e-2905 (Civil and human rights)
- Keywords
- Civil and human rights
- Neurotechnology
Original language of petition: English
Petition to the House of Commons
- Rapid advancements in neurotechnology open unprecedented possibilities for accessing, collecting, sharing, and manipulating information from the brain;
- Prosthetic limbs can be wired directly into the brain, and operate intuitively as if they were never lost;
- Neurological devices, including neuroweapons, are constantly becoming more prevalent in society;
- Legal safeguards surrounding the possibilities for misuse, or unintended consequences, are lagging far behind the escalating state of neurotechnology;
- There are precedents, across the entire globe, of governmental entities experimenting on unwitting civilians in an effort to expedite advancements within the field of neurotechnology (i.e. Project MKULTRA, etc.);
- Canada’s current human rights are not absolute, nor are they sufficient enough to protect the population from emerging issues;
- Development of these rights should be conducted by a panel of decorated neuroscientists, legal experts, technology developers, human rights advocates, and neuroethicists appointed by the House of Commons;
- The following neuro-specific human rights, cited from the paper “Towards new human rights in the age of neuroscience and neurotechnology” (Ienca and Andorno, 2017), can serve as the foundation for development; and
- It is vital that the neuro-specific human rights are enacted into law as absolute rights.
- Open for signature
- July 2, 2021, at 8:58 a.m. (EDT)
- Closed for signature
- October 30, 2021, at 8:58 a.m. (EDT)