This issue of Criminal Law and Philosophy contains three papers on a topic of increasing importance within the field of "neurolaw"-namely, the implications for criminal law of direct brain intervention based mind altering techniques. To locate these papers' topic within a broader context, I begin with an overview of some prominent topics in the field of neurolaw, where possible providing some references to relevant literature. The specific questions asked by the three authors, as well as their answers and central claims, (...) are then sketched out, and I end with a brief comment to explain why this particular topic can be expected to gain more prominence in coming years. (shrink)

Various authors debate the question of whether neuroscience is relevant to criminal responsibility. However, a plethora of different techniques and technologies, each with their own abilities and drawbacks, lurks beneath the label “neuroscience”; and in criminal law responsibility is not a single, unitary and generic concept, but it is rather a syndrome of at least six different concepts. Consequently, there are at least six different responsibility questions that the criminal law asks—at least one for each responsibility concept—and, I will suggest, (...) a multitude of ways in which the techniques and technologies that comprise neuroscience might help us to address those diverse questions. In a way, on my account neuroscience is relevant to criminal responsibility in many ways, but I hesitate to state my position like this because doing so obscures two points which I would rather highlight: one, neither neuroscience nor criminal responsibility are as unified as that; and two, the criminal law asks many different responsibility questions and not just one generic question. (shrink)

In this chapter, I propose the mechanism of cognitive enhancement based on studies of cognitive-enhancing drugs and behavioral training. I argue that there are mechanistic differences between cognitive-enhancing drugs and behavioral training due to their different enhancing effects. I also suggest possible mechanisms for cognitive-enhancing drugs and behavioral training and for the synergistic effects of their simultaneous application.

In this article, we critically examine some of the ethical challenges and interpretive difficulties with possible future non-clinical applications of pediatric fMRI with a particular focus on applications in the classroom and the courtroom - two domains in which children come directly in contact with the state. We begin with a general overview of anticipated clinical and non-clinical applications of pediatric fMRI. This is followed by a detailed analysis of a range of ethical challenges and interpretive difficulties that trouble the (...) use of fMRI and are likely to be especially acute with non-clinical uses of the technology. We conclude that knowledge of these challenges and difficulties should influence policy decisions regarding the non-clinical uses of fMRI. Our aim is to encourage the development of future policies prescribing the responsible use of this neuroimaging technology as it develops both within and outside the clinical setting. (shrink)

The use of genetic testing and neuroscientific evidence in legal trials raises several issues. Often their interpretation is controversial: the same evidence can be used to sustain both the prosecution’s and defense’s argument. A recent Italian case confirms such concerns and stresses other relevant related questions.

Direct brain intervention based mental capacity restoration techniques-for instance, psycho-active drugs-are sometimes used in criminal cases to promote the aims of justice. For instance, they might be used to restore a person's competence to stand trial in order to assess the degree of their responsibility for what they did, or to restore their competence for punishment so that we can hold them responsible for it. Some also suggest that such interventions might be used for therapy or reform in criminal legal (...) contexts-i.e. to make non-responsible and irresponsible people more responsible. However, I argue that such interventions may at least sometimes fail to promote these responsibility-related legal aims. This is because responsibility hinges on other factors than just what mental capacities a person has-in particular, it also hinges on such things as authenticity, personal identity, and mental capacity ownership-and some ways of restoring mental capacity may adversely affect these other factors. Put one way, my claim is that what might suffice for the restoration of competence need not necessarily suffice for the restoration of responsibility, or, put another way, that although responsibility indeed tracks mental capacity it may not always track restored mental capacities. (shrink)

This is a report on the 3-day workshop “The Neuroscience of Responsibility” that was held in the Philosophy Department at Delft University of Technology in The Netherlands during February 11th–13th, 2010. The workshop had 25 participants from The Netherlands, Germany, Italy, UK, USA, Canada and Australia, with expertise in philosophy, neuroscience, psychology, psychiatry and law. Its aim was to identify current trends in neurolaw research related specifically to the topic of responsibility, and to foster international collaborative research on this topic. (...) The workshop agenda was constructed by the participants at the start of each day by surveying the topics of greatest interest and relevance to participants. In what follows, we summarize (1) the questions which participants identified as most important for future research in this field, (2) the most prominent themes that emerged from the discussions, and (3) the two main international collaborative research project plans that came out of this meeting. (shrink)

In recent years, two distinct trajectories of bioethical inquiry have emerged: neuroethics and nanoethics. The former deals with issues in neuroscience, whereas the latter deals with issues in nanoscience and nanotechnology. In both cases, the ethical inquiries have coalesced in response to rapidly increasing scientific and engineering developments in each field. Both also present major issues for contemplation in bioethics. However, the questions are (1) how different are the ethical issues raised, and (2) is it beneficial for neuroethics and nanoethics (...) inquiries to proceed on often-divergent trajectories by ethicists who otherwise might never interact? If, for example, ethical inquiry occurs only within the disciplinary confines of their predominant area(s) of science (which now seems to be the case) or by overlooking prior discussions in other scientific realms (like genetics), then the opportunity for a richer, more comprehensive discourse may be lost. I argue that this (1) is a disservice to bioethics, (2) is antithetical to some of the aims of bioethical inquiry, and (3) encourages the reductionism bioethicists’ claim that is counterproductive. (shrink)