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A Case for Legalizing Enhanced Humans
We are already seeing "doping" scandals emerge right before the Olympics, with suddenly announced retirements and so on. But in the grand scheme of things, where's the beef? According to this article, a lot of "regular" people right now might possibly fail to qualify for the Olympics because of drugs in their system, even caffeine at too high of levels. So should they get stricter about it, or just admit reality that the biochemical and surgical tech and science is getting good enough now that enhanced humans will be breaking records far into the future if it is allowed?
We fully expect all these same advances to be taken advantage of in the normal non competing public, so where is the problem again, and where can you honestly draw a line over what is "natural" or not? If a ligament is repaired surgically, is it still natural, compared to a ligament rearranged for more efficiency? It's artificial surgery on a piece of the body, there is no real difference when you look at it that way, so how far should we go in advancing this or restricting it? Aren't athletes supposed to have the same rights as non athletes?
The way technology is being integrated into athletics lags behind the way the rest of society treats new discoveries, in part because the sports world's policies on enhancement are still committed to the venerable ideal of all-natural human performance. But this notion is a charade: Athletes are already highly dependent on all manner of technology, including aerodynamic uniforms and carefully calibrated nutrition supplements.
ed.z.: Very good points, especially the charade part, both with chemical and surgical enhancements and the old amateur versus professional status, which was blown long ago despite vigorous denials (college team sports are amateur, what a complete giggle that has been for years).
They say they have to restrict this or that to "protect" the athlete and keep the sport pure...well..uhh...it's not illegal to jump off of ski jumps or go extreme rock climbing or cave diving or 200 MPH motorsports racing or any other fairly dangerous and exacting sport in the first place, so where can you put a "too dangerous" threshold? Just running a marathon in 90 degree summer heat is freaking dangerous to start with, why is it legal again if they want to protect people? If people really want to push their personal limits, well, ain't it their body, especially once they have hit adult legal status and are allowed to make all their own decisions without the state or some "governing body" stepping in? If a sport is dangerous enough that even a "normal" non enhanced participant can get seriously hurt, like what happens all the time, hurt enough to require medical care including surgery and drugs and long recovery times and so on, doesn't this blow the "natural and protecting" part in the first place? They sure weren't protected enough and they sure required an enhancement to keep functioning! So, after the fact is OK, it is "safe and natural" versus before the fact which is "forbidden", and that's the ethical big dividing line? Isn't that like buckling your seatbelt after a crash?