Document Type
Article
Publication Date
11-16-2020
Abstract
This essay responds to Hirstein, Sifferd and Fagan’s book, Responsible Brains (MIT Press, 2018), which claims that executive function is the guiding mechanism that supports both responsible agency and the necessity for some excuses. In contrast, I suggest that executive function is not the universal acid and the neuroscience at present contributes almost nothing to the necessary psychological level of explanation and analysis. To the extent neuroscience can be useful, it is virtually entirely dependent on well-validated psychology to correlate with the neuroscientific variables under investigation. The essay considers what executive function is and what the neuroscience adds to our understanding of it. Then it addresses moral and legal responsibility generally, and specific doctrines. Executive function is seldom found to be the most perspicuous approach to any of the general or specific moral and legal questions.
Keywords
cognition, perception, executive functioning, decision-making, brain, self-regulatory activities, moral & criminal responsibility, excuse, psychological correlation to neuroscientific variables, sleepwalking killer, unwilling addict, juvenile justice, mental disorder, blame, desert, punishment
Repository Citation
Morse, Stephen J., "Is Executive Function The Universal Acid?" (2020). All Faculty Scholarship. 2234.
https://scholarship.law.upenn.edu/faculty_scholarship/2234
Included in
Biological Psychology Commons, Cognitive Neuroscience Commons, Criminal Law Commons, Criminology Commons, Criminology and Criminal Justice Commons, Law and Psychology Commons, Law and Society Commons, Medical Jurisprudence Commons, Public Law and Legal Theory Commons, Social Control, Law, Crime, and Deviance Commons