Brain and mind

The human brain has been the subject of unprecedented research efforts for several decades. In the European Union’s Human Brain Project alone, more than half a billion euros were spent on research grants between 2013 and 2023. Improved imaging techniques such as magnetic resonance imaging or positron emission tomography, together with other innovative technologies in areas such as neurogenetics or neuroinformatics, are providing an increasingly precise understanding of the structure and function of the brain. These new insights into the brain are being complemented by new possibilities for intervention. For example, stimulation techniques such as deep brain stimulation or transcranial magnetic stimulation are not only used to treat neurological disorders such as Parkinson’s disease, but also to alleviate psychiatric disorders such as depression or obsessive-compulsive disorder.

The enormous promises of neuroscience are not always followed by the desired results. In particular, hopes of revolutionising our understanding of the human psyche through insights into the functioning of the brain have regularly been disappointed. This holds true, for example, for ambitious attempts to place the diagnosis of psychiatric illnesses on a completely new, “more objective” foundation through brain imaging techniques or the collection of biomarkers in the laboratory. As a critical authority, neurophilosophy has established itself as an independent sub-discipline of philosophy in parallel with the boom in neuroscience. A common line of argument in neurophilosophy is, for example, to reject certain assumptions about the relationship between the human brain and the human mind as simplistic or reductionist. This applies to the widespread thesis that neuroscience has proven that there is no such thing as free will. If it was true, this would have far-reaching consequences for the way we understand ourselves as human beings and would also challenge fundamental ethical assumptions about human autonomy and responsibility. It therefore is commonplace now to speak not only of neurophilosophy but also of neuroethics. In this branch of applied ethics, ethically relevant neuroscientific concepts are discussed alongside new kinds of intervention made possible by brain research. In addition to the techniques of brain stimulation mentioned before, the latter include efforts to improve people’s cognitive abilities or mood with the help of psycho- or neuropharmaceuticals (so-called neuro-enhancement).