Is there a human right to be superhuman?

While America was rushing to see sharp metal blades jut from Wolverine_s fists during the opening of the third "X-Men" movie last weekend, an academic conference was being held at Stanford University to discuss what might happen if people with special powers really existed.

The coincidence was too remarkable to ignore.

In the movie, the plot is driven by the government_s attempt to _cure_ the mutants so they_ll be _normal,_ the very sort of issue the conference, called _Human Enhancement Technologies and Human Rights,_ addressed.
The meeting, sponsored by Stanford University_s Center for Law and the Biosciences, the Center for Cognitive Liberty and Ethics, and the Institute for Ethics and Emerging Technologies, was remarkable for several reasons.

First, leaders of the latter two organizations are _transhumanists_ who believe better days are ahead if we take advantage of new technologies to magnify normal human abilities with a full menu of add-ons. Transhumanism has a long history, but in modern times, it has been dismissed by most as a fringe element of comic-book-reading, sci-fi aficionados. No more.

Second, the question of enhancement...