Methylphenidate is sometimes used by students to enhance their mental abilities, improving their concentration and helping them to study. Professor John Harris, an expert in bioethics, has said that it would be unethical to stop healthy people taking the drug. He also argues that it would be "not rational" and against human enhancement to not use the drug to improve people's cognitive abilities.[93]
John Harris, FRSA, FMedSci (born 21 August 1945), is a British bioethicist and philosopher.[1]He is the Lord Alliance Professor of Bioethics and Director of the Institute for Science, Ethics and Innovation at the University of Manchester. He was educated at the University of Kent and Balliol College, Oxford. He was one of the Founder Directors of the International Association of Bioethics and is a founder member of the Board of the journal Bioethics and a member of the Editorial Board of the Cambridge Quarterly of Healthcare Ethics. He is also the joint Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of Medical Ethics.[2]
He has throughout his career defended broadly libertarian - consequentialist approaches to issues in bioethics.[3]
FMedSci - Academy of Medical Sciences
FRSA - Fellows of the Royal Society of Arts
