A social issues roundtable was held yesterday at Neuroscience 2009. At least some of the discussion was about the problems that the panelists thought neuroscience could create or exacerbate. From "We Are Neuroscientists and We Come in Peace" (Science):
Before this afternoon's social issues roundtable, I blithely assumed that neuroscience is mostly a good thing for society. It's all about understanding emotions, memory and cognition--the things that make us who we are--and tackling scourges such as Alzheimer's disease and depression. So I was thrown a bit off-guard by the opening remarks of the session moderator, Alan Leshner. "I think when the rest of society finds out what the broader implications of neuroscience research are, they're not going to like it," Leshner said.
The other speakers picked up this troubling thread and highlighted aspects of neuroscience research that have the potential to elicit unease in the general population. Philosopher Patricia Churchland of the University of California, San Diego, spoke about the implications of research on the neural mechanisms of decision-making (which tend to sound pretty deterministic) for the widely held view that people must be held responsible for their actions. Cognitive neuroscientist Barbara Sahakian of the University of Cambridge, U.K., cited recent evidence that the use of cognitive-enhancing drugs such as
modafinil is increasing among teenagers, raising questions about long-term effects on the still-developing adolescent brain, among other ethical worries. And philosopher Jonathan Moreno of the University of Pennsylvania flew through a history of military uses and abuses of psychology and neuroscience research, ranging from 1950s work on using LSD to pry secrets from enemy spies to current interest in using the "trust hormone" oxytocin to loosen lips.
Just when it seemed things could get no worse, Hank Greely of Stanford Law School pointed to several areas of potential friction between neuroscience research and widely held religious beliefs (findings that point to consciousness, or a form of it, in nonhuman animals, for example, might undermine the notion that humans occupy a unique position in the world) and asked whether neuroscientists might get dragged into the type of culture war waged by evolutionary biologists and creationists.
Reads like there was a definite materialist leaning on the panel but that is no surprise. Click to read the rest.
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