Ethical issues in moral and social enhancement

7.5.6. Conclusions 
On the basis of the Rational Persuader Machine scenario and Hall’s Brain Implant 
case I have argued that the main problem with the God Machine lies not in the fact 
that the agent lacks meaningful alternative event-universals (overt actions) but 
rather the lack of the appropriate engagement or control over the influence. Further, 
taking into consideration the relevant distinction between events-universals and 
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Another argument can be that the value of a good state of mind comes from the fact that 
although different intentions may not make a difference in that particular instance but they 
may impact behaviour in other instances. Here I wish to argue for a stronger position: that 
the difference in the agent is a morally relevant difference in the world 
regardless
of 
impacts in other instances.

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event-particulars, I have proposed that overdetermination cases preserve ‘the ability 
to do otherwise’ to a sufficient degree to ground moral responsibility. Finally, I 
have argued that freedom of choice even in the absence of a change in subsequent 
event-universals makes a morally important difference.
The decoupling of thought and action is not the only problem with the God 
Machine. What is also problematic about the God Machine is the conjoined 
diminishment of freedom of thought – even though the agent acts on his free will, it 
is not free will of his own – and the fact that its influence does not even give the 
agent a chance to engage with that influence. In my view, those considerations 
mark a significant difference between the God Machine and imprisonment and 
propaganda, and the God Machine is much more problematic by comparison. As 
Harris pointed out in 
How Narrow the Straight
, ‘… this is a different level of 
unfreedom. As with all actions, when we are free, we are only free to do as we like 
and take the consequences’ (2014a, p. 254).
I am not trying to suggest that freedom of action does not matter at all or that 
freedom of thought is all that matters. As Harris (2014a) argues, the freedom to act 
and to make a difference in the world is important for political freedom, self-
governance and responsibility understood as accountability for how our actions 
shape ourselves and the world. I rather want to outline what I consider to be the best 
interpretation of the God Machine’s influence, an interpretation that elucidates the 
reasons why the God Machine is 
especially
problematic for freedom – significantly 
more so than living under the rule of law and perhaps even more so than in a 
despotic regime that minds its own business with regards to the mind.