More Than Human? The Ethics of Biologically Enhancing Soldiers

An already large percentage of soldiers are returning with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. Many soldiers are unable to re-integrate into society and end up homeless or alone. If we enhance them further, will that not make re-integration of warfighters even more difficult?

There is also the question of who owns the enhancements. If the government owns the enhancements of the warfighters that could mean that they were forbidden in other use, or that they would have to be removed or neutralized at the end of the warfighter’s service.
As traumatic as being turned into something other would be, the trauma would be doubled when you had to be turned back.

I think the use of robots will be here and be more viable ethically before the technology to enhance humans. The first units in combat will work like the Avatar movie character; with a human brain at the remote control. Eventually in the next 20 to 30 years they will have fully autonomous electronic brains. Then the whole concept of modern warfare becomes obsolete as its really just a question of who can build the most destructive robot, and repair it the quickest. When humans no longer suffer any consequence to war, the whole dianamic of ethics changes. My crystal ball is too cloudy to see boyond that horizon.

Yes, DARPA does have a “Project Avatar”: http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2012/02/darpa-sci-fi/

According the agency, “the Avatar program will develop interfaces and algorithms to enable a soldier to effectively partner with a semi-autonomous bi-pedal machine and allow it to act as the soldier’s surrogate.”