Minds Brains And Law

This book addresses the philosophical questions that arise when neuroscientific research and technology are applied in the legal system. The empirical, practical, ethical, and conceptual issues that Pardo and Patterson seek to redress will deeply influence how we negotiate and implement the fruits of neuroscience in law and policy in the future.

Cognitive neuroscientists have deepened our understanding of the complex relationship between mind and brain and complicated the relationship between mental attributes and law. New arguments and conclusions based on functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), electroencephalography (EEG), and other increasingly sophisticated technologies are being applied to debates and processes in the legal field, from lie detection to legal doctrine surrounding criminal law, including the insanity defense to legal theory. In Minds, Brains, and Law, Michael S. Pardo and Dennis Patterson analyze questions that lie at the core of implementing neuroscientific research and technology within the legal system. They examine the arguments favoring increased use of neuroscience in law, the scientific evidence available for the reliability of neuroscientific evidence in legal proceedings, and the integration of neuroscientific research into substantive legal doctrines. The authors also explore the basic philosophical questions that lie at the intersection of law, mind, and neuroscience. In doing so, they argue that mistaken inferences and conceptual errors arise from mismatched concepts, such as the disconnect between lying and what constitutes "lying" in many neuroscientific studies. The empirical, practical, ethical, and conceptual issues that Pardo and Patterson seek to redress will deeply influence how we negotiate and implement the fruits of neuroscience in law and policy in the future. This paperback edition contain a new Preface covering developments in this subject since the hardcover edition published in 2013.

An examination of the relationship between the brain and culpability that offers a comprehensive neuroscientific theory of human responsibility. When we praise, blame, punish, or reward people for their actions, we are holding them responsible for what they have done. Common sense tells us that what makes human beings responsible has to do with their minds and, in particular, the relationship between their minds and their actions. Yet the empirical connection is not necessarily obvious. The “guilty mind” is a core concept of criminal law, but if a defendant on trial for murder were found to have serious brain damage, which brain parts or processes would have to be damaged for him to be considered not responsible, or less responsible, for the crime? What mental illnesses would justify legal pleas of insanity? In Responsible Brains, philosophers William Hirstein, Katrina Sifferd, and Tyler Fagan examine recent developments in neuroscience that point to neural mechanisms of responsibility. Drawing on this research, they argue that evidence from neuroscience and cognitive science can illuminate and inform the nature of responsibility and agency. They go on to offer a novel and comprehensive neuroscientific theory of human responsibility. The authors' core hypothesis is that responsibility is grounded in the brain's prefrontal executive processes, which enable us to make plans, shift attention, inhibit actions, and more. The authors develop the executive theory of responsibility and discuss its implications for criminal law. Their theory neatly bridges the folk-psychological concepts of the law and neuroscientific findings.

Minds, Brains and Science takes up just the problems that perplex people, and it does what good philosophy always does: it dispels the illusion caused by the specious collision of truths. How do we reconcile common sense and science? John Searle argues vigorously that the truths of common sense and the truths of science are both right and that the only question is how to fit them together. Searle explains how we can reconcile an intuitive view of ourselves as conscious, free, rational agents with a universe that science tells us consists of mindless physical particles. He briskly and lucidly sets out his arguments against the familiar positions in the philosophy of mind, and details the consequences of his ideas for the mind-body problem, artificial intelligence, cognitive science, questions of action and free will, and the philosophy of the social sciences.

Pardo and Patterson assess the philosophical questions that arise when neuroscientific research and technology are applied in the legal system. It examines the arguments favouring the increased use of neuroscience in law, the means for assessing its reliability in legal proceedings, and the integration of neuroscientific research into substantive legal doctrines. The book uses its explorations to inform a corrective inquiry into the mistaken inferences and conceptual errors that arise from mismatched concepts, such as the mental disconnect of what constitutes 'lying' on a lie detection test.

Minds, Brains, Computers serves as both an historical and interdisciplinary introduction to the foundations of cognitive science.

The implications for law of new neuroscientific techniques and findings are now among the hottest topics in legal, academic, and media venues. Law and Neuroscience—a collaboration of professors in law, neuroscience, and biology—is the first and still only coursebook to chart this new territory, providing the world’s most comprehensive collection of neurolaw materials. This text will be of interest to many professors teaching Criminal Law and Torts courses, who would like to incorporate the most current thinking on how biology intersects with the law. New to the Second Edition: Extensively revised chapters, updated with new findings and materials. New chapter on Aging Brains Hundreds of new references and citations to recent developments. Over 600 new references and citations to recent developments, with 260 new readings, including 27 new case selections Highly current material; 45% of cases and publications in the Second Edition were published since the first edition in 2014 Professors and students will benefit from: Technical subjects explained in an accessible manner Extensive glossary of key terms Photos and illustrations enliven the text Professors of any background can teach this course

Bringing together the latest work from leading scholars in this emerging and vibrant subfield of law, this book examines the philosophical issues that inform the intersection between law and neuroscience.