Drugs may boost your brain power (BBC)

This story might seem a bit dull until you start to think about some of the implications for society.

This article tells us about two studies, first a scientific investigation into whether such drugs work and second a study into how such drugs might effect society.

If you assume they do work what are the implications for society?

Well you could theoretically buy intelligence, buying the pills would give you an edge over other people that didn't in exams, jobs etc. Would exams have to get harder to compensate or would pills be banned for exams to level the playing field?

What about employment, as part of high performing schemes companies could insist that managers take the drugs to enhance their performance. Could taking the drug be written into someone's contract if the company paid for the drugs?

What about the long term health effects, it will be decades before any time bomb is realised. What if prolonged use leads to parkinson's, alzeheimers or cancer?

One area of life that the article does mention is at school, parents will push the drugs onto children to enhance their performance at school, so they can get in the right schools and get the best chance in a career. If you as a parent chose not to let the child use the drugs would that constitute child abuse?

The UK Government has commissioned a report to assess the impact of 'intelligence' drugs on medicine and society. The report will be published later this year.

I always thought it was going to be brain implants or biochemical body enhancements that would create this kind of social divide but it seems I forgot the power of the pill, intelligence in tablet form.