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by Carolyn Plunkett Carolyn Plunkett is a Ph.D. Candidate in the Philosophy Department at The Graduate Center of City University of New York. She is also an Ethics Fellow in The Bioethics Program at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, and a Research Associate in the Division of Medical Ethics at NYU Langone Medical Center. Carolyn will defend her dissertation in spring 2016, and, beginning July 2016, will be a Rudin Post-Doctoral Fellow in the Divisions of Medical Ethics and Medical Humanities at NYU Langone Medical Center.  This post is part of a series that recaps and offers perspectives on the conversations and debates that took place at the recent 2015 International Neuroethics Society meeting. Karen Rommelfanger , founding editor of The Neuroethics Blog, heard a talk I gave on deep brain stimulation (DBS) at Brain Matters! 3 in 2012. Three years later, she heard a brief synopsis of a paper I presented a few weeks ago at the International Neuroethics Society Annual Mee...

by Carlie Hoffman Much of today’s neuroscience research investigating human brain diseases and disorders utilizes animal models. Animals ranging from flies, rodents, and non-human primates are routinely used to model various disorders, with mice being most commonly utilized. Scientists employ these animal models to approximate human conditions and disorders in an accessible manner, with the ultimate purpose of applying the findings derived in the animal back into the human brain. Rhesus macaques , a species of NHP often used in research. The use of animals in research has been the source of much debate, with people either supporting or objecting their use, and objections arising from animal rights activists , proponents of critical neuroscience such as Nikolas Rose and Joelle Abi-Rached , and others. A main focus of this debate has also been the use of non-human primates (NHP) in research. The cognitive functions and behaviors of NHPs are more closely related to those seen in hu...

by John Banja , PhD *Editor's note: In case you missed our annual Zombies and Zombethics (TM) Symposium entitled Really, Most Sincerely Dead. Zombies, Vampires and Ghosts. Oh my! you can watch our opening keynote by Dr. Paul Root Wolpe by clicking on the image below. We recommend starting at 9:54 min. Two weeks ago, I attended a panel session on brain death at the annual conference of the American Society for Bioethics and Humanities . Forgive the bad pun, but the experience left me cold and …lifeless(?). The panel consisted of three scholars revisiting the more than a decade old conversation on defining death . Despite a standing room only crowd, there was utterly nothing new. Rather, we heard a recitation of the very familiar categories that have historically figured in the “What does it mean to be dead?” debate, e.g., the irreversible cessation of cardio-respiratory activity, the Harvard Brain Death criteria , the somatic integration account, the 2008 Presidential Commissi...

by Dr. Hannah Maslen  Hannah Maslen  is a Research Fellow in Ethics at the Oxford Martin School and the Oxford Uehiro  Centre for Practical Ethics. She currently works on the Oxford Martin Programme on Mind and Machine, where she examines the ethical, legal, and social implications of various brain intervention and interface technologies, from brain stimulation devices to virtual reality.  This post is part of a series that recaps and offers perspectives on the conversations and debates that took place at the recent 2015 International Neuroethics Society meeting. In its Gray Matters report, the United States Presidential Commission for the Study of Bioethical Issues underscored the importance of integrating ethics and neuroscience early and throughout the research endeavor.  In particular, the Commission declared:  "As we anticipate personal and societal implications of using such technologies, ethical considerations must be further deliberated.   Ex...