Cognitive Enhancing Drugs In The Movie Limitless

Buchanan frames biomedical enhancement as an inevitability rather than a possibility. He states, “just saying no to biomedical enhancements isn’t really an option—unless we want to stop medical progress”. As researchers come up with cognitive enhancers to treat people with Alzheimer’s and schizophrenia, they will be made available only for medical use. It will take people like Eddie Mora, who are willing to take a drug for an unintended purpose, to test the effects on normal cognition.

For the drug to be refined and improved, Eddie has to suffer through the raw forms of the prototype NZT. His life is transformed by his ability to harness his cognitive potential, but he is nearly martyred in the process. Given that the use of cognitive enhancers is unavoidable, and their implications can only be determined by usage, Eddie serves a critical role for society. Eddie reaps the benefits but also suffers through the side effects of using a prototype drug of which the state of knowledge is low. Eddie is the perfect guinea pig for the NZT thought experiment, he is an unfulfilled writer with a promising book deal that he can’t get off the ground. His conditions make him suitable to test the prototype pill because he has high cognition but lacks the drive or will to fully utilize it. Given that the effects of the drug are not fully understood, Eddie is responsible for taking a risk for our benefit. In discussing cognitive enhancers, Farah states “the only large-scale trial we may see is the enormous but uncontrolled and poorly monitored trial of people using these drugs and devices on their own” (Farah). The side effects and withdrawal symptoms from a drug like NZT can’t be known without usage, and for Eddie they turn out to be worse than he initially thinks. However, all of the side effects he suffers through lead him to perfecting the drug and working out its kinks. At the end of the movie Eddie says to Carl “see, once you know what's in it, you can tweak it, re-engineer it. Get the bugs out. Taper off. ” By the end of the movie it is clear that Eddie has either redesigned the drug to work out the side effects, or he has actually tapered off it like he claims.

Either way, Eddie has served as the beta test for NZT for an improved and refined version. Eddie kills at least four people as a result from taking the drug, the young woman, the drug dealer, and the dealer’s cronies. Through the framework that Eddie is a beta tester of a flawed product, these deaths are just unfortunate casualties from a non-clinical drug trial. The ends justify the means, as Buchanan states "Eventually, we might even be able to take charge of human evolution” (4). Being a Guinea pig in an experiment far more important than himself or the people he killed, Eddie is therefore free from the moral culpability of his actions. In fact, as Farah states, knowing the “prevalence, risks, and benefits” is critical to “formulate useful policy”. (Farah) The knowledge that NZT can lead to homicide is an essential concern to understanding the cognitive enhancer.