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Showing posts from January, 2014

Bias in the Academy: From Neural Networks to Social Networks Symposium Video Archive

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Did you miss our annual neuroethics symposium?  Now you can watch the video archive of the event! Just click below on the link of the title of the session and then click play. Neuroethics Symposium December 10, 2013 Bias in the Academy: From Neural Networks to Social Networks.   This neuroethics symposia is designed to discuss the complex influence of stereotype/bias on academia and apply advances in the science of stereotype bias to university policies and practices. Through a pre-symposia seminar series and symposia, a white paper will be produced to highlight challenges and to put forth practical solutions to move toward mitigating the detrimental influence of bias and stereotyping in academia.   Part I: 9:15-10:15 am - Elizabeth Phelps The Neuroscience of Race Bias          Part II: 10:30-11:30 am - Chad Forbes Gaining Insight from a Biased Brain: Implications for the Stigmatized       ...

Neuroethics Journal Club Report: "Creating a false memory in the hippocampus" Ramirez et al. Science 2013

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Our memory can be unreliable, that comes as no surprise. But beyond forgetting where the car is parked or misremembering a date, a perhaps more interesting phenomenon is that of false memories of events that have never happened, or at least not to us directly. In most cases, the fallibility of memory is benign or occasionally embarrassing, but in the courtroom it can have serious consequences. In the final Neuroethics Journal Club of the semester, Emory University graduate student and  AJOB Neuroscience  editorial intern, Katie Strong, led a thought-provoking discussion of Ramirez’s 2013  Science  paper 1  entitled “Creating a false memory in the hippocampus” with a focus on the potential neuroethical implications of this research on the justice system. The discussion paper comes from  1987 Nobel laureate  Susumu Tonegawa’s lab and is in some ways a sequel to their 2012 paper published in  Nature 2 . In both studies this group utilized an elegantl...

Static and dynamic metaphysics of free will: A pragmatic perspective

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By Eric Racine, PhD and Victoria Saigle Dr. Eric Racine is the director of the Neuroethics Research Unit at the Institut de recherches cliniques de Montréal and holds academic appointments in the Department of Medicine and the Department of Social and Preventive Medicine at Université de Montréal and in the Department of Neurology and Neurosurgery, the Department of Medicine, and the Biomedical Ethics Unit at McGill University. He is also a member of the AJOB Neuroscience Editorial Board. Victoria Saigle is a research assistant at the Neuroethics Research Unit at the Institut de recherches cliniques de Montréal. In the public eye, one of the most striking types of findings neuroscience research claims to unravel concerns how decisions are made and whether these decisions are made “freely”. Unpacking the relationship between what is meant by “freely” and other neighboring notions such as “voluntarily”, “informed”, “conscious”, “undetermined”, “uncoerced”, “autonomous”, “controlle...

Autism and Well-Being

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By Richard Ashcroft, MA, PhD Professor Richard Ashcroft teaches medical law and ethics at both the undergraduate and postgraduate level in the Department of Law at Queen Mary, University of London. Previously, he was Professor of Biomedical Ethics in the School of Medicine and Dentistry, and before that he worked at Imperial College London, Bristol University and Liverpool University. Professor Ashcroft is Co-Director of the Centre for the Study of Incentives in Health, funded by the Wellcome Trust, with partners at Kings College London and the London School of Economics.  He is also working on the role of human rights theory, law and practice in bioethics policy, and on ethical challenges in public health. He has a longstanding interest in biomedical research ethics.  I am both someone who writes and teaches on bioethics, and father of a son with autism.  He’s a delightful and happy child and he and I have good lives. But like most parents of children with autism I do wo...