Neurotechnology, mental integrity and the extended mind

Neurotechnological devices can act upon the brain and cause a range of mental and behavioral events. Neurotechnology has the potential to develop further, so scholars have started to explore the extent to which our present ethical and legal concepts are sufficient for new technologies. The right to bodily integrity is an important ethical and legal norm, that is one of the foundations upon which informed consent is supported. The creation of Neurotechnologies have prompted debate about whether a “right to mental integrity” could be a new normative standard with which we could evaluate these new technologies. I will argue that if we fully understand the implications of the extended mind thesis, we do not need a new normative standard. Once we understand the ways in which mental events are not just events in our brains but are usually things that happen in our bodies or are projected onto the world, we can rely upon concepts such as the right to bodily integrity, for thinking through the ethics of neurotechnology.