Neuroscience and the Law: Free will, responsibility and punishment

神经科学与法律：自由意志、责任与惩罚

• 批准号: AH/J011061/1
• 负责人: Helen Beebee
• 金额: $ 3.04万
• 依托单位: University of London
• 依托单位国家: 英国
• 项目类别: Research Grant
• 财政年份: 2012
• 资助国家: 英国
• 起止时间: 2012 至 无数据
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://gtr.ukri.org/projects?ref=AH%2FJ011061%2F1
• 关键词: Neuroscience; Law; Free; will; responsibility

Recently there has been a huge amount of academic debate about, and public and legal practitioner interest in, the general question of how or whether neuroscientific discoveries should prompt us to reconsider the theoretical underpinnings of, or the actual practice of, the legal system. Developments in neuroscience increasingly uncover the underlying causal mechanisms in the brain that generate our behaviour, thus raising the question whether it is 'us' or instead our brains that are really responsible for what we do. This raises questions both about whether we act freely - something that is central to both the moral and legal notions of responsibility - and about whether the purpose of punishment for criminal acts should be conceived as a matter of retribution or rehabilitation.However, the academic debate has largely been focussed on specifically philosophical issues (involving neuroscientists and philosophers) or specifically legal issues (involving neuroscientists and lawyers). Philosophy can bring conceptual clarity and a significant body of relevant philosophical discussion to the debate about law and neuroscience; while the law, in turn, brings a practical dimension to philosophical debates about free will, moral responsibility and punishment. This project therefore aims to explore the extent to which three-way collaboration between philosophers, lawyers and neuroscientists can shed additional light on these questions.

最近，关于神经科学的发现如何或是否应该促使我们重新考虑法律的体系的理论基础或实际实践的一般性问题，学术界展开了大量的辩论，公众和法律的从业者对此也很感兴趣。神经科学的发展越来越多地揭示了大脑中产生我们行为的潜在因果机制，从而提出了一个问题，即真正对我们所做的事情负责的是“我们”还是我们的大脑。这就提出了两个问题：我们是否自由行动-这是道德和法律的责任概念的核心-以及惩罚犯罪行为的目的是否应被视为报复或改造问题。学术争论主要集中在具体的哲学问题上（涉及神经科学家和哲学家）或特别是法律的问题（涉及神经科学家和律师）。哲学可以为关于法律和神经科学的辩论带来概念上的清晰和重要的相关哲学讨论;而法律反过来又为关于自由意志，道德责任和惩罚的哲学辩论带来了实践层面。因此，该项目旨在探索哲学家，律师和神经科学家之间的三方合作在多大程度上可以进一步阐明这些问题。