Will my values change in ways that they are unlikely to change without the changes to my brain? By analogy, drinking alcohol has temporarily affects on my judgement because it affects my brain chemistry and on the whole it makes my judgement worse (although sometimes it has removed unhelpful inhibitions).
To me the premise that the possibility of changing my brain through fasting is unquestionably a silver bullet free of tradeoffs is suspect. Or to put it another way, the fact that fasting had a particular effect does not imply that effect is a positive one.
Furthermore, hunger is a strong motivation toward behaviors that are ethically suspect in its absence. A full belly is a rung up Maslow’s hierarchy.
People who spend their days starving mice at scale have incentives to interpret that starvation in positive ways. It would be hard to rationalize starvation and vivisection otherwise and still consider one’s life choice reasonable and ethical. Hence, I am skeptical of acting in the ways an optimistic interpretation of the report suggests. YMMV.
To me the premise that the possibility of changing my brain through fasting is unquestionably a silver bullet free of tradeoffs is suspect. Or to put it another way, the fact that fasting had a particular effect does not imply that effect is a positive one.
Furthermore, hunger is a strong motivation toward behaviors that are ethically suspect in its absence. A full belly is a rung up Maslow’s hierarchy.
People who spend their days starving mice at scale have incentives to interpret that starvation in positive ways. It would be hard to rationalize starvation and vivisection otherwise and still consider one’s life choice reasonable and ethical. Hence, I am skeptical of acting in the ways an optimistic interpretation of the report suggests. YMMV.