By David Seminowicz A potential difficulty, but also an opportunity, relating to using neuroimaging evidence in legal cases arises from the difficulty brain researchers have in separating emotional and physical pain. We know that pain and emotion are tightly linked. In fact, “emotion” is in the very definition of pain. The IASP definition of pain…
By Martha Farah Neurolaw includes some fascinating issues that lack any practical legal significance – for example whether we should consider anyone responsible for anything they do, given that all behavior is physically caused by brain processes. It also includes some legally important issues that lack intellectual juiciness – like regulatory issues surrounding neurotechnology. Thank…
By Norman L. Cantor France recently confronted its version of America’s 2005 Schiavo case (in which the Florida Supreme Court upheld a spouse’s determination to end life support to a permanently unconscious patient despite the patient’s parents’ objections). In 2014, France’s Conseil d’Etat ruled that artificial nutrition and hydration (ANH) could be withdrawn from a…
By Amanda C. PustilnikI am excited to join the Petrie-Flom Center as the first Senior Fellow in Law & Applied Neuroscience. This fellowship is the product of an innovative partnership between the Petrie-Flom Center and the Center for Law, Brain and Behavior (CLBB) at Massachusetts General Hospital. This partnership aims to translate developments in neuroscience…
By Dov Fox The U.S. Supreme Court has not in recent years held the views of the American Psychological Association (APA) in so high regard as it did this week. In 2012, the Court set aside the APA’s arguments for why due process requires the exclusion of eyewitness testimony obtained under suggestive circumstances that rendered it especially likely to…
By Nathaniel Counts In our legal system, colleges may not make admissions decisions in order to ameliorate historical (or presumably other) inequalities, but may make decisions that take into account the particular situation of the applicant or that strive to create a diverse student body. Justice Powell rejected the former two goals in Part IV…
By Deborah Cho In recent years, providers have attempted to shift how health care is delivered so as to include the patient in the decision-making process. This concept of shared decision-making was most memorably relayed to me in medical school through a critical lesson during which we were instructed to replace the word “noncompliant” with…
Evaluating the Revised Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-5) Tuesday, March 11, 2014, 12:00pm Wasserstein Hall 3018, Harvard Law School, 1585 Massachusetts Ave. The DSM is the reference used by clinicians, researchers, and insurers to diagnose and classify mental disorders, with the intent to provide specific, objective criteria by which to assess symptoms and…
Evaluating the Revised Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-5) Tuesday, March 11, 2014, 12:00pm Wasserstein Hall 3018, Harvard Law School, 1585 Massachusetts Ave. The DSM is the reference used by clinicians, researchers, and insurers to diagnose and classify mental disorders, with the intent to provide specific, objective criteria by which to assess symptoms…
By Michelle Meyer This is post is part of The Bioethics Program’s ongoing Online Symposium on the Munoz and McMath cases, which I’ve organized, and is cross-posted from the symposium. To see all symposium contributions, in reverse chronological order, click here. Had the hospital not relented and removed the ventilator from Marlise Munoz’s body, could…
