Neurocosmetology

Progress in neuroscience may soon make possible an age of neurocosmetology: the use of drugs to let people affect the way their brains work, so as to make them more effective, more attractive, and more like their “cognitive ideal.” A world where all the women are beautiful and all the men handsome might be bearable if boring. But would a society full of type-A’s work at all? Can it be rational to choose to change in ways that may change who you are? Should there be moral or legal prohibitions against healthy people messing with their own brain chemistry? John and Ken put on their best face with Sam Barondes from UCSF, author of Better than Prozac: Creating the Next Generation of Psychiatric Drugs.