Bioethics and Brains

How neuroethics can be increasingly relevant and informative for inclusive social policy and political discourse about brain science and technologies.

Neuroethics, a field just over two decades old, addresses both ethical issues generated in and by brain sciences and the neuroscientific studies of moral and ethical thought and action. These foci are reciprocally interactive and prompt questions of how science and ethics can and should harmonize. In Bioethics and Brains, John R. Shook and James Giordano ask: How can the brain sciences inform ethics? And how might ethics guide the brain sciences and their real-world applications?

The authors’ structure for a disciplined neuroethics reconciles science and ethics by requiring ethical principles consistent with moral neuroscience and moral psychology. Their cosmopolitan perspective looks beyond Western theories toward a new metaethics for neuroethics and illustrates its approach in chapters that address the issues and approaches to questions and problems generated by the proliferation of neurotechnology in global contexts. Shook and Giordano posit that neuroethics can merge science and ethics toward establishing global consensus on guiding brain research, neurotechnological innovation, and grounding neurorights.Acknowledgments
1. Introduction
2. Disciplinary Neuroethics
3. Integrated Neuroethics
4. Prescriptive Neuroethics
5. Natural Neuroethics
6. Principled Neuroethics
7. Neuroethics beyond Normal
Notes
Index“Bioethics and Brains places neuroscience and neuroethics into nuanced conversation. Avoiding the usual dualisms, Shook and Giordano have written an elegant volume that articulates a novel epistemology destined to inform the future of neuroethics.”
—Joseph J. Fins, E. William Davis, Jr. M.D. Professor of Medical Ethics and Chief of the Division of Medical Ethics, Weill Cornell Medicine; Visiting Professor of Law, Yale Law School; author of Rights Come to Mind: Brain Injury, Ethics, and the Struggle for Consciousness
 
“Bioethics and Brains is a thoughtful and thought-provoking discussion of current and future neurotechnology and its actual and potential effects on us. Steering clear of hyped or dystopian interpretations of neuroscience research and its clinical applications, Shook and Giordano provide a realistic and responsible neuroethics that will guide readers in considering the normative implications of mapping, monitoring, and altering the brain.”
—Walter Glannon, Professor of Philosophy, University of Calgary
 
“For ‘global endeavors across science, technology, economics, sociocultural trends, politics, and law, neuroethical discussions must be international, both in scope and spirt.’ This quotation from Bioethics and Brains captures the very essence of the future of neuroethics (Neuroethics 3.0) and the worldwide playing field for ethics and neuroscience. This latest book in the growing collection of books on neuroethics is thoughtful, fresh, and illuminating.”
—Judy Illes, Professor of Neurology, Distinguished University Scholar, and UBC Distinguished Professor in Neuroethics, University of British Columbia; Director, Neuroethics CanadaJohn R. Shook is Associate Professor of Philosophy at Bowie State University in Maryland and an Instructor with the Liberal Studies Graduate Program at Georgetown University in Washington, DC. He coedited Ectogenesis and Neuroscience, Neurophilosophy, and Pragmatism, and he authored Pragmatism (MIT Press).

James Giordano is the Pellegrino Center Professor of Neurology and Chief of the Neuroethics Studies Program at Georgetown University Medical Center, Washington, DC; Senior Bioethicist of the US Department of Defense Medical Ethics Center; and Chair Emeritus of the Neuroethics Project, IEEE Brain Initiative.