The potential to collect brain data more directly, with higher resolution, and in greater amounts has heightened worries about mental and brain privacy. In order to manage the risks to individuals posed by these privacy challenges, some have suggested codifying new privacy rights, including a right to “mental privacy.” In this paper, we consider these arguments and conclude that while neurotechnologies do raise significant privacy concerns, such concerns are—at least for now—no different from those raised by other well-understood (...) data collection technologies, such as gene sequencing tools and online surveillance. To better understand the privacy stakes of brain data, we suggest the use of a conceptual framework from information ethics, Helen Nissenbaum’s “contextual integrity” theory. To illustrate the importance of context, we examine neurotechnologies and the information flows they produce in three familiar contexts—healthcare and medical research, criminal justice, and consumer marketing. We argue that by emphasizing what is distinct about brain privacy issues, rather than what they share with other data privacy concerns, risks weakening broader efforts to enact more robust privacy law and policy. (shrink)

Organ donation after the circulatory determination of death requires the permanent cessation of circulation while organ donation after the brain determination of death requires the irreversible cessation of brain functions. The unified brain-based determination of death connects the brain and circulatory death criteria for circulatory death determination in organ donation as follows: permanent cessation of systemic circulation causes permanent cessation of brain circulation which causes permanent cessation of brain perfusion which causes permanent cessation of (...) brain function. The relevant circulation that must cease in circulatory death determination is that to the brain. Eliminating brain circulation from the donor ECMO organ perfusion circuit in thoracoabdominal NRP protocols satisfies the unified brain-based determination of death but only if the complete cessation of brain circulation can be proved. Despite its medical and physiologic rationale, the unified brain-based determination of death remains inconsistent with the Uniform Determination of Death Act. (shrink)

It has recently been suggested that research in neuroscience of art has failed to bring art into focus in the laboratory. Two general arguments are brought to bear in the regard. The common perceptual mechanisms argument observes that neuroscientists working within this field develop models to explain art relative to the ways that artworks are fine-tuned to the operations of perceptual systems. However, these perceptual explanations apply equally to how viewers come to recognize and understand art and nonart objects and (...) events. Therefore these explanations fail to disambiguate artworks from other things. They fail to locate art. This observation points to a deeper problem. What interests us in art is how what we perceive has been used to show us what the work represents. Our understanding of art is governed by a range of productive and evaluative normative conventions that govern how we ought to look at a work and evaluate how it was made. The normative dimension of appreciation argument suggests that these aspects of our engagement with artworks lie outside the scope of neuroscientific explanations of art. This chapter provides a sketch of a diagnostic recognition framework for engaging art that resolves both problems and helps explains how artworks function within the social institution of the artworld to facilitate a communicative exchange between artists and consumers. (shrink)

Introduction to mind and brain -- The science and philosophy of mind -- A brief look into brain structure and function -- States of mind -- Signatures of consciousness -- Rhythms of the brain -- Brain synchrony, coherence, and resonance -- Networks of the brain -- Introduction to the hard problem -- Multiscale speculations on the hard problem -- Glossary.

The method of positron emission tomography illustrates the circular logic popular in subtractive neuroimaging and linear reductive cognitive psychology. Both require that strictly feed-forward, modular, cognitive components exist, before the fact, to justify the inference of particular components from images after the fact. Also, both require a "true" componential theory of cognition and laboratory tasks, before the fact, to guarantee reliable choices for subtractive contrasts. None of these possibilities are likely. Consequently, linear reductive analysis has failed to yield general, reliable, (...) componential accounts. (shrink)

Abstract:Disturbing cases continue to be published of patients declared brain dead who later were found to have a few intact brain functions. We address the reasons for the mismatch between the whole-brain criterion and brain death tests, and suggest solutions. Many of the cases result from diagnostic errors in brain death determination. Others probably result from a tiny amount of residual blood flow to the brain despite intracranial circulatory arrest. Strategies to lessen the mismatch (...) include improving brain death determination training for physicians, mandating a test showing complete intracranial circulatory arrest, or revising the whole-brain criterion. (shrink)

In recent decades, a new scientific approach to understand, explain, and predict many features of religion has emerged. The cognitive science of religion has amassed research on the forces that shape the tendency for humans to be religious and on what forms belief takes. It suggests that religion, like language or music, naturally emerges in humans with tractable similarities. This new approach has profound implications for how we understand religion, including why it appears so easily, and why people are willing (...) to fight-and die for it. Yet it is not without its critics, and some fear that scholars are explaining the ineffable mystery of religion away, or by showing that religion is natural proves or disproves the existence of God. An Introduction to the Cognitive Science of Religion offers students and general readers an accessible introduction to the approach, providing an overview of key findings and the debates that shape it. The volume includes a glossary of key terms, and each chapter includes suggestions for further thought and further reading as well as chapter summaries highlighting key points. This book is an indispensable resource for introductory courses on religion and a much-needed option for advanced courses. (shrink)

What ethical questions does neuroscience raise and help to answer? Neuroethics blends philosophical analysis with modern brain science to address central questions within this growing field: · Is free will an illusion? · Does brain stimulation impair a patient's autonomy? · Does having a mental disorder excuse bad behavior? · Is addiction a brain disease? · Should we trust our gut feelings in ethics and politics? · Should we alter our brains to become better people? · Is (...) human reasoning bound to be biased by our values? · Can brain science be trusted to read the minds of criminals and consumers? This book provides an opinionated tour through captivating cases and a close examination of the philosophical issues and scientific evidence. Joshua May's lively and accessible writing style makes it an indispensable resource for students and scholars in both the sciences and humanities. (shrink)

Choice Outstanding Academic Title, 1996. In hundreds of articles by experts from around the world, and in overviews and "road maps" prepared by the editor, The Handbook of Brain Theory and Neural Networks charts the immense progress made in recent years in many specific areas related to great questions: How does the brain work? How can we build intelligent machines? While many books discuss limited aspects of one subfield or another of brain theory and neural networks, the (...) Handbook covers the entire sweep of topics—from detailed models of single neurons, analyses of a wide variety of biological neural networks, and connectionist studies of psychology and language, to mathematical analyses of a variety of abstract neural networks, and technological applications of adaptive, artificial neural networks. Expository material makes the book accessible to readers with varied backgrounds while still offering a clear view of the recent, specialized research on specific topics. (shrink)

It has long been known that brain damage has important negative effects on one’s mental life and even eliminates one’s ability to have certain conscious experiences. It thus stands to reason that when all of one’s brain activity ceases upon death, consciousness is no longer possible and so neither is an afterlife. It seems clear that human consciousness is dependent upon functioning brains. This essay reviews some of the overall neurological evidence from brain damage studies and concludes (...) that our argument from brain damage has been vindicated by such overwhelming evidence. It also puts forth a more mature philosophical rationale against an afterlife and counters several replies to the argument. -/- 1. Philosophical Background -- 2. The Dependence of Consciousness on the Brain: Some Preliminary Evidence -- 3. Brain Damage, Lesion Studies, and the Localization of Mental Function - 3.1 Perception - 3.2 Awareness, Comprehension, and Recognition - 3.3 Memory - 3.4 Personality - 3.5 Language - 3.6 Emotion - 3.7 Decision-Making - 3.8 Social Cognition and Theory of Mind - 3.9 Moral Judgment and Empathy - 3.10 Neurological Disorders and Disease - 3.11 The Unity of Consciousness -- 4. Objections and Replies - 4.1 Souls, Minds, and Energy Fields - 4.2 The Instrument Theory - 4.3 The Embodied Soul Alone is Affected -- 5. Conclusion. (shrink)

The method of positron emission tomography illustrates the circular logic popular in subtractive neuroimaging and linear reductive cognitive psychology. Both require that strictly feed-forward, modular, cognitive components exist, before the fact, to justify the inference of particular components from images after the fact. Also, both require a "true" componential theory of cognition and laboratory tasks, before the fact, to guarantee reliable choices for subtractive contrasts. None of these possibilities are likely. Consequently, linear reductive analysis has failed to yield general, reliable, (...) componential accounts. (shrink)

Attentional control theory (ACT) was proposed to account for trait anxiety’s effects on cognitive performance. According to ACT, impaired processing efficiency in high anxiety is mediated through inefficient executive processes that are needed for effective attentional control. Here we review the central assumptions and predictions of ACT within the context of more recent empirical evidence from neuroimaging studies. We then attempt to provide an account of ACT within a framework of the relevant cognitive processes and their associated neural mechanisms and (...) networks, particularly the fronto-parietal, cingular-opercula, and default mode networks. Future research directions, including whether a neuroscience-informed model of ACT can provide a platform for novel neurocognitive intervention for anxiety, are also discussed. (shrink)

A concise articulation of Neurobiological Emergence -- a theory that solves the "hard problem" of consciousness while also showing its widespread existence in nature (beyond just humans).

The interaction between syntax and its semantics is one which has been well studied in categorical logic. The results of this particular study are employed to understand how the brain is able to create meanings. To emphasize the toy character of the proposed model, we prefer to speak of the homunculus brain rather than the brain per se. The homunculus brain consists of neurons, each of which is modeled by a category, and axons between neurons, which (...) are modeled by functors between the corresponding neuron-categories. Each neuron has its own program enabling its working, i.e. a theory of this neuron. In analogy to what is known from categorical logic, we postulate the existence of a pair of adjoint functors, called Lang and Syn, from a category, now called BRAIN, of categories, to a category, now called MIND, of theories. Our homunculus is a kind of “mathematical robot”, the neuronal architecture of which is not important. Its only aim is to provide us with the opportunity to study how such a simple brain-like structure could “create meanings” and perform abstraction operations out of its purely syntactic program. The pair of adjoint functors Lang and Syn model the mutual dependencies between the syntactical structure of a given theory of MIND and the internal logic of its semantics given by a category of BRAIN. In this way, a formal language and its meanings are interwoven with each other in a manner corresponding to the adjointness of the functors Lang and Syn. Higher cognitive functions of abstraction and realization of concepts are also modelled by a corresponding pair of adjoint functors. The categories BRAIN and MIND interact with each other with their entire structures and, at the same time, these very structures are shaped by this interaction. (shrink)

In the extended mind literature, one sometimes finds the claim that there is no neural correlate of consciousness. Instead, there is a biological or ecological correlate of consciousness. Consciousness, it is claimed, supervenes on an entire organism in action. Alva Noë is one of the leading proponents of such a view. This paper resists Noë's view. First, it challenges the evidence he offers from neuroplasticity. Second, it presses a problem with paralysis. Third, it draws attention to a challenge from the (...) existence of metamers and visual illusions. (shrink)

The relationship between brain and mind has been extensively explored through the developments within neuroscience over the last decade. However, the ontological status of mind has remained fairly problematic due to the inability to explain all features of the mind through the brain. This inability has been considered largely due to partial knowledge of the brain. It is claimed that once we gain complete knowledge of the brain, all features of the mind would be explained adequately. (...) However, a challenge to such a position is downward causation: How do we explain the causal power that mental states exert over brain activities? If we agree that downward causation occurs, then to what extent could a sole explanation of brain activities account for our behaviour? (For they would in themselves be conditioned by the mental states which are left unexplained). This dissertation is an attempt to understand relation between brain and mind through the concept of emergence, placed in the context of complex systems approach. This will create a space to account for the causal power of mental states. The complex systems approach says that as the complexity of a system increases, we witness the emergence of novel qualities and after a certain threshold (of complexity), the emergence of a novel structure. When the body (and correspondingly, brain) reaches a certain level of complexity, the mind emerges. The brain is a complex system from which the mind emerges. The brain, consisting of billions of neurons interacting with each other, regulates the body placed in the environment. The interaction of neurons (local interactions involving self-organization) result in dynamical brain signatures (global synergy). Such signatures are correlative to mental states. Mind is the process of a living organism embodying an intentional stance. This object could be the subject itself or another distinct from the subject. With the emergence of mind, the causal powers of brain are conditioned by the mind. Such a conditioning is evident through the causal efficacy of mental states. While the brain is minimal condition for the mind to emerge, the mind in itself is embedded (showcased/explicated/manifested) throughout the body. The mind is a process that belongs to body-as-a-whole with the novel quality of intentionality. A preliminary to understanding this relation is its metaphysical inclination. A large portion of the history of philosophy of mind has advocated a metaphysics of entities where the mind and body have been seen as two entities with distinct essences. However, such attribution of entity-ship does not take into account the processual nature of these existents (that they are essentially dependent on their environment for their existence and sustenance). Thus, the category of processual unity has been introduced which sought to account for existent as emergent wholes that move towards a stable equilibrium through self-organization. By considering existents to be processual unities, we can account for their identity as a whole-in-itself (what has been called organizational closure) and also for their processual nature. The brain is a component of the body which is a complex system and is representative of the body’s stance in the world. The brain, consisting of billions of neurons interacting with each other, regulates the body placed in the environment. The interaction of neurons (local interactions involving self-organization) result in dynamical brain signatures (global synergy). Such signatures are correlative to mental states. These mental states in turn condition the brain patterns, that allows the embodying of mental states. Thus, the three-way process of the representation of body in the world by the brain, the emergence of mental state through dynamic brain patterns and the reciprocal causal power on the brain patterns by the mental states marks embodiment. The relation between brain, body and mind can be outlined as follows: A. There are complex interactions in the brain. These interactions are representative of the body’s stance in the world and are present in form of dynamical brain signatures. B. The dynamical brain signatures lead to emergence of mind as a process. The mental state has causal power which conditions the brain. C. The brain conditioned by causal power of the mind carries out embodiment of the mind throughout the body. In the dissertation, an exposition on relation between brain and mind through complex system approach is followed by a brief on relation between body and mind. The radical embodiment approach adopts the nonlinear dynamic systems theory to understand relation of brain, body and mind. It states a shift from mapping of cognitive states onto Neural Correlates of Consciousness to their mapping through dynamic brain signatures. Every mental state is embedded throughout the body. The dissertation explores the three features of consciousness, intentionality and qualia. These have previously formed a challenge within a dualistic framework and the dissertation intends to show a direction in which they can be accounted for, within the complex systems approach and radical embodiment viewpoint. After a certain threshold of the rate of production of cell assemblies is bypassed, we become conscious of the representation itself. This leads to emergence of phenomenal states. Qualia is the qualitative character of such states, which belong to the body-as-a-whole and for this reason, cannot be reduced to properties of any of the components from which it emerges (the dynamic brain signatures) or in which it is embodied (the body and its individual parts) alone. Intentionality is the novel property of mind of moving towards a certain set of attractors where attractors refer to the states that the system prefers (which would positively contribute to its fitness). The scope of this dissertation is to delineate the relation of brain to the mind and unravel some persistent troubles of philosophy of mind within such delineation. The types of components and their relation within the mind preceded by a thorough study of how the mind is embodied is an area yet to be extensively explored in the coming works. (shrink)

To identify the neural components that make a brain ready for language, it is important to have well defined linguistic phenotypes, to know precisely what language is. There are two central features to language: the capacity to form signs (words), and the capacity to combine them into complex structures. We must determine how the human brain enables these capacities. A sign is a link between a perceptual form and a conceptual meaning. Acoustic elements and content elements, are already (...) brain-internal in non-human animals, but as categorical systems linked with brain-external elements. Being indexically tied to objects of the world, they cannot freely link to form signs. A crucial property of a language-ready brain is the capacity to process perceptual forms and contents offline, detached from any brain-external phenomena, so their “representations” may be linked into signs. These brain systems appear to have pleiotropic effects on a variety of phenotypic traits and not to be specifically designed for language. Syntax combines signs, so the combination of two signs operates simultaneously on their meaning and form. The operation combining the meanings long antedates its function in language: the primitive mode of predication operative in representing some information about an object. The combination of the forms is enabled by the capacity of the brain to segment vocal and visual information into discrete elements. Discrete temporal units have order and juxtaposition, and vocal units have intonation, length, and stress. These are primitive combinatorial processes. So the prior properties of the physical and conceptual elements of the sign introduce combinatoriality into the linguistic system, and from these primitive combinatorial systems derive concatenation in phonology and combination in morphosyntax. Given the nature of language, a key feature to our understanding of the language-ready brain is to be found in the mechanisms in human brains that enable the unique means of representation that allow perceptual forms and contents to be linked into signs. (shrink)

_Brain Mystery Light and Dark_ examines scientific models of how the brain becomes conscious and argues that the spiritual dimension of life is compatible with the main scientific theories. Keyes shows us that the belief in the unity of mind and brain does not necessarily undermine aesthetic, religious, and ethical beliefs.

The mainstream rationale for equating brain death (BD) with death is that the brain confers integrative unity upon the body, transforming it from a mere collection of organs and tissues to an organism as a whole. In support of this conclusion, the impressive list of the brains myriad integrative functions is often cited. Upon closer examination, and after operational definition of terms, however, one discovers that most integrative functions of the brain are actually not somatically integrating, and, (...) conversely, most integrative functions of the body are not brain-mediated. With respect to organism-level vitality, the brains role is more modulatory than constitutive, enhancing the quality and survival potential of a presupposedly living organism. Integrative unity of a complex organism is an inherently nonlocalizable, holistic feature involving the mutual interaction among all the parts, not a top-down coordination imposed by one part upon a passive multiplicity of other parts. Loss of somatic integrative unity is not a physiologically tenable rationale for equating BD with death of the organism as a whole. (shrink)

In his article, a unified brain-based determination of death is described by James Bernat (2024) as a permanent cessation of systemic circulation causing a permanent cessation of brain circulation...

This review evaluates pros and cons of the schema theory as a general framework for expressing what Arbib et al. call “systems neuroscience.” We discuss the software/hardware duality of the schema concept and the relative neglect of the mechanical properties of muscles. We propose a computational alternative to the functional decomposition in terms of schemas.

Since the early 1980s, James Bernat’s scholarship has accompanied and shaped most scientific and policy developments on death determination. In 1981, he, Charles Culver, and Bernard Gert provided a...