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CHAPTER 6: Narrative identity
6.1.
Introduction
One of the objections raised against enhancement technologies is that they might
change ‘who we are’. This worry might be explicated within the context of
authenticity and identity – this chapter focuses on examining the latter. While there
is a rich philosophical literature related to identity, the current bioethical debate
largely draws on the analytic philosophy tradition, which focused on the question of
numerical identity.
Following other scholars such as Schechtman (1996, 2009), DeGrazia (2005)
introduces a distinction between numerical and narrative identity. According to
him, while numerical identity refers to the criteria that determine whether a being at
one time and a being at another time are, despite change, one and the same being,
narrative identity relates to the question of what is most central and salient in a
given person’s self-conception. In his 2005 paper on enhancement and identity,
DeGrazia argues that much of the worry about creating a ‘new person’ may derive
from conflating the two senses of identity: ‘If taking an SSRI changes your
personality in important ways,
you
will change; it’s not the case that you would
literally be destroyed and replaced with another person, as would occur if numerical
identity were disrupted’ (DeGrazia, 2005, p. 269).
While DeGrazia’s appraisal of the bioethical debate as often conflating the two
senses of identity is convincing, he uses a very wide notion of ‘narrative identity’.
He goes on to examine the ‘narrative identity’ arguments against enhancement with
only a sparse and token reference to relevant theories of narrative identity. This is
not unusual; with the exception of a handful of papers (e.g. Schechtman 2009,
Baylis 2013), the narrative identity approach has been mentioned but not fully
integrated into the bioethical debate about enhancement. The situation might be
characterised as not even ‘talking past each other’ but rather ‘talking in one’s own
corner.’ This chapter aims to address this disconnection.
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Narrative accounts of identity suggest that the sense of who we are is created via
autobiographical self-narratives, which are seen as a means to give meaning to
events, behaviours, desires, intentions, etc. in the context of one’s life. One
objection that can be raised against the ethical permissibility of MB is that such
changes cannot be incorporated into a self-constituting narrative and, thus, that MB
threatens to undermine narrative identity. I will argue that the objection is weak.
The chapter proceeds in three steps.
First, I examine the argument brought forward by Martya Schachtman’s (2009)
who outlines the possible issues related to narrative identity raised by DBS and
assess whether such arguments can provide a basis for a moral argument against the
permissibility of DBS generally and MB via direct emotion modulation
specifically. After briefly outlining relevant features of Schechtman’s narrative
identity account, I draw paralells between DBS as discussed in Schechtman’s 2009
paper and MB. I argue that Schechtman’s (2009) argument fails to ground an
ethical objection to DBS on her own account because the
articulation constraint
could be satisfied in cases of emotion modulation via DBS. Moreover, it is unclear
that biomedically undermined identity-narratives would be irreparable. In the
second part of the section, I examine the empathetic access condition for self
narratives and argue that it should be rejected as too demanding, given that it
unjustifiably focuses on one backwards-looking attitude.
Second, I describe and evaluate Paul Ricoeur’s account of narrative identity and
argue that his theory provides overly stringent criteria for narrative identity.
Moreover, the example of Ricoeur’s theory is illustrative of the problem with
applying narrative identity approaches to evaluate the moral permissibility of
biomedical interventions.
Third, I argue against the strong ethical narrative thesis, according to which a
consistent narrative is necessary for, or highly conducive to, a full and flourishing
life. I argue that although narrative identity might be an interesting and fruitful way
of looking at personal identity, we should accept that it is not necessary for a full
and flourishing life. I conclude that although narrative identity theories can provide
an interesting insight into potential issues raised by direct emotion modulation and
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MB, such theories fail to provide a strong basis for a robust ethical objection to
biomedically modifying our moral sphere.
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