Ethics of neuroscience

• Ethical: treating/ understanding criminal behaviour

  • used to rehabilitate offenders and prevent offences as stems from brain abnormalities
  • Raine et al, if we can see what areas of brain are impacted, gov could scan before offence
  • Can be chemically/surgically treated before offence
  • Males w history of violent behaviour decreased in aggression and impulsiveness after anti depressant
• Ethical: treat abnormal behaviour

  • Effective treatment o depression, ocd and Parkinson's
  • SSRIs produced bc of neuroscience indicating that depressed patients have lower seretonin
  • DBS treats as neuroscience increase knowledge of localisation of brain function , and advances in tech makes it highly successful. 2005, 4/6 patient w severe depression had symptoms dramatically reduce after DBS
• Ethical: marketing

  • Neuromarketing to measure consumer responses, using fMRI and eyetracking
  • gain objective measure of consumer thoughts to create more effective marketing strategies
  • VW highly successful in 2011
• Ethical: Enhance neurological function

  • Neuroscience can improve abilities of induviduals with TDCS
  • Pass small electrical current across specific parts of brain to enhance performancce
  • Kadosh et al found it improves problem solving,maths, language, memory and attention capabilities.
  • Use to prepare for exams to enhance performance so benefits society
• Unethical: treating/ understanding criminal behaviour

  • If criminal justice system uses neuroscience to alter prisoner behaviour, they are denied of individual freedom- free will
  • Ethical and social implications of Raine -removal from society or compulsory treatment bc of brain structure
  • Unethical when no crime commited
  • False positives? Bennet et al dead salmons show brain scans can show false positives and aren’t always reliable

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• Unethical: treating abnormal behaviour

  • treatments can cause psychological harm, side effects include memory/speech impairment , aggression and increased risk of suicide.
  • DBS causes other complications- dislodged electrodes-> bleed in brain
  • those given anti depressants 2x more likely to attempt suicide than those given placebo, side effects often worse than original disorder.
• Unethical: marketing

  • reading minds for profit?
  • Consumers lack free will when buying products
  • moral dilemma of disclosing info found-> 5% of brain scans by marketing firms show incidental findings
• unethical: enhancing neurological function

  • No licensing rules for practitioners so under qualified people can administer- serious ethics
  • high risk of physical harm- brain damage
  • Not available to everyone so unfair
• Social implications of neuroscience

  • society safer if criminals can be treated
  • people suffering from disorders can have more normal lives, effective treatment
• economic implications of neuroscience

  • marketing boosts economy BUT unethical; manipulating consumers
  • Anti depressants cost uk £9.1 bn in 2000. Replacing this with DBS can save economy millions
  • Pharmaceutical companies focus too much on profit
  • TDCS lead to better exam results so better jobs and better contributions to economy