In 2001, on the eve of the US-led invasion into Afghanistan, soldiers are fortified with more than just guns and bullets. Many, especially the pilots, were on Provigil produced by Cephalon in the US. The drug is designed to treat narcolepsy but allows pilots to stay awake, and operational, for up to 85 hours at a time.

What works for the military soon becomes popular elsewhere. Scientists and stressed executives were soon pushing cognitive enhancers into off-label areas of use. Provigil is popular, but so too is Ritalin (usually prescribed for attention deficit and hyperactivity disorder), Aricept (used to treat Alzheimer's disease), and Adderall (used for both narcolepsy and ADHD).

In the seminal short story, Flowers for Algernon, by Daniel Keyes, Charlie Gordon documents his experiences following surgery designed to enhance his intelligence. Charlie gradually becomes one of the most intelligent people on earth before tragically suffering a reversion and dying. Keyes, however, had tapped into the curious pursuit of cognitive enhancement that has driven scientists to take unusual risks with their own lives.

On 19 April 1943, Swiss chemist, Dr Albert Hofmann of the Sandoz Laboratories in Switzerland, intentionally ingested 250ug of Lysergic acid diethylamide; LSD. Its hope as a mind-enhancing steroid has proven a disappointment, despite energetic disciples such as Timothy Leary.

However, the pursuit of synthesized drugs that would provide cognitive enhancement is still an area of tremendous activity.

The most popular of mental stimulants is still coffee, and the caffeine it contains. A survey by Nature, in 2008, indicates that large numbers of scientists take cognitive enhancers in order to concentrate and focus. Schizophrenics smoke a lot because nicotine controls their condition. Cancer patients often take marijuana to reduce pain and increase their appetite. And this is without discussing the vast number of athletic performance enhancing steroids.

Biotechnology promises to unlock a more focused crop of treatments that will offer tremendous enhancement to the mental acuity of its beneficiaries. When this happens, society will have to cope with the legal and social implications of such treatments, as well as the drugs itself.

Nature’s most recent article on cognitive enhancement focuses on the politics of the new therapies. Certainly, producing such a pharmaceutical therapy is difficult and there are likely to be many false dawns before a mainstream product is released, but within the next 20 years lifestyle drugs which challenge the nature of ability are likely to enter the market.

It could be made illegal, but that never worked particularly well with prohibition. And it also challenges the concept of civil liberties. Surely the individual has the right to decide what is in his or her own best interest?

As Nature says, “Like all new technologies, cognitive enhancement can be used well or poorly. We should welcome new methods of improving our brain function. In a world in which human workspans and lifespans are increasing, cognitive enhancement tools — including the pharmacological — will be increasingly useful for improved quality of life and extended work productivity, as well as to stave off normal and pathological age-related cognitive declines. Safe and effective cognitive enhancers will benefit both the individual and society.”

The period that will challenge many societies sense of “fairness” will be in the early stages of release, when the wealthy – and the wealthier nations – are able to afford treatment, resulting in massive acceleration of income generation and success.

However, as with all cognition, the drugs will not make thoughts occur on their own, nor will they make successful innovations fall out of the sky.

You may have the potential to run the world’s fastest 100 metre sprint, but you’re still actually going to have to get up and run it. So too with cognitive enhancement.