Does Neuroscience Undermine Deontological Theory?
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Does Neuroscience Undermine Deontological Theory? Richard Dean
Received: 7 July 2009 / Accepted: 12 October 2009 / Published online: 14 November 2009 # Springer Science + Business Media B.V. 2009
Abstract Joshua Greene has argued that several lines of empirical research, including his own fMRI studies of brain activity during moral decision-making, comprise strong evidence against the legitimacy of deontology as a moral theory. This is because, Greene maintains, the empirical studies establish that “characteristically deontological” moral thinking is driven by prepotent emotional reactions which are not a sound basis for morality in the contemporary world, while “characteristically consequentialist” thinking is a more reliable moral guide because it is characterized by greater cognitive command and control. In this essay, I argue that Greene does not succeed in drawing a strong statistical or causal connection between prepotent emotional reactions and deontological theory, and so does not undermine the legitimacy of deontological moral theories. The results that Greene relies on from neuroscience and social psychology do not establish his conclusion that consequentialism is superior to deontology. Keywords Deontology . Consequentialism . Personal moral dilemmas . Joshua Greene . Neuroscience . Harmless wrongs Joshua Greene’s work in neuroscience deserves the considerable attention it has received from moral philosophers. The fMRI studies that Greene and his colleagues conducted have opened a rich discussion R. Dean (*) California State University Los Angeles, Los Angeles, USA e-mail: [email protected]
of the neural activity associated with different types of moral thinking, and this line of inquiry may well have significant implications for moral theory. However, I think there is good reason to be skeptical of Greene’s recent attempt, in “The Secret Joke of Kant’s Soul,” to draw particular, anti-deontological conclusions from empirical studies [1]. Greene has argued that several lines of empirical research, including his own fMRI studies of brain activity during moral decision-making, comprise strong evidence against both the reliability of particular “characteristically deontological” judgments and against deontological moral theories, which Greene maintains are elaborate rationalizations of these particular deontological judgments [1]. The fMRI studies, Greene maintains, show that deontological thinking arises from areas of the brain more associated with automatic, “emotional” reactions, while utilitarian thinking arises from more “cognitive” areas of the brain like the anterior cingulate cortex and dorsolateral prefrontal cortex. Similarly, social psychology studies of “harmless wrongs” show an emotional or noncognitive basis for judgments that harmless (but disgusting or offensive) actions are wrong, and other studies show that retributive (and therefore deontological) judgments regarding punishment of wrongdoers have an emotional rather than cognitive basis. Greene argues that all of these lines of researc
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