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Self-identity in emotion enhancement

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Abstract

This paper investigates the impacts of emotion enhancement on self-identity and assesses possible ethical consequences of these changes. It introduces the crucial dimensions related to the self which emotion enhancement may endanger—emotion standards, narrative identity, self-objectification, and freedom of hope and pursuit. I argue that the ethically salient issue with emotion enhancement is its impact on autonomous agency—whether one’s actions and beliefs are one’s own, and how the relational autonomy may be hindered or fostered. The changes arising from emotion enhancement may be considered to belong to the same self as long as such changes do not alter the individual’s internal value system and the individual identifies with such changes. That being said, emotion enhancement remains unjustified in terms of freedom. Even if the emotional enhancement is performed out of free will, it does not bring freedom in the true sense, and thus threatens the subject’s special kind of being as the same rational agent.

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All data included in this study are available upon request by contact with the author. 

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Funding

This work was supported by the major project of the National Social Science Fund of China, “Contemporary Approaches to Personal Identity” (Grant No. 18ZDA029) and the Major Project of the Key Research Base of Humanities and Social Sciences of the Ministry of Education of China (Grant No. 22JJD720005)

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Philosophy, School of Humanities, China University of Political Science and Law (Haidian Campus), Haidian District, 25 Xitucheng Road, Beijing, 100088, China

    Duoyi Fei

  2. The Institute of Foreign Philosophy, Peking University, Haidian District, No.5 Yiheyuan Road, Beijing, 100871, China

    Duoyi Fei

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  1. Duoyi Fei
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Correspondence to Duoyi Fei.

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No conflict of interest exists in the submission of this manuscript, and manuscript is approved by the author for publication. I would like to declare that the work described was original research that has not been published previously, and not under simultaneous consideration elsewhere.

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Fei, D. Self-identity in emotion enhancement. AJPH 2, 59 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s44204-023-00113-y

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