Moral Judgments Can Be Altered: Neuroscientists Influence People’s Moral Judgments ...

[amyrose2712]

Moral Judgments Can Be Altered: Neuroscientists Influence People’s Moral Judgments by Disrupting Specific Brain Region

ScienceDaily (Mar. 30, 2010) — MIT neuroscientists have shown they can influence people's moral judgments by disrupting a specific brain region -- a finding that helps reveal how the brain constructs morality.

To make moral judgments about other people, we often need to infer their intentions -- an ability known as "theory of mind." For example, if a hunter shoots his friend while on a hunting trip, we need to know what the hunter was thinking: Was he secretly jealous, or did he mistake his friend for a duck?

Previous studies have shown that a brain region known as the right temporo-parietal junction (TPJ) is highly active when we think about other people's intentions, thoughts and beliefs. In the new study, the researchers disrupted activity in the right TPJ by inducing a current in the brain using a magnetic field applied to the scalp. They found that the subjects' ability to make moral judgments that require an understanding of other people's intentions -- for example, a failed murder attempt -- was impaired.


http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/03/100329152516.htm

[unpossibles]

1. interesting

thanks for the link.

[havocmom]

2. Thanks for posting.

looking forward to some quiet time to read this and ponder the mind

[Cronus Protagonist]

3. Few of these "moral judgments" are accurate anyway

Watch how many people say, "They think..." and how WRONG they are most of the time.

[wildflower]

4. I wonder who that hunting anecdote was referring to?

:)

[BeFree]

5. Aha!!

That's why those aliens have the antennae. Tapped in and tuned on.

[harry_pothead]

6. I wonder if TPJ activity can be enhanced instead of impaired.

If so, we need to develop that treatment and amend HCR to include free trials for Republican senators.