Magnetic field modifies morality

[Pythagorean]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8593748.stm

What are your thoughts and does anyone know if the proceedings are available without being a member?

 

[Evo]

So, morality is just above the right ear? That's too funny.

 

[Ivan Seeking]

Darn, I was still rooting for Descarte and the pineal gland.

 

[zoobyshoe]

Sounds bogus to me.

 

[Frame Dragger]

I don't see why this is surprising, or any stranger than a snort of oxytocin causing people to act in a more trusting manner (until they lose their minds of course...).

TMS (Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation) is not bogus, nor is it even particularly controversial, although it is still very much in its infancy. Much of what we consider to be moral actions, are pro-social actions, presumably ones which evolved and rely on neurological structures or processes.

Of course, is "morality above the right ear" or is just a handy place to disrupt a particular process? That, is still unkown, but if anyone here has met or worked with someone who suffered a TBI involving the frontal lobe, this isn't surprising at all.

@Pythagorean: I subscribe to the (general) JAMA and archives, but I don't see tha tit is published there. That said, JAMA has a great deal of free literature available, and much concerning TMS. Sadly, most of the free work is opinion or commentary.

 

[zoobyshoe]

Of course, is "morality above the right ear" or is just a handy place to disrupt a particular process? That, is still unkown, but if anyone here has met or worked with someone who suffered a TBI involving the frontal lobe, this isn't surprising at all.

It's precisely because there are so many "moral" degenerations associated with right frontal lobe damage (the case of Phineus Gage being the best known example) that locating morality in the rtpj seems suspect.

How is it they focused only on moral questions after stimulating this area? Would a broader range of questions reveal that it alters all kinds of situation analysis?

Also, it's an annoyingly unrigorous assertion. In the same way right frontal lobe damage causes "moral degeneration" because the right frontal lobe is responsible for impulse control, what is the actual function being interrupted here that seems to present as 'morality'?

I'm not disputing that TMS can alter the way the brain works, by the way.

 

[Frame Dragger]

It's precisely because there are so many "moral" degenerations associated with right frontal lobe damage (the case of Phineus Gage being the best known example) that locating morality in the rtpj seems suspect.

How is it they focused only on moral questions after stimulating this area? Would a broader range of questions reveal that it alters all kinds of situation analysis?

Also, it's an annoyingly unrigorous assertion. In the same way right frontal lobe damage causes "moral degeneration" because the right frontal lobe is responsible for impulse control, what is the actual function being interrupted here that seems to present as 'morality'?

I'm not disputing that TMS can alter the way the brain works, by the way.

Hey, that's why I said they could just as easily have disrupted a critical pathway or process. That said, Frontal Lobe Trauma usually hampers impulse control, the ability to reflect upon one's action, and plan. If you take that away, but the moral center remains, I still don't know that you'd be able to tell.

That the TMS did NOT have that full range of effects, is probably more telling than what the authors' conclusions were. As I said, this is very new; essentially TMS is (temporary) Psychosurgery, and that has always been a terribly blunt instrument. That said, they disrupted procesess' critical to behaviour we percieve as moral AT LEAST... I find that telling.

I would just add, that there is Mr. Gage was a REMARKABLE example... most people don't have a pipe through their head. Frontal TBI's are often much harder to quantify or qualify, because the damage is due to impact, swelling, or loss of circulation. When you then look at such a person in saaaay, an fMRI, you say, "Ah, the frontal lobe is relatively 'dark'," but is that becuase there is no demand being placed on it, or is it critically damaged?

I'm not saying that this was some amazing study, but "Sounds bogus to me" was not informative enough for me to understand your position. Frankly, it sounds as though we agree.

As for more questions, there are other studies, but it's going to be at least 3-5 years before there is enough data to BEGIN making declarative statements to BBC, or by the BBC. Then again, they're competing for funding, so not exactly a shock.

 

[Pythagorean]

It's precisely because there are so many "moral" degenerations associated with right frontal lobe damage (the case of Phineus Gage being the best known example) that locating morality in the rtpj seems suspect.

How is it they focused only on moral questions after stimulating this area? Would a broader range of questions reveal that it alters all kinds of situation analysis?

Also, it's an annoyingly unrigorous assertion. In the same way right frontal lobe damage causes "moral degeneration" because the right frontal lobe is responsible for impulse control, what is the actual function being interrupted here that seems to present as 'morality'?

I'm not disputing that TMS can alter the way the brain works, by the way.

That doesn't seem to conflict with the two assertions from the researcher (ignoring the journalist's remarks) that TMS "modifies morality" and that the "RTPJ is necessary for morality".

But I do agree that this is likely to be a specific process associated with morality, not morality itself (which is an abstract concept, not a behavior or task).

The Temporal and Parietal lobes have a lot to do with our world model. I think morality isn't much different. We learn cues about morality from our society. In the end, a lot of morality is a matter of 'social intelligence' (judging what society accepts and does not) which relies on episodic memories (being punished for being bad or seeing others punished for behavior) and semantic memories (when something is defined as bad).

Episodic memory is associated with the parietal lobes, while semantic memory is associated with the temporal lobes.

 

[Frame Dragger]

I have to say, I was pretty dissapointed by the journalist... the BBC used to be so much better than this. REUTERS used to be. DAMN I'm tired of everything being lost in translation, or an attempt at sensationalism.

 

[Pythagorean]

I have to say, I was pretty dissapointed by the journalist... the BBC used to be so much better than this. REUTERS used to be. DAMN I'm tired of everything being lost in translation, or an attempt at sensationalism.

Yeah, whenever I read these kinds of articles, I generally skip the aesthetics. This is why I was wondering if anyone had found a link to the actual proceedings so that we wouldn't even bother arguing over or discussing the journalism.

 

[Frame Dragger]

I looked... no joy yet. :(

 

[zoobyshoe]

That doesn't seem to conflict with the two assertions from the researcher (ignoring the journalist's remarks) that TMS "modifies morality" and that the "RTPJ is necessary for morality".

But I do agree that this is likely to be a specific process associated with morality, not morality itself (which is an abstract concept, not a behavior or task).

The Temporal and Parietal lobes have a lot to do with our world model. I think morality isn't much different. We learn cues about morality from our society. In the end, a lot of morality is a matter of 'social intelligence' (judging what society accepts and does not) which relies on episodic memories (being punished for being bad or seeing others punished for behavior) and semantic memories (when something is defined as bad).

You could get a person drunk, give them the same morality questions, and then conclude that alcohol's effect on people is that it disrupts morality. Of course it does, but that would be a narrow and mis-emphasized final conclusion to draw about alcohol: there's a lot more going on, and I have to wonder why these researchers are are screening for effects on 'morality' to begin with. It strongly suggests to me there's an agenda behind it.

 

[Pythagorean]

You could get a person drunk, give them the same morality questions, and then conclude that alcohol's effect on people is that it disrupts morality

Which has already been done...

Of course it does, but that would be a narrow and mis-emphasized final conclusion to draw about alcohol: there's a lot more going on, and I have to wonder why these researchers are are screening for effects on 'morality' to begin with.

I don't see an emphasis. If you're making generalizations in a global sense, you don't rely on one study. This kind of research is a contribution to the whole question, not an answer to it. You're speaking more to the responsibilities of the reader than to the experimenters.

It strongly suggests to me there's an agenda behind it.

What kind of agenda? I'm largely politically ignorant, so it's not surprising I can't find a motivation for deceit associated with this kind of experiment.

 

[zoobyshoe]

What kind of agenda? I'm largely politically ignorant, so it's not surprising I can't find a motivation for deceit associated with this kind of experiment.

An agenda, not a political agenda. What I suspect is something like this:

You may or may not be aware of the attention Ramachandran got when he published his hastily put together speculations about a "God-Module" in the brain. He, himself, quickly realized that the criticism of it, that it was based on only two or three patients, was a good criticism and he regretted having let the idea get into print without more study and thought. Regardless, the notion spread like wildfire, and even became the crux of a plot of an X-files episode. It made him a minor celebrity.

I am thinking these researchers may be trying for something similar with the 'discovery' of a "Morality Module". "Magnetic field modifies morality" is vastly more attention getting than "TMS alters hierarchy of values in social analysis" or whatever title might be more soberly descriptive. In the world of "Publish or Perish" a study that gets picked up by the popular media is a feather in your cap. Even if it's picked apart by your colleages, as Ramachandran's experience demonstrates.

 

[zoobyshoe]

I would just add, that there is Mr. Gage was a REMARKABLE example... most people don't have a pipe through their head. Frontal TBI's are often much harder to quantify or qualify, because the damage is due to impact, swelling, or loss of circulation. When you then look at such a person in saaaay, an fMRI, you say, "Ah, the frontal lobe is relatively 'dark'," but is that becuase there is no demand being placed on it, or is it critically damaged?

I'm sure it may be difficult to assess the extent of the damage on a scan, but it doesn't take anything near Gage-like damage to the frontal lobes to produce amoral and anti-social behavior.

Couple of personal anecdotes: I once met a girl who had her right orbital fossa fractured by her ex boyfriend. In addition to a grand mal seizure about a year later, she had quit her job since the attack and become a stripper. There used to be a guy who was a regular seller at the swap meet I go to who was belligerent, profane, and completely unwilling to negotiate on any sales ("You're just tryin' to screw me. Take a hike, a-hole.") He always had the surly demeanor of someone who was very drunk and angry. One day his lady friend explained to me he'd been shot in the forehead at some point with a .22, and the bullet was still lodged in his brain.


A few years back I saw a program on TV where they gave that NY serial killer, Rifkin, I think his name was, an 8 hour battery of neurological tests. He did great on the bulk of them, and they even assessed his I.Q. at 125. Where he fell down completely was on the impulse control tests: failed all three flat out. The neurologist concluded there was no doubt he had something wrong with his right frontal lobe.

As you probably know chronic crystal meth users become completely amoral and lie outrageously without hesitation. Meth use has been pretty solidly linked to frontal lobe damage. And, of course, the link between sociopathic behavior and reduced frontal lobe functioning is probably known to you.

So, yes, Gage had some really extreme damage, but it was probably far in excess of the minimum required to produce an authentically amoral and anti-social person. I don't know what the minimum might be: scull fracture, cyst, occluded blood vessel? It doesn't have to be a pipe through the head, though.

 

[apeiron]

I wrote about TMS in my Lancet Neurology column some years back. It might be of some relevance...particularly this comment "Experiments indeed show that hitting the higher cortex releases the "lower brain" to make more rapid, less inhibited, automatic responses. People hesitate less when adding up numbers or naming objects in line drawings."

The kooks and spooks are circling. And as usual, I can't decide how to take them. Are they part of life's great rich tapestry? Or are they evidence of something fundamentally rotten about the modern intellect?

What I am talking about is TMS - transcranial magnetic stimulation. The other day an acquaintance confided he is working on a hush hush multi-coil set-up, funded by DARPA, the US defense research body. Existing TMS machines rely on a single large coil to deliver a jolt of magnetically-induced current to a patch of cortex. Neurologists will be familiar with it as a tool for mapping brain function - ahh, reversible lesions! - and its promise as a treatment for depression, perhaps even other illnesses like obsessive-compulsive disorder, schizophrenia or Parkinson's. Well, anyway, the obvious next step for this technology is to go miniaturised and multichannel; to build a helmet with 20 to 100 independently controlled coils.

Just think, drooled my researcher, rather than zap isolated chunks of brain you could massage whole neuronal networks. You could tug and twist at patterns of activity, really taking control of a person's state of mind. So why are the military interested in such technology? Well, came the coy answer, erm, it might be a great way to jazz up the brains of battle-weary soldiers, erasing their anxiety and fatigue just at the moment the action kicks off.

Yeah, right. We've all heard these kinds of cover stories before. Back in the 1960s the CIA pumped money into any number of wacky mind control techniques under thinly veiled excuses like needing to tackle shellshock or radar operator fatigue. Who can forget their dabbling with sensory deprivation, LSD, hypnosis and psychic "remote viewing".

But they also had a good go at techniques remarkably similar to TMS. There were the Directed Energy Weapons (DEW) where you beam microwaves in an attempt to scramble and disorientate brains. State Department files reveal one particularly crackpot suggestion was to record the EEG of brains in a desired mental state and then broadcast the rhythms in the hope of inducing the same state in targets. A good way to get enemy troops to turn and run, or put Soviet generals in an uncharacteristically generous mood at peace talks.

Then there were the Stimoceiver type devices - implanted electrodes that could be switched on remotely by radio signals. Neuroscientists showed how they could trigger rage or docility in monkeys at the flick of a switch. Or electrode arrays that could be programmed in sequence to control a paralysed arm. Perhaps a high-place foreign national could be trapped and operated on, then hypnotised to forget, awaiting the time when a buzzing in his brain would activate him for some nefarious purpose.

It's not so much the ethics of mind control that concern. It is that these technological fantasies - for they invariably ARE fantasies - seem to be taken seriously by some highly educated people. We have seen it before in other areas like artificial intelligence and Star Wars anti-missile systems. Are they just cynically spinning yarns to extract research grants? Is it all a clever ruse - a squirt of octopus ink - to panic and confuse the enemy? Or do too many live in a Looking Glass world where they are quite capable of believing six impossible things before breakfast?

Just as crazy are those who are talking about TMS as an IQ booster, a creativity unleasher. Recently Allan Snyder, a vision researcher who moved from Yale to set up a grandiose "Centre for the Mind" at the Australian National University in Canberra, has been advocating TMS blasts to the temple as a way of releasing the idiot savant in all of us. Experiments indeed show that hitting the higher cortex releases the "lower brain" to make more rapid, less inhibited, automatic responses. People hesitate less when adding up numbers or naming objects in line drawings. But to equate the obssesive mathematics or eidetic drawing of some autistics to true creativity - to genuine mastery over skill - is a wild misunderstanding of how brains actually work.

I don't mean to pick on Snyder. But just check out his website (Google on Snyder TMS) which is plastered with pictures of him meeting Nelson Mandela, the Dalai Lama, the Aussie Prime Minister, Oliver Sacks! Are we really meant to take him seriously?

Again, the question is do we laugh or cry? Perhaps it is all pretty harmless fun. After all, even the CIA only ever talked about trying out their very craziest ideas. And the likes of Snyder satisfy a public appetite for techno-boggle. But I still worry that too many may believe the sci-fi dreams.

 

[Frame Dragger]

Wow, we agree I think. I liken this to people being given snorts of Oxytocin, playing trust games, and then reading an article about "mind control sprays". Mind ALTERING sure, but then so is a pipe through the noggin.

This to me is just a new generation of the same old psychosurgeons, some with good intent and too much naivetee, some who do decent research but SERIOUSLY oversell the results for funding (understandable, but reperehensible), and most who as you so aptly say DROOL at the idea of being able to do to people for a while, what thay have to cats, dogs, and monkeys for MUCH longer.

What always gets to me about projects such as the ones you refer to (MK ULTRA and the like), beyond the ethical cluster****, is that they don't WORK. Inevitably, some people spill their guts if you dose them with scopolamine and sodium thiopental, many don't. NOW Midazolam is the big ticket, and again, some talk, most talk too much and just babble.

Why not just aim a Tesla Coil at someone's head at this point?! TMS clearly has an effect, but I question what kind of researcher, doctor or both is thinking when they move from that to "fine-tuning the mind". Oh, and Snyder we laugh at cry at, and realize that once again... going back to the CIA and DARPA... M.I.C.E.
Money
Ideology
Compromise/coercion
Ego

I believe that the bolds apply to Snyder and the middle two (C in the sense that they wish to do this to others) apply to DARPA. History seems to indicate that bluntly shutting down, or depressing those 'higher functions' also depressed the part you want to influence or talk to. As for control, I just have to laugh... DARPA is thrilled that they have RV Fruit Beetles ... as with mapping genomes, they should probably take the hint, along with anyone who thinks TMS is going to be more than mild and directed ECT sans obvious adverse reactions.

Everyone wants to alter the mind, but they set so few standards. I can alter my mind with a beer, or by getting a good or poor night's sleep, or by having a friend crack me in the head with a bat. Making the outcome useful and predictable... Now that is currently horse****.

Good column btw, grats on publishing in the Lancet.

 

[Frame Dragger]

Hmmm, now we can link this thread to discussions of Greek Philosophy; we both seem to agree that TMS as a "radical breakthrough" can best be described witha single word: "Hubris".
(note: metaphorically or literally, depending on beliefs of course)

 

[Pythagorean]

I am thinking these researchers may be trying for something similar with the 'discovery' of a "Morality Module".

I see...

I agree that we should see more about what they did do for control (asking non-moral questions, for instance) because of the obvious role of the rtjp in semantic memory in general.

Has anyone happened to find the proceedings themselves?

 

[Pythagorean]

With regard to TMS, I have no doubt that an electromagnetic field can influence neurons. The physics and neurobiology are actually quite easy to understand (especially since EM has the neat property of superposition).

TMS though, is a specific engineering attempt at doing that. I have no idea how it's designed or how it works, so I have no way to make a judgment on it.

 

[Pythagorean]

found it:

http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2010/03/11/0914826107.full.pdf
(I'm on a university isp and the pnas site identifies my Uni, so not sure if this will be available to everyone)

It seems to have a lot of references indicating the involvement of the rtpj. I don't know anything about the credibility of the journals involved though.

This is an article that has been cited 56 times. It's by the same author, alluding to the correlates between morality and the rtpj:
http://scholar.google.com/scholar?r...rtpj morality&um=1&ie=UTF-8&sa=N&hl=en&tab=ws

It seems the idea of the rtpj's involvement with morality has been discussed quite a bit in the last five or ten years. It would take a bit of digging to see exactly how because there's so many different papers here.

 

[Frame Dragger]

With regard to TMS, I have no doubt that an electromagnetic field can influence neurons. The physics and neurobiology are actually quite easy to understand (especially since EM has the neat property of superposition).

TMS though, is a specific engineering attempt at doing that. I have no idea how it's designed or how it works, so I have no way to make a judgment on it.

Two words: "Brute Force". Focused brute force, but still... BF nonetheless. I'm reminded of a reference to "reverse-phrenology" in a (purely fun) Simon R. Green story... the idea being that if the shape of the skull reflects morality, clearly using a hammer to change them...

...
yeah. Again, temporary psychosurgery.

 

[zoobyshoe]

I see...

I agree that we should see more about what they did do for control (asking non-moral questions, for instance) because of the obvious role of the rtjp in semantic memory in general.

I don't think a good investigation would be a matter of asking control verses moral questions, because that means your emphasis is still on morality. Some function is being interrupted that incidentally affects moral decisions and it seems they are not trying to pin point that function in a neutral way, that they are focusing on a moral spin. If this had been done with right frontal lobe cases we could already nickname that the "Morality Module" and completely miss the point that what is actually being affected is impulse control.

As you point out this might be some sort of memory interruption and as FrameDragger suggested it might just be a pathway interruption, in either of which cases the importance of this spot to morality is being hyped. With better questions it might be discovered that what is actually happening is that normal empathy responses are being suppressed, or that desire for approval (some subset of a pleasure-seeking mechanism) becomes non-operative, either of which could or would figure into what we'd ultimately call a "moral" decision. I am not suggesting it is either one of those, I'm just saying there are a lot of possibilities for deficits that could, incidentally, present as what we call "moral" deficits.

It is interesting, of course, that screwing with this area does affect moral decisions, but there's a danger of stopping there and considering it some sort of "Morality Module" when it's probably actually one contributor among many.

 

[zoobyshoe]

Two words: "Brute Force". Focused brute force, but still... BF nonetheless. I'm reminded of a reference to "reverse-phrenology" in a (purely fun) Simon R. Green story... the idea being that if the shape of the skull reflects morality, clearly using a hammer to change them...

...
yeah. Again, temporary psychosurgery.

I'm too lazy to look it up but I seem to recall it can either hyperactivate or hypoactivate the target area depending on field strength, frequency, etc.

 

[Frame Dragger]

I don't think a good investigation would be a matter of asking control verses moral questions, because that means your emphasis is still on morality. Some function is being interrupted that incidentally affects moral decisions and it seems they are not trying to pin point that function in a neutral way, that they are focusing on a moral spin. If this had been done with right frontal lobe cases we could already nickname that the "Morality Module" and completely miss the point that what is actually being affected is impulse control.

As you point out this might be some sort of memory interruption and as FrameDragger suggested it might just be a pathway interruption, in either of which cases the importance of this spot to morality is being hyped. With better questions it might be discovered that what is actually happening is that normal empathy responses are being suppressed, or that desire for approval (some subset of a pleasure-seeking mechanism) becomes non-operative, either of which could or would figure into what we'd ultimately call a "moral" decision. I am not suggesting it is either one of those, I'm just saying there are a lot of possibilities for deficits that could, incidentally, present as what we call "moral" deficits.

It is interesting, of course, that screwing with this area does affect moral decisions, but there's a danger of stopping there and considering it some sort of "Morality Module" when it's probably actually one contributor among many.

Well, you could screen for impulse vs. long-term "morality"... I just think that they would find BOTH in this case. That said, they need to define what they mean by "moral questions" vs. those that touch merely on socialzation, or enlightened self-interest, or a very MORAL person robget of the ability to adequately plan.

Even then, as Zooby said, if it's a matter of a process, one could spend decades (in fact, some are) making 'better' TMS, but then we're back to this as a blue-sky project, not scientific endevour.

 

[Frame Dragger]

I'm too lazy to look it up but I seem to recall it can either hyperactivate or hypoactivate the target area depending on field strength, frequency, etc.

That's true, which is the equivalent of using a smaller hammer and different strokes to the head. Again, from the EM perspective, you can see why researchers would go back to the "we can induce the proper mental resonance-ah blahblahbahsdubv0" and the DoD literally swoons. Given that this research is getting no less popular, I suppose we'll eventually get to see if this is a new fronteir, or if it's reverse-phrenology.

 

[zoobyshoe]

That's true, which is the equivalent of using a smaller hammer and different strokes to the head. Again, from the EM perspective, you can see why researchers would go back to the "we can induce the proper mental resonance-ah blahblahbahsdubv0" and the DoD literally swoons. Given that this research is getting no less popular, I suppose we'll eventually get to see if this is a new fronteir, or if it's reverse-phrenology.

Hehe. Well, in defense of TMS I must point out it's being used effectively to test for cortical spreading depression.

 

[Frame Dragger]

Hehe. Well, in defense of TMS I must point out it's being used effectively to test for cortical spreading depression.

True, and probably the research into TMS will yield more results, but that hardly justifies the claims made by some researchers (vs. clinicians using any port in a storm). I don't mean to say that this is worthless in the way that phrenology was pure fantasy, but rather to point out what a truly crude tool it is. That wouldn't be bad at all, but for the claims and expectations; the former will lead to the latter being dissapointed, and that can hurt funding down the road for more realistic and paced research.

 

[zoobyshoe]

True, and probably the research into TMS will yield more results, but that hardly justifies the claims made by some researchers (vs. clinicians using any port in a storm). I don't mean to say that this is worthless in the way that phrenology was pure fantasy, but rather to point out what a truly crude tool it is. That wouldn't be bad at all, but for the claims and expectations; the former will lead to the latter being dissapointed, and that can hurt funding down the road for more realistic and paced research.

Yes, I thought your phrase "brute force" was apt, and that's a good point about the potential taint.

 

[Frame Dragger]

Yes, I thought your phrase "brute force" was apt, and that's a good point about the potential taint.

Thank you! By the way, in terms of brute force, I think not just that it's a matter of overwhelming or distorting electrical (and therefore chemical) activity in the brain, but also in the sense that it is used in cryptology. I think that's why I keep going to back to phrenology, even though that is a somewhat unfair comparison (phrenology was pure fantasy after all).

Either way, the approach lacks the controls needed for an experiment to yield the results claimed by the authors. I almost HOPE that they're gaming for grants, and not genuinely of the belief that this is truly a workable 'cure' for all ills that is about to emerge. Politicians are scum, but at least they know that raising expectations beyond anything reasonable is doom for the their future.

 

[Gokul43201]

Citation for the paper:

Liane Young, Joan Albert Camprodon, Marc Hauser, Alvaro Pascual-Leone, and Rebecca Saxe, "Disruption of the right temporoparietal junction with transcranial magnetic stimulation reduces the role of beliefs in moral judgments", PNAS, 107, 6753-6758 (2010).

Pyth: I've saved a copy; PM me your email, if interested.

 

[Pythagorean]

I found it and posted it above, thanks though Gokul, still appreciated.

 

[Gokul43201]

Oops! Didn't notice there was a second page of posts.

 

[Frame Dragger]

Thanks to both!

I've just scanned the paper, but I'm disturbed by the small smaple size, and the nature of the test. I don't see ANY screening for morality vs. impulse and otheer diminshed capacity. It looks very interesting however, and somewhat startling. Putting what you believe to be poison in someone's coffee is DEEPLy anti-social, but it raises questions about perception that are not answered here.

I'd like to see something a bit more direct and screened, such as people rigging a card game, or even (fake) Russian Roulette. In other words, I want to see a clearly IMMORAL or amoral stance taken as a result of the TMS, not just abnormal behaviour after being blasted with a EM field targeted at a crucial region. Putting powder in coffee, as they admit in the paper, is not necessarily a clearly immoral act; it could be careless, or impulsive.

EDIT: More embarressing, I didn't notice that Pythagorean posted it. Oooooh boy. *raps on head... wooden sound fills room*.

 

[Pythagorean]

It seems the connection between morality and the rtpj had been established already by other papers. See the references at the end. That's where you'll have to dig for the actual process involved.

I'm on my mobile now, but there were some complaints about the old view of the prefrontal lobe (I skimmed last night)

the descrepincy seems to be comparing negative outcome to negative intention.

I'll have to read more when I have time.