What is Neurophilosophy? Characteristics and topics for reflection

A summary of neurophilosophy, a field of research in expansion.

Philosophy is the primordial discipline of study, the one that, for millennia, has been dedicated to addressing the transcendental questions about reality itself.

One of its most modern branches is neurophilosophy, which, unlike others, has a Biological basis, as we will explore below.

• Related article, "How are psychology and philosophy similar?"

Definition of Neurophilosophy

This is a subdiscipline of philosophy that connects philosophy with neuroscience (the study of the nervous system).. In fact it is also known as philosophy of neuroscience. And it is an interdisciplinary study of the two.

In other words, it is the study of the connections between the mind and the brain. He argues that the whole psychology of the human being must be explained by the organic structure of the brain, so it is necessary to study the functioning of this organ to understand in depth the essence of our thoughts.

Methods of study

The main problem that arises at the time of entering into this discipline is that both mind and brain can only be studied indirectly.. We will now look at some of the methods most commonly used in this way.

1. Functional magnetic resonance imaging

This is a a well-known medical technique for imaging brain activity in specific regions of the brain.. The machine needed to perform them is the same as the conventional MRI, although there are some differences in the programs used for image processing. In general, no previous contrast injection is needed, although for some specific techniques within the fMRI it should be applied.

A synthesized explanation of the operation of this technique would be the following. The individual is introduced into the MRI machine, and has to be completely still except for the specific part of the body that we ask him to move, for example, the fingers. In this way, by obtaining the images of the brain during rest and movement, we will be able to clearly observe which areas reflect greater activity when performing a particular task.

Functional magnetic resonance imaging is especially useful for neuroscience in general and neurophilosophy in particular because it it allows us to establish which areas of the brain are dedicated to essential functions (e.g., language). Another great advantage of fMRI is that it shows us in a visible and objective way the effect of a medication, which goes far beyond the information that the patient himself can verbalize from his subjective experience.

Not only neurophilosophy drinks from this technique. Other transversal neuroscience studies, such as neuromarketing or neuroeconomics, also use this method to observe the brain regions where we make financial decisions.

A variant that has been used for a short time is functional magnetic resonance imaging in a resting state, i.e. where the individual is not in a state of rest.This means that the individual is not performing any specific task, but simply the natural flow of his thoughts. In this way it is possible to study the patterns of activity that occur on the surface of the brain in this apparent state of rest, and thus identify the elementary architecture that occurs in these processes of brain activation during a neutral state in the person studied.

Criticism

Neuroscientists such as Michael Anderson do not entirely agree with the weight given to this technique to obtain information on how we think.They maintain that in the visual records obtained we are losing a lot of data, and that it is necessary to take into account both the activation that occurs for the task and the activation that occurs for control, and with the technique studied we could not see the areas activated during control that are also involved in the task.

Others directly reject the technique because they maintain that the brain acts as a whole, and that cognition involves the joint functioning of a large part of the brain structures, and therefore cannot be reduced to a specific region. They ask that the effect observed by functional magnetic resonance imaging should not be confused with the specific function of that area of the brain..

2. Cognitive neuropsychology

This branch of psychology also provides valuable records that feed the theoretical foundations of neurophilosophy. In this case the procedure is to study people who have suffered a brain injury and to determine which of their psychological functions have been altered, so that we can establish a connection between the two.In this way, we can establish a connection between the damaged part of the brain and the altered or impaired behaviors.

Neuropsychology has famous studies with which we can see more clearly the concepts we are talking about.

Phineas Gage

The case of Phineas Gage is one of the oldest (it occurred in 1848), but also one of the most relevant for brain studies. This individual was a laborer who, during a day's work, suffered an accident in which an explosion caused an iron bar to shoot out, with such bad fortune that it pierced his skull, entering under his head and entering his brain.It entered below his left cheekbone and exited at the top.

Obviously, after such severe damage, the most logical thing would have been for Phineas to die instantly. But that was not the case, far from it. In fact, after the accident, he was able to walk, talk and think completely normally. So he didn't suffer any after-effects after seeing his brain literally being pierced by a metal rod?

Yes, there were after-effects, but they were of a different kind. What Phineas Gage was affected was his personality, the very essence of his being. Apparently, prior to this event, Mr. Gage was a polite, kind, and generally sociable man. Following the severe damage to his frontal lobe, he became much more dependent on his more primal impulsesHe lost his patience easily, was inconsistent in his tasks, disrespectful to his fellow man, and totally incapable of holding down a job.

In other words: he stopped being who he was and became a different person.

Paul Broca and Tan

The famous Dr. Broca discovered the brain area that today bears his name by studying the patient Tan, so called because he was unable to pronounce any other word.

After documenting in detail the characteristics of the aphasia that Tan and other patients with similar symptomatology, he was able to relate it to the brain damage he observed when performing the autopsies and thus conclude that there had to be necessarily a relationship between the atrophied area and the altered language functions..

Other studies

Although the list is long, we can summarize by indicating that many other laboratory tests have been done to associate brain regions to specific functions.

For example, with wounded soldiers in World War I, it was discovered that the occipital lobe controlled vision, and therefore damage to the occipital lobe was found to be the most important function of the occipital lobe.Therefore, damage to this region could even leave the subject blind.

On the other hand, the famous patient HM had a region of the temporal lobes removed, as it was believed that this would improve his epilepsy. The result, instead, was an anterograde amnesia which, although it was a terrible misfortune for the patient, made it possible to establish the direct connection between the excised area and the function of creating new memories.

Computational neuroscience

It is an interdisciplinary science that encompasses many different fields and its objective is to create computational models that realistically simulate the neuronal functioning of our brain. In other words, to obtain a virtual image that adequately represents the distribution and activity of neural networks.

However, many representatives of neurophilosophy However, many representatives of neurophilosophy have rejected the use of this discipline and the usefulness of the mathematical models obtained to explain the functioning of the brain. the use of this discipline and the usefulness of the mathematical models obtained to explain the functioning of the mind.

In summary

We have made a theoretical overview of neurophilosophy and its sources. This is an interesting discipline with a long way to go, but we have seen how difficult it is to associate a thought or belief, as well as its underlying mechanisms, with a specific neuronal region of our brain.

There remains, therefore, much to be done in this field, and who knows if progress will be made in this area.And who knows whether advances in computational neuroscience and its increasingly complex mathematical models, and even the fast-paced quest for true artificial intelligence, will lead to a leap in our understanding of the philosophy that unites mind and brain.

It may be that once we achieve such advances we will have the tools to resolve questions of absolute transcendence, which have been in our thinking since antiquity, such as free will.

Bibliographical references:

• Davis, W.J. (1980). Neurophilosophical Reflections on Central Nervous Pattern Generators. Behavioral and Brain Sciences.
• Hebb, D. (2002). The Organization of Behavior: A Neuropsychological Theory. Psychology Press.
• Rodríguez, A. (2002). Neurophilosophy as a meeting point between philosophy and neuroscience. Contrastes. International Journal of Philosophy.
• Anderson, M.L.(2007). The Massive Redeployment Hypothesis and Functional Topography of the Brain. Philosophical Psychology Vol20.
• E. Proal, M. Álvarez-Segura, M. de la Iglesia-Vayá, L. Martí-Bonmatí, F.X. Castellanos, S.R. (2011). Functional brain activity in the resting state: networks in connection. Journal of Neurology. Viguera.