powers in (...) social realm. (shrink)

Many powers metaphysicians postulate both active and passive powers, understood as distinct kinds of intrinsic causal properties of objects. I argue that the category of passive power is superfluous. I also offer a diagnosis of how philosophers are misled to postulate passive powers.

Excellence and frontier research have made inroads into European research policymaking and structure political agendas, funding programs and evaluation practices. The two concepts travelled a long way from the United States and have derived from contexts outside of science. Following their conceptual journey, we ask how excellence and frontier research have percolated into European science and higher education policies and how they have turned into lubricants of competition that buttress an ongoing reform process in Europe.

A behavioral drive directed solely at minimizing prediction error would cause an agent to seek out states of unchanging, and thus easily predictable, sensory inputs (such as a dark room). The default to an evolutionarily encoded prior to avoid such untenable behaviors is unsatisfying. We suggest an alternate information theoretic interpretation to address this dilemma.

ProblemThe question of what factors drive the effectiveness of ethics teaching in medicine has remained largely unanswered in German-speaking countries. Due to the lack of scientifically sound evaluation studies, it is sometimes only possible to assume how effective certain teaching formats and methods actually are in ethics courses. The selection of teaching formats and methods that ethics lecturers use to achieve a specified learning objective is often not made according to evidence-based criteria, but on the basis of positive or negative (...) teaching experiences and direct feedback from students.Methods and argumentsIn this article, after a brief overview of evaluation procedures of ethical competences, findings from selected international effectiveness studies are presented and discussed in terms of their relevance for teaching medical ethics.Results and conclusionAlthough the findings from these evaluation and meta-studies come from other, related fields such as research ethics and other teaching contexts, they can serve as an impetus for discussion and contribute to defining cornerstones in order to design effective ways to teach ethics in medicine in the German-speaking countries. (shrink)

In Fig. 2 of the aforementioned article the mean value of the “chair” condition is incorrectly displayed as 0.011 when it should be 0.008. All statistics in the text are correct, and the conclusions remain the same.

Der Körper hat Konjunktur. Als ausgestellter, verfüg- und verführbarer begegnet er uns täglichim Übermaß. Es war nur eine Frage der Zeit, bis im Spiel der sich in den Wissenschafteneinander ablösenden turns auch ein corporeal (oder body) turn ausgerufen würde. Dabeibleibt im genannten turn der Gegenstand der Untersuchung nicht selten reduziert auf das, wasman im deutschen Sprachgebrauch »Körper« nennt: ein physisches Substrat, das wie ein Dingunter Dingen beschreibbar ist. Gegen diese Verkürzung stellt der Begri des »Leibes«,spätestens seit Edmund Husserl, eine präzise (...) theoretische Intervention in die wissenschaftlicheund philosophische Diskussion um Körper und Körperlichkeit dar: Dem objektiv beobachtbaren Körper, den wir haben, wird der lebendige Leib, der wir sind, gegenübergestellt. Diesem »Leib«, seiner Geschichte, seinen Varianten und seinem Versprechen gehen dieAutoren der vorliegenden Beiträge nach. Inhaltsübersicht Emmanuel Alloa/Thomas Bedorf/Christian Grüny/Tobias Nikolaus Klass: Einleitung I. Der Leibbegriff in der Phänomenologie Emmanuel Alloa / Natalie Depraz: Edmund Husserl – „Ein merkwürdig unvollkommenkonstituiertes Ding“ – Stefan Kristensen: Maurice Merleau-Ponty I – Körperschema undleibliche Subjektivität – Emmanuel Alloa: Maurice Merleau-Ponty II – Fleisch und Dierenz – David Espinet: Martin Heidegger – Der leibliche Sinn von Sein – Thomas Bedorf: EmmanuelLevinas – Der Leib des Anderen – Karel Novotný: Körper, Leib, Aektivität in Jan Pato č kasPhänomenologie der natürlichen Welt – Julia Scheidegger: Michel Henry – TranszendentaleLeiblichkeit – Jörg Sternagel: Bernhard Waldenfels – Responsivität des Leibes – Kerstin Andermann: Hermann Schmitz – Leiblichkeit als kommunikatives Selbst- und Weltverhältnis II. Zur Geschichte des Leibbegris Emmanuel Alloa: Archaische Leiblichkeit. Die griechische Antike und die Entdeckung desKörpers – Theresia Heimerl: Der Leib Christi und der Körper des Christen: Körper und Leib alszentrale Problemzonen des Christentums – Marc Rölli: Philosophische Anthropologie im 19. Jahrhundert – Zwischen Leib und Körper – Tobias Nikolaus Klass: Friedrich Nietzsche – Denkenam „Leitfaden des Leibes“ – Andreas Cremonini: Sigmund Freud – Der gelebte vs. derphantasmatische Leib – Uta Noppeney: Kurt Goldstein und Frederik Buytendijk – Der Leib-Begri in der organismischen Biologie – Volker Schürmann: Max Scheler und Helmuth Plessner– Leiblichkeit in der Philosophischen Anthropologie – Marion Lauschke: Ernst Cassirer und AbyWarburg – Kulturanthropologie III. Grenzen und Kritik des Leibbegris Christian Grüny: Theodor W. Adorno – Soma und Sensorium – Ulrich Johannes Schneider: Michel Foucault – Der Körper und die Körper – Burkhard Liebsch: Paul Ricoeur – Das leiblicheSelbst begegnet dem Widerstand des Anderen – Mirjam Schaub: Gilles Deleuze – Was weiß ein„Körper ohne Organe“ vom Leib? – Kathrin Busch: Jean-Luc Nancy – Exposition und Berührung– Shaun Gallagher: Embodiment: Leiblichkeit in den Kognitionswissenschaften – Marie-Luise Angerer: Gender und Performance – Ist leibliche Identität ein Konstrukt? – Thomas Bedorf/Selin Gerlek: Praxistheorien – Leibkörperliche Praktiken im Vollzug. (shrink)

Recent studies have shown that population-level time perspectives can be approximated using “big data” on search engine queries, and that these indices, in turn, predict the per-capita Gross Domestic Product of countries. Although these findings seem to support Baumard's suggestion that affluence makes people more future-oriented, they also reveal a more complex relationship between time perspectives and economic outputs.

There is increasing evidence for epigenetically mediated transgenerational inheritance across taxa. However, the evolutionary implications of such alternative mechanisms of inheritance remain unclear. Herein, we show that epigenetic mechanisms can serve two fundamentally different functions in transgenerational inheritance: (i) selection-based effects, which carry adaptive information in virtue of selection over many generations of reliable transmission; and (ii) detection-based effects, which are a transgenerational form of adaptive phenotypic plasticity. The two functions interact differently with a third form of epigenetic information transmission, (...) namely information about cell state transmitted for somatic cell heredity in multicellular organisms. Selection-based epigenetic information is more likely to conflict with somatic cell inheritance than is detection-based epigenetic information. Consequently, the evolutionary implications of epigenetic mechanisms are different for unicellular and multicellular organisms, which underscores the conceptual and empirical importance of distinguishing between these two different forms of transgenerational epigenetic effect. (shrink)

This book is in honour of Professor Anna-Sofia Maurin on her 50th birthday. It consists of eighteen essays on metaphysical issues written by Swedish and international scholars.

BackgroundResponsive neurostimulation has been utilized as a treatment for intractable epilepsy. The RNS System delivers stimulation in response to detected abnormal activity, via leads covering the seizure foci, in response to detections of predefined epileptiform activity with the goal of decreasing seizure frequency and severity. While thalamic leads are often implanted in combination with cortical strip leads, implantation and stimulation with bilateral thalamic leads alone is less common, and the ability to detect electrographic seizures using RNS System thalamic leads is (...) uncertain.ObjectiveThe present study retrospectively evaluated fourteen patients with RNS System depth leads implanted in the thalamus, with or without concomitant implantation of cortical strip leads, to determine the ability to detect electrographic seizures in the thalamus. Detailed patient presentations and lead trajectories were reviewed alongside electroencephalographic analyses.ResultsAnterior nucleus thalamic leads, whether bilateral or unilateral and combined with a cortical strip lead, successfully detected and terminated epileptiform activity, as demonstrated by Cases 2 and 3. Similarly, bilateral centromedian thalamic leads or a combination of one centromedian thalamic alongside a cortical strip lead also demonstrated the ability to detect electrographic seizures as seen in Cases 6 and 9. Bilateral pulvinar leads likewise produced reliable seizure detection in Patient 14. Detections of electrographic seizures in thalamic nuclei did not appear to be affected by whether the patient was pediatric or adult at the time of RNS System implantation. Sole thalamic leads paralleled the combination of thalamic and cortical strip leads in terms of preventing the propagation of electrographic seizures.ConclusionThalamic nuclei present a promising target for detection and stimulation via the RNS System for seizures with multifocal or generalized onsets. These areas provide a modifiable, reversible therapeutic option for patients who are not candidates for surgical resection or ablation. (shrink)

We use Marya Schechtman’s Narrative Self-Constitution View to support the widespread idea that food can contribute to the construction and expression of our identities and be used to understand others. What foods we consume can be one such way to construct our identities as food itself can have different values: ethically sourced, healthy, culturally significant, etc. However, the ability to constitute one’s own identity in this way depends on the ability to autonomously choose what we consume. We argue that most (...) consumers have much less control over their own consumption habits than is typically assumed (indeed, much of the literature on food and identity relies on the assumption) and thus consumers have diminished autonomy with respect to identity-constitution. We focus on the effects of three such autonomy compromising practices: food impositions, which are social pressures on food choice; manipulative marketing; and impediments to access. Together these practices diminish second-order endorsement of food-related values, generate false beliefs about what one is eating, and create social, economic, or physical barriers which limit access to desired foods. There are, however, spaces where consumers are fighting back against cultural norms and agribusiness and changing their own relationship(s) with consumption, thereby exercising increased autonomy over their food and their identity. (shrink)

The book (in German) on “Solar Energy – challenge for research, development and international co-operation” is the report of a study group of the Akademie der Wissenschaften zu Berlin. It reviews solar thermal, photovoltaic, and bio mimetic solar energy techniques; prospects of de-central techniques in developing countries; transport and storage of solar energy; and chances for cooperation with Arabic countries and countries of the South of the former Soviet Union. The prospect of large scale energy production in arid areas, and (...) the modern potentials of conducting electricity over long distances by high-voltage DC transmission (V, 2.1) are particularly relevant for the concluding section. Political chances as well as risks were considered for reliable long term cooperation with various Arab countries on these issues. The recommendations appear to be still appropriate 25 years after the book was published, particularly the political advice in favour of cooperation between Europe and suitable countries of the Maghreb. The global time scale of implementation (discussed in chapter I, 7.2) is of the same (high) magnitude as that of other major changes in the history of technology, such as the substitution of sailing ships by steamboats which took almost a century. (shrink)

Depression is a highly recurrent disorder with limited treatment alternatives for reducing risk of subsequent episodes. Acceptance and commitment therapy (ACT) and attention bias modification (ABM) separately have shown some promise in reducing depressive symptoms. This study investigates (a) if group-based ACT had a greater impact in reducing residual symptoms of depression over a 12-month follow-up than a control condition, and (b) if preceding ACT with ABM produced added benefits. This multisite study consisted of two phases. In phase 1, participants (...) with a history of depression, currently in remission (N= 244), were randomized to either receive 14 days of ABM or a control condition. In phase 2, a quasi- experimental design was adopted, and only phase-1 participants from the Sørlandet site (N= 124) next received an 8-week group-based ACT intervention. Self-reported and clinician-rated depression symptoms were assessed at baseline, immediately after phase 1 and at 1, 2, 6, and 12 months after the conclusion of phase 1. At 12-month follow-up, participants who received ACT exhibited fewer self-reported and clinician-rated depressive symptoms. There were no significant differences between ACT groups preceded by ABM or a control condition. There were no significant differences between ACT groups preceded by ABM or a control condition. Group-based ACT successfully decreased residual symptoms in depression over 12 months, suggesting some promise in preventing relapse. (shrink)

This study investigates experimentally whether people in retrospective are self-aware that they engage in status-seeking behavior. Subjects participated in a real-effort task where effort translated into a donation to a charity. Within-subjects we varied the visibility of their performance (private/public feedback). On average, subjects exerted more effort in the public treatment. After the real-effort task, subjects were asked to state their retrospective beliefs about their performance in public given feedback about their performance in private, and about the performance of other (...) subjects in public given the average performance in private. Between-subjects, we varied the compensation that participants would receive for providing accurate performance estimates. Our results show a lack of self-awareness about status-seeking behavior that is robust to increased belief compensation. We also found that subjects expected others to be as status-seeking as they are themselves or even less. (shrink)

This volume includes 22 articles that provide an introduction to fundamental issues in the theory of fiction. It covers the most influential approaches used to demarcate the boundary between fictional and non-fictional media based on pragmatic, receptive, and contextual theories. The handbook explores core philosophical and psychological questions about the functions and the institutional history of fictionality since ancient times.

There is the widely held view that quantum physics differs fundamentally from classical physics regarding measurements. In order to prepare the ground for settling this question we discuss the consequences it has for classical physics if one includes measurement in the theory. After explaining the terms measurement and error it is argued that every measurement can be reduced to a measurement of length and/or number. Additionally to the wellknown statistical and systematical errors we introduce the concept of classical uncertainty which (...) states that every measurement of a physical quantity _A_ carries a finite inaccuracy Δ_A_. Hence it is transempirical to assign an infinite decimal number to a measurement. This implies that, also in classical physics, only probabilistic predictions are possible and that we need ensembles for the empirical testing of theoretical predictions. Furthermore we rebut the claim that in classical physics measurements can be performed without any disturbance of the system under investigation. Finally we state that by including measurements in the theory itself classical physics like quantum physics can be formulated as an indeterministic theory. Likewise both theories can be formulated deterministically if measurements are excluded from the theory. _German_ Gemäß einer weit verbreiteten Sichtweise gibt es hinsichtlich der Messung in der Quantenphysik und in der klassischen Physik einen grundlegenden Unterschied. Um einer Klärung dieser Frage den Boden zu bereiten, versuchen wir für die klassische Physik die Folgen zu diskutieren, die sich ergeben, wenn man die Messung in die Theorie mit einbezieht. Zunächst wird dafür argumentiert, dass jede Messung auf eine Längenbzw. Zählmessung zurückzuführen ist. Wir führen zusätzlich zu den bekannten Arten von Messfehlern – statistischen und systematischen Fehlern – das Konzept der klassischen Messunschärfe ein, das abbildet, dass jede Messung einer Messgröße _A_ mit einer endlichen Ungenauigkeit Δ_A_ behaftet sein muss. Dies bedeutet insbesondere, dass die Angabe von nichtendlichen Dezimalzahlen für Messwerte transempirisch ist. Die Betrachtung der Messfehler führt zu der Folgerung, dass auch in der klassischen Physik nur mehr Wahrscheinlichkeitsaussagen getroffen werden können und Messungen an Ensembles zur empirischen Bestätigung theoretischer Vorhersagen nötig sind. Außerdem wird die Behauptung entkräftet, in der klassischen Physik seien im Prinzip Messungen möglich, die den Zustand eines Systems nicht stören. Abschließend stellen wir heraus, dass durch Einbeziehung der Messung in die Theorie die klassische Physik wie die Quantenphysik als indeterministischen Theorie formuliert werden kann, ebenso wie beide ohne Einbeziehung der Messung deterministisch formuliert werden können. (shrink)

Background Palliative care is an integral part of health care, which in term has become increasingly technologized in recent decades. Lately, innovative smart sensors combined with artificial intelligence promise better diagnosis and treatment. But to date, it is unclear: how are palliative care concepts and their underlying assumptions about humans challenged by smart sensor technologies (SST) and how can care benefit from SST? -/- Aims The paper aims to identify changes and challenges in palliative care due to the use of (...) SST. In addition, normative guiding criteria for the use of SST are developed. -/- Methods The principle of Total Care used by the European Association for Palliative Care (EAPC) forms the basis for the ethical analysis. Drawing on this, its underlying conceptions of the human and its socio-ethical aspects are examined with a phenomenological focus. In the second step, the advantages, limitations, and socio-ethical challenges of using SST with respect to the Total Care principle are explored. Finally, ethical-normative requirements for the application of SST are derived. -/- Results and Conclusion First, SST are limited in their measurement capabilities. Second, SST have an impact on human agency and autonomy. This concerns both the patient and the caregiver. Third, some aspects of the Total Care principle are likely to be marginalized due to the use of SST. The paper formulates normative requirements for using SST to serve human flourishing. It unfolds three criteria according to which SST must be aligned: (1) evidence and purposefulness, (2) autonomy, and (3) Total Care. (shrink)

While many studies from analytical sociology apply agent-based modeling to analyze the transformational mechanisms linking the micro to the macro level, we hold the view that both situational and action formation mechanisms can rather be unveiled by means of more advanced quantitative methods. By focusing on selective exposure to quality newspapers, our study has both an analytical and a substantive aim. First., our analytical aim is to amend the psychological mechanism of avoiding cognitive dissonance by social mechanisms allowing postulates on (...) how the selective exposure effect might vary by particular social groups. Second, our substantive aim is to set the ground for a longitudinal analysis of selective exposure to quality papers by placing these social mechanisms in the context of social and cultural change. By referring to hypothetical data, we illustrate which kind of (multilevel) moderator effects would have to hold if our hypotheses were true. (shrink)

Wie lässt sich der Bereich des Privaten heute genau beschreiben? Welchen Wert besitzt Privatheit in digitalisierten Gesellschaften für den Einzelnen und die Gesellschaft als Ganzes? Welche Werte und Lebensformen werden durch Privatheit geschützt, welche eingeschränkt? Entstehen durch die Informationsasymmetrie zwischen Technologieunternehmen, staatlichen Verdatungsinstitutionen und Verbrauchern/Bürgern möglicherweise neue Machtstrukturen? Welche rechtlichen Implikationen ergeben sich hieraus? Dieser Band geht diesen und anderen Fragen, die sich im Hinblick auf die etablierte Gleichung von Freiheit und Privatheit stellen, nach und versucht Antworten zu finden.

Study 1 examined how personality and attitudes are related to daily pro-environmental behavior and whether these relationships are moderated by perceived behavioral costs and benefits. One hundred and seventy-eight participants responded to scales measuring the dark and light side of personality, as well as their pro-environmental attitude. Afterward, they were notified three times a day for 7 days in a row. Each time they reported their PEB that had occurred in the past four hours and indicated their behavioral costs and (...) benefits. Multilevel analyses showed a positive relationship between the frequency of PEB and the light triad of personality and pro-environmental attitude, while the dark tetrad was negatively related to PEB. Unexpectedly, less environmentally aware participants reported to engage in PEB with higher costs and lower benefits than did pro-environmental participants. A second study suggests that less environmentally aware people do not actually engage in PEB with high costs and low benefits, but rather that they only perceive their behavior to be costly and of little benefit. Overall, our findings suggest that the way people perceive their daily PEB is not necessarily shared by others. (shrink)

The digital teaching of medieval, and especially auxiliary, scientific skills has been going on for more than a decade. Nevertheless, the breadth and depth of the auxiliary sciences is making them difficult to present in their entirety. With ‘Ad fontes’, basic knowledge of skills needed to study the Middle Ages is imparted through interactive exercises. The e-learning platform was completely revised in 2018, allowing new technical possibilities to be realised while maintaining the strengths of its intuitive exercises. Additionally, crowdsourcing enterprises (...) prove extremely valuable in the application of knowledge. After all, it is only possible to bring together knowledge of a particular field if collaborations are established across individual institutions and researchers. (shrink)

Humans often behave more prosocially when being observed in person and even in response to subtle eye cues, purportedly to manage their reputation. Previous research on this phenomenon has employed the “watching eyes paradigm,” in which adults displayed greater prosocial behavior in the presence of images of eyes versus inanimate objects. However, the robustness of the effect of eyes on prosocial behavior has recently been called into question. Therefore, the first goal of the present study was to attempt to replicate (...) this effect. Additionally, it remains unclear whether the watching-eyes effect is driven specifically by reputation management or whether any cues indexing human presence more generally also have a similar effect. To address these questions, the current study compared prosocial behavior in the presence of eyes versus inanimate objects as well as other human features. The study was conducted as a field experiment at a children’s museum. Each week, the donation signs were changed to show eyes, noses, mouths, or chairs. Total donation amount and number of patrons per week were recorded. Participants donated more when they were exposed to eyes than to inanimate objects. We thus replicated the previously reported watching-eyes effect. Moreover, more money was donated when individuals were exposed to eyes than to more general cues of human presence. The current findings suggest that eyes play a special role in promoting cooperation in humans, likely by serving as cues of monitoring and thus eliciting reputation management behavior. (shrink)

BackgroundBiobanking biospecimens and consent are common practice in paediatric research. We need to explore children and young people’s (CYP) knowledge and perspectives around the use of and consent to biobanking. This will ensure meaningful informed consent can be obtained and improve current consent procedures.MethodsWe designed a survey, in co-production with CYP, collecting demographic data, views on biobanking, and consent using three scenarios: 1) prospective consent, 2) deferred consent, and 3) reconsent and assent at age of capacity. The survey was disseminated (...) via the Young Person’s Advisory Group North England (YPAGne) and participating CYP’s secondary schools. Data were analysed using a qualitative thematic approach by three independent reviewers (including CYP) to identify common themes. Data triangulation occurred independently by a fourth reviewer.ResultsOne hundred two CYP completed the survey. Most were between 16–18 years (63.7%, N = 65) and female (66.7%, N = 68). 72.3% had no prior knowledge of biobanking (N = 73).Acceptability of prospective consent for biobanking was high (91.2%, N = 93) with common themes: ‘altruism’, ‘potential benefits outweigh individual risk’, 'frugality', and ‘(in)convenience’.Deferred consent was also deemed acceptable in the large majority (84.3%, N = 86), with common themes: ‘altruism’, ‘body integrity’ and ‘sample frugality’. 76.5% preferred to reconsent when cognitively mature enough to give assent (N = 78), even if parental consent was previously in place. 79.2% wanted to be informed if their biobanked biospecimen is reused (N = 80).ConclusionProspective and deferred consent acceptability for biobanking is high among CYP in the UK. Altruism, frugality, body integrity, and privacy are the most important themes. Clear communication and justification are paramount to obtain consent. Any CYP with capacity should be part of the consenting procedure, if possible. (shrink)

The ethics of human enhancement has been a hotly debated topic in the last 15 years. In this debate, some advocate examining science fiction stories to elucidate the ethical issues regarding the current phenomenon of human enhancement. Stories from science fiction seem well suited to analyze biomedical advances, providing some possible case studies. Of particular interest is the work of screenwriter Andrew Niccol (Gattaca, S1m0ne, In Time, and Good Kill), which often focuses on ethical questions raised by the use of (...) new technologies. Examining the movie In Time (2011), the aim of this paper is to show how science fiction can contribute to the ethical debate of human enhancement. In Time provides an interesting case study to explore what could be some of the consequences of radical life-extension technologies. In this paper, we will show how arguments regarding radical life-extension portrayed in this particular movie differ from what is found in the scientific literature. We will see how In Time gives flesh to arguments defending or rejecting radical life-extension. It articulates feelings of unease, alienation and boredom associated with this possibility. Finally, this article will conclude that science fiction movies in general, and In Time in particular, are a valuable resource for a broad and comprehensive debate about our coming future. (shrink)