The rise of neurotechnologies, especially in combination with artificial intelligence (AI)-based methods for brain data analytics, has given rise to concerns around the protection of mental privacy, mental integrity and cognitive liberty – often framed as “neurorights” in ethical, legal, and policy discussions. Several states are now looking at including neurorights into their constitutional legal frameworks, and international institutions and organizations, such as UNESCO and the Council of Europe, are taking an active interest in developing international policy and governance guidelines (...) on this issue. However, in many discussions of neurorights the philosophical assumptions, ethical frames of reference and legal interpretation are either not made explicit or conflict with each other. The aim of this multidisciplinary work is to provide conceptual, ethical, and legal foundations that allow for facilitating a common minimalist conceptual understanding of mental privacy, mental integrity, and cognitive liberty to facilitate scholarly, legal, and policy discussions. (shrink)

The debate between the amodal and the grounded views of cognition seems to be stuck. Their only substantial disagreement is about the vehicle or format of concepts. Amodal theorists reject the grounded claim that concepts are couched in the same modality-specific format as representations in sensory systems. The problem is that there is no clear characterization of format or its neural correlate. In order to make the disagreement empirically meaningful and move forward in the discussion we need a neurocognitive criterion (...) for representational format. I argue that efficient coding models in computational neuroscience can be used to characterize modal codes: These are codes which satisfy special informational demands imposed by sensory tasks. Additionally, I examine recent studies on neural coding and argue that although they do not provide conclusive evidence for either the grounded or the amodal views, they can be used to determine what predictions these approaches can make and what experimental and theoretical developments would be required to settle the debate. (shrink)

One of the most prominent ethical concerns regarding emerging neurotechnologies is mental privacy. This is the idea that we should have control over access to our neural data and to the information about our mental processes and states that can be obtained by analyzing it. A key issue is whether this information needs more stringent protection than other kinds of personal information. I will articulate and support the view, underlying recent regulatory frameworks, that mental privacy requires a special treatment because (...) of its relation to relevant aspects of personal identity. It has been suggested that this approach could be supported by the idea that mental privacy constitutes a fundamental psychological dimension of privacy. The connection between this psychological view of privacy and identity can be traced back to Irwin Altman’s idea that privacy is an interpersonal boundary regulation process. However, it is not clear whether this notion of privacy can be associated with a conception of identity that is relevant in contemporary neuroethics. I will suggest that the narrative and relational approach to identity, a prominent view in recent ethical discussions of neurotechnology, lines up with key aspects of Altman’s proposal. I suggest that if mental privacy is an essential component of identity, the latter could be affected by technological mind-reading. (shrink)

Although it has been argued that mechanistic explanation is compatible with abstraction, there are still doubts about whether mechanism can account for the explanatory power of significant abstract models in computational neuroscience. Chirimuuta has recently claimed that models describing canonical neural computations must be evaluated using a non-mechanistic framework. I defend two claims regarding these models. First, I argue that their prevailing neurocognitive interpretation is mechanistic. Additionally, a criterion recently proposed by Levy and Bechtel to legitimize mechanistic abstract models, and (...) also a criterion proposed by Chirimuuta herself aimed to distinguish between causal and non-causal explanation, can be employed to show why these models are explanatory only under this interpretation. Second, I argue that mechanism is able to account for the special epistemic achievement implied by CNC models. Canonical neural components contribute to an integrated understanding of different cognitive functions. They make it possible for us to explain these functions by describing different mechanisms constituted by common basic components arranged in different ways. (shrink)

It has been argued that the approximate number system (ANS) constitutes a problem for the grounded approach to cognition because it implies that some conceptual tasks are performed by non-perceptual systems. The ANS is considered non-perceptual mainly because it processes stimuli from different modalities. Jones (2015) has recently argued that this system has many features (such as being modular) which are characteristic of sensory systems. Additionally, he affirms that traditional sensory systems also process inputs from different modalities. This suggests that (...) the ANS is a perceptual system and therefore it is not problematic for the grounded view. In this paper, I defend the amodal approach to the ANS against these two arguments. In the first place, perceptual systems do not possess the properties attributed to the ANS and therefore these properties do not imply that the ANS is perceptual. In the second place, I will propose that a sensory system only needs to be dedicated to process modality-specific information, which is consistent with responding to inputs from different modalities. I argue that the cross-modal responses exhibited by traditional sensory systems are consistent with modality-specific information whereas some responses exhibited by the ANS are not. (shrink)

A new strategy for moving forward in the characterization of the Global Neuronal Workspace (GNW) is proposed. According to Dehaene, Changeux and colleagues, broadcasting is the main function of the GNW. However, the dynamic network properties described by recent graph-theoretic GNW models are consistent with many large-scale communication processes that are different from broadcasting. We propose to apply a different graph-theoretic approach, originally developed for optimizing information dissemination in communication networks, which can be used to identify the pattern of frequency (...) and phase-specific directed functional connections that the GNW would exhibit only if it were a broadcasting network. (shrink)

Pritchard propone revitalizar el proyecto analítico para la noción de conocimiento: ofrecer una caracterización informativa y no circular de la misma. Cree que la clave es entender que las dos intuiciones centrales a esta noción imponen demandas independientes. Sostengo, por el contrario, la suficiencia de la condición anti-suerte. No solo respondo al argumento de Pritchard sino que desarrollo una línea alternativa inadvertida por él, pero implicada por supuestos suyos sobre la condición anti-suerte. Sostengo que una concepción evidencial de la seguridad (...) la hace dependiente de una condición de habilidad. Fortalezco la defensa de la epistemología anti-suerte minando dicha concepción. (shrink)

An argument recently proposed by Chirimuuta seems to motivate the rejection of the claims that every neurocognitive phenomenon can have a mechanistic explanation and that every neurocognitive explanation is mechanistic. In this paper, I focus on efficient coding models involving the so-called “canonical neural computations” and argue that although they imply some form of pluralism, they are compatible with two mechanistic generalizations: all neurocognitive explanations are mechanistic; and all neurocognitive phenomena that have an explanation have a purely mechanistic explanation.

James Gross ha desarrollado una propuesta muy difundida según la cual la regulación emocional es un procesoreflexivo o de segundo orden que es diferente de las emociones. A su vez, Gross considera que esta propuesta esindependiente de qué teoría sobre las emociones uno adopte. En este trabajo discutoesta presunta independencia. En particular, sostengo queel enfoque evolutivo de Tooby y Cosmidestiene dos implicaciones respecto de la relación entre emoción y regulación emocional: los procesos comúnmente considerados como regulativos son, de acuerdo con (...) esta propuesta, parte de la emoción misma y la regulación emocional se lleva a cabo horizontalmente, es decir, entre emociones que se encuentran en el mismo nivel. (shrink)

Causal approaches to explanation often assume that a model explains by describing features that make a difference regarding the phenomenon. Chirimuuta claims that this idea can be also used to understand non-causal explanation in computational neuroscience. She argues that mathematical principles that figure in efficient coding explanations are non-causal difference-makers. Although these principles cannot be causally altered, efficient coding models can be used to show how would the phenomenon change if the principles were modified in counterpossible situations. The problem is (...) that efficient coding models also involve difference-makers that, prima facie, cannot be characterized as non-causal in this sense. Mathematical principles always involve variables which have counterfactual relations between them. However, we cannot simply assume that these difference-makers are causal. They can also be found in paradigmatic non-causal explanations and therefore they must be characterized as non-causal in some sense. I argue that, despite appearances, Chirimuuta's view can be applied to these cases. The mentioned counterfactual relations presuppose the counterpossible conditionals that describe the modification of a relevant mathematical principle. If these conditionals are the hallmark of non-causal relations, then Chirimuuta’s criterion has the desired implication that variables in mathematical principles are non-causal difference-makers. (shrink)