The Ethical Brain: the science of our moral dilemmas
Michael S. Gazzaniga
2005
178 pp.
Rating: 4 of 5
A pretty interesting book. Gazzaniga has a go at many of the ethical dilemmas that are being brought forth by brain science. He covers stem cell research, end of life issues (when does life actually begin or end, in strict scientific terms? his answers might surprise); brain enhancement techniques (through drugs, or through genetic manipulation); free will and responsibility (are criminals really to blame if the problem they have is a brain 'disorder'?); and what it means to be 'moral', and is there a universal moral sense shared amongst humanity?
Like Mind Wide Open, The Ethical Brain goes into interesting but not too technical detail on the structures of the brain, and modern experiments that look at what parts of the brain are involved in doing what kind of chores. Like Mind Wide Open, this book shows that we have different parts of the brain that compete with each other, and also talks about a part of our brain that might act as a sort of organizer of the impulses of the various parts of the brain. This area is what tries to make sense of contradictory messages from different brain centers. If there is no good reason, it makes one up by trying to find any kind of potential reason, and has your vocal chords say something that can't possibly be true. Most famously, this is seen in some stroke/paralysis patients, who when asked why they can't move a paralyzed arm, frequently will say things like "that's not my arm" (even though they can see it is attached to their body), or "I just don't feel like moving it." They really believe these answers -- it's their 'meta brain's' best guess (but they respondent has no idea that it is a guessed response).
The book is quite rich with examples and some great moral/ethical dilemma situations, which would probably make for great party games as well.
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