Scratch

if he's already mentally handicapped and he gets his intelligence tripled, doesn't that make him as smart as a regular person? or does it make him twice as smart as a regular man? it depends on how dumb he is i guess

The thing is that in the story the surgery is only temporary. Because of that I definitely don't think it's worth it?

It's a story so anything controversial is good. IQ (Intelligence quotient) scores are based on everyone who has done the same test. The mean is set at 100. Now doubling someone's intelligence score does not make their IQ score double (More on this later). Also as people are getting smarter it and it is becoming increasingly more difficult to obtain a high IQ than what it was in the past. IQ scores in my opinion are only valid at the time the score was determined. Say someone got an IQ score of 130 ten years ago, does it make the person smarter than someone who did the test today and scored 115? Well no. You can make your IQ whatever you want it to be by only taking test which less intelligent people have taken, effectively lowering the tests mean. That would also mean those who scored midrange on the test would actually have a much lower IQ score than others on a population test. Now to double your IQ would mean to double your tests score and the persons score would have to be less than 50%. But obtaining a score of 100% won’t guaranty a doubled IQ as it depends on what other people have scored on the test. An IQ of 130 (2 standard deviations) makes the person have a higher IQ than 97.5% of the population that did the test. I have to tell you that all IQ scores are not a true measurement of intelligence and scores less than 70 (dumber than 97.5% of the population tested) and greater than 130 can be quite inaccurate.

4Infinity wrote:

dear lord everybody stop getting so technical

the point of this is not to discuss how accurate the intelligence quotient is- its to discuss if it would be moral to triple your intelligence.

what-the wrote:

It's a story so anything controversial is good

Seriously to me "would be moral to triple your intelligence?" is like asking. "Is it ethical to have really smart people?" Go figure.

Tripling your intellegence for a temporary time:

Moral: Yes

Ethical: No.

4Infinity wrote:

ssss wrote:

Tripling your intellegence for a temporary time:

Moral: Yes

Ethical: No.

*facepalm

theyre the same thing

No they're not:
Moral: Concerned with the principles of right and wrong behavior and the goodness or badness of human character.

Ethical: relating to moral principles.

Is it moral to make yoursel smarter?  Of course!

But is it ethical?  Nope 

I have to ask this question but do you know what moral actually means? I would say yes make a moral and break the unwritten rules of ethics.

You want to know if it is ethically correct to surgically make someone smart. Well ethics is personal opinion shaped by those around you and what they think is right and wrong. I say, is it ethical to keep someone dumb if you can make them smart? Though this sentences outcome will depend entirely on education, government, powerful people and religion. Honestly I will not really answer an ethical question for you or anyone, it is up to them.

Last edited by what-the (2011-06-04 04:55:16)

what-the wrote:

I have to ask this question but do you know what moral actually means? I would say yes make a moral and break the unwritten rules of ethics.

You want to know if it is ethically correct to surgically make someone smart. Well ethics is personal opinion shaped by those around you and what they think is right and wrong. I say, is it ethical to keep someone dumb if you can make them smart? Though this sentences outcome will depend entirely on education, government, powerful people and religion. Honestly I will not really answer an ethical question for you or anyone, it is up to them.

thats an interesting point of view

i like your point- you have the reverse opinion of mine

Ace-Of-Hearts wrote:

In the story, does the guy use his (new) intelligence to try to cure cancer or something? If there was more information like this, it would be easier to categorize it as moral or immoral.

Idk we didn't get that far

assuming he did what would you think

Ace-Of-Hearts wrote:

4Infinity wrote:

Ace-Of-Hearts wrote:

In the story, does the guy use his (new) intelligence to try to cure cancer or something? If there was more information like this, it would be easier to categorize it as moral or immoral.

Idk we didn't get that far

assuming he did what would you think

Well if he uses it for righteous actions, I think it could be considered moral. It all depends on his actions and intentions.

At the climax he could go power hungry. Is it still moral to be the person who gave/suggested it if you did not know this would happen? In other words: just because he eventually goes bad, does it make it unethical to perform the surgery just because the person chose to go bad?

Last edited by soupoftomato (2011-06-04 18:37:11)