My latest MercatorNet story: Brain scans and neurotrash
It's the ultimate branding strategy. Just slap "neuro" before a word and the goofiest speculation becomes respectable science." Here: Unfortunately, neurotrash may not always be harmless nonsense in marketing departments about what color of car people choose. Increasingly, in the form of neurolaw, it is catching on in the legal profession, in the same way that lie detector tests did decades ago. What happened there was that some people learned to fake results - people who may well have committed serious crimes. Who knows how many others were damaged by false results when they were innocent?

Neuroscience: Man was conscious 23 years ... but who except him knew?
At the Mail Online, Allan Hall reports (November 23, 2009) on the case of a man who was conscious for 23 years, but no one knew because he was paralyzed.A car crash victim has spoken of the horror he endured for 23 years after he was misdiagnosed as being in a coma when he was conscious the whole time.Rom Houben, trapped in his paralysed body after a car crash, described his real-life nightmare as he screamed to doctors that he could hear them - but could make no sound. 'I screamed, but there was nothing

Sociology: Should you add Satan to your Board of Directors?
Sociology: Should you add Satan to your Board of Directors?Belief in hell spurs economic growth?In "Satan, the great motivator: The curious economic effects of religion," Michael Fitzgerald(Boston Globe, November 15, 2009), advises, A pair of Harvard researchers recently examined 40 years of data from dozens of countries, trying to sort out the economic impact of religious beliefs or practices. They found that religion has a measurable effect on developing economies - and the most powerful influence relates t

Neuroscience and popular culture: Reasons not to buy "neuronovels" for people for Christma
In the age of neuro-everything, I am hardly surprised to hear about the neuronovel. Jonah Lehrer at Frontal Cortex reports, The last dozen years or so have seen the emergence of a new strain within the Anglo-American novel. What has been variously referred to as the novel of consciousness or the psychological or confessional novel-the novel, at any rate, about the workings of a mind-has transformed itself into the neurological novel, wherein the mind becomes the brain. ince 1997, readers have encountered, in rough chronological order, Ian McEwan's Enduring Love (de Clérambault's syndrome, c

Neurolaw: Confusing intent with motive is a threat to civil rights
Re the problem with "neurolaw" (the attempt to scan brains to identify criminal behaviour), I have said this before, but it is worth repeating in the context: Law is, or should be, concerned with "intent", not "motive."Yes, yes, in detective fiction, everything hinges on motive: Cousin Harry murdered Aunt Sally to get her fortune; plain Jane murdered pretty Kitty because Kitty got the man; squadron leader Beeder murdered that guy because of a long ago wartime betrayal ....However, real law depends in design inferences, not speculations about motive. Here