Participants came from the USA, Canada, Iceland, France, the UK and China, and the cross-national similarities and differences in the politics of race and genomics proved particularly enlightening. 

Key issues debated included the usefulness of race categories for developing and delivering biomedical research, the understanding(s) of terms like ‘race’, ‘ethnicity’ and ‘ancestry’ across borders and disciplines, and how genomic research is shaping current and future notions of human identity.

The outcome will be a set of recommendations to the Wellcome Trust as to the priorities for future research in this area, the ways in which these issues should be dealt with in research protocols and reports, and the range of expertise needed to address these issues. A full report will be available soon on the BIOS and CPNSS websites, and future events are in the planning stage.

We now invite you to continue this discussion. To do so, we offer this post thread to allow a forum-type conversation.

To post a message or reply to an existing message, click on the “Leave a Comment“ link above.

1. Do you believe that scientific technology provides credibility to an accusation or a result?
2. What does the word “neuroscience” mean to you?
3. How might the future of neuroscience technology affect you as an individual? As a society?
4. Do you trust neuroscience technologies, such as brain imaging, enough to walk through a scanner with belief that no harm is being done to your body? Why or why not?

BB: How did you come across your field of study?

DF: I have to admit, I came to an interest in the neurosciences through a fairly circuitous route. Actually, my real intellectual interest, up to quite recently, was in the practice of psychiatry. And I was interested in psychiatry because I was interested, broadly, in the encounters between things like knowledge, and experience, and personhood; and it struck me, as a would-be anthropologist, that mental disorder (specifically: major psychosis) often mediated and conjoined these categories in odd and interesting ways (Foucault was among the obvious influences here). Unfortunately for me, this thought had also occurred to a whole other generation of scholars – many of them, I’m sorry to say, quite good – and, as I began to really think about my research, I wasn’t at all sure that there was a great deal left to say on the topic.

BB: So you found some new inspiration?

DF: Yes, this changed when I really started to delve into the psychiatric research journals. Because the more I read first-hand around the field, the more I started to think that twenty-first century ‘psychiatry’ was not entirely– to misuse a term – a thing in itself; that it increasingly deferred to a background object upon whose authority the legitimacy of its knowledge was founded. And it became apparent that this object wasn’t the mind, and it wasn’t behaviour, and it certainly wasn’t subjective feeling – though these all remained important. Instead, that object was now the brain – that innocuous, fleshy lump inside your head – and it was the brain, or an idea of it at least, that seemed to provide, for an increasingly influential body of people, some sort of meeting-point between the conditions of knowledge, the foundations of experience, and the status of the human. I’ve taken up the (‘social’) study of the neurosciences, then, because I’m increasingly convinced that if mental disorder can still, today, translate between both the knowledge and the category of the human, it can only do so because it speaks, so fluently, the language of the brain; but also that it can only speak, in this mode, of a particular kind of disorder-in-the-brain – one that’s constantly shifting and moving, that is both ideal and material, and that has the capacity to ricochet, and translate, between people and experiences, heads and machines, images and scientists (here, I must also acknowledge the influence of Bruno Latour [1993, 2005] , and other works that fall under the broad rubric of what has come to be called ‘Actor Network Theory’) .

BB: What specifically would you like to research now at BIOS and the LSE?

DF: Thus, I’m turning my attention to diagnostic brain imaging which, I think, is a site from which, via the study of disorder, very concrete, and very authoritative, ideas about the attributes of contemporary personhood – and the relationships those attributes have to knowledge, experience and the social – are emerging. Right now, I’m trying to think about what might be some of the specific transactions that occur between psychopathology and brain imaging. In particular, I’m currently considering (1) what sort of subject it is that is exchanged in such transactions (which very much raises the questions of identity and self-identity. One of the ironies of diagnostic brain imaging, I’m increasingly thinking, is that it partly reconstitutes the space for some sort of autonomous, moral subject), (2) what sort of disorder it is that’s transmitted between these sites (because I’m genuinely struggling to see an ontological equivalence between, say, an inability to attribute mental states to others, and dysfunction in the orbito-frontal cortex, and I’d like to trace the movements between some influential imaging studies and the nosological systems used by diagnosticians), and, finally, (3) what these exchanges say about what we might call ‘the social’ (because, of course, these studies don’t just have efficacy at the level of the individual; they speak, too, of the individual’s capacity, or tendency, for sociality, communication, empathy, and so on – indeed, for their status as a sociological ‘subject’ in the first place).

BB: How would you sum up your research goals?

DF: So, at this very early stage, my general goal is start mapping some of the effects of the new brain sciences, particularly as they emerge from an engagement with mental disorder, and to use some of the above issues as points from which to orient myself as I set about it. Eventually, I hope to have something interesting to say about the relationship of diagnostic imaging to contemporary ideas of self- and person-hood, or something akin to what Joseph Dumit (2003) calls ‘objective self-fashioning.’ But we’ll have to wait and see how that turns out.

MALINTENT applies long established principles using a mix of old and new technologies.  It is well accepted that the human body and the human mind are mutually interacting phenomena each reciprocally influencing the other.  It has long been known that heart rate and blood pressure change under conditions of stress, including deceit and subterfuge.  The principle is simple, however applying the principle in a rigorous, scientific or diagnostic manner proves surprisingly problematic.  Nonetheless, in certain contexts, technologies like MALINTENT find fertile ground.

Lie detection technologies, based on the same basic principles as MALINTENT, have a long and controversial history lasting most of the 20th century.  In American courts, the 1923 Frye ruling established the principle that scientific testimony was only acceptable from “experts whose judgments were derived from principles in line with the consensus of the relevant scientific community” (Alder 2002 p. 8).  At present “[d]etecting deception is still very much a ‘best-guess’  game” (Ford 2006, p. 174; Andrewartha 2008).  However despite the inaccuracies which have had them largely banned from the court room, lie detection technologies have flourished in other contexts where the high legal standards of proof do not apply.  In the mid 20th century US for example, they were used enthusiastically recruitment and suspected fraud at work (Alder 2002, p. 17 ff).  Now, often using new technologies from emerging brain science, lie detection technologies continue operate beyond the court room.

A recent paper delivered at the British Forensic Psychology conference described and advocated the use of EEG technology in police questioning with uncritical evangelistic fervour (Raman 2008).  This example anecdotally illustrates Alder’s (2002) argument that lie detection technologies emerge at the intersections of popular convictions about science, perceived social need, and professional expertise.  Alder also hints that professional opportunism can play a role in the history of lie detection technologies (Alder 2002).  In this case Raman, a former professor of clinical psychology and head of the neuropsychology unit at the Indian National Institute of Mental Health & Neurosciences, works on a consultancy basis for police forces in Bangalore using ‘brain signature profiling’ as an interrogation aid.  Scientific expertise and charisma, combined with a police desire to expedite interrogation, has created a new 21st century site for the use of biometric technology to read the minds of human subjects.

In the case of MALINTENT I suggest that an influential social and political discourse may also have played a role in the emergence of this technology.  In the UK there have been allegation that police have abused “stop and search” powers by preferentially targeting ethnic minorities.  In the USA, the satirical offence of ‘driving whilst black’ captures the essence of a similar controversy about racial profiling and prejudice amongst the police and security services.  Whether in the UK or USA, authorities find themselves caught between the imperatives of public protection, minimal intrusion, and vulnerability to allegations of racial discrimination.  The high stakes of the ‘war on terror’ raise these issues afresh, not least in the context of airport security where MALINTENT might likely be employed.  MALINTENT is attractive because it promises a demonstrably objective means of identifying individuals for further questioning.  Despite a shortage of accepted peer-reviewed evidence about the accuracy lie-detection related technologies – which has mainly kept lie detection out of the courts – MALINTENT seems, like its predecessors, to have found an alternative favourable social context for development and deployment.

References
Alder, K. (2002). “A Social History of Untruth: Lie Detection and Trust in Twentieth-Century America.” Representations 80: 1-33.
Andrewartha, D. (2008). “Lie Detection in Litigation: Science or Prejudice?” Psychiatry, Psychology and Law 15(1): 88-104.
Ford, E. B. (2006). “Lie detection: Historical, neuropsychiatric and legal dimensions ” International Journal of Law and Psychiatry 29(3): 159-177.
Raman, M. C. (2008). Brain electrical oscillations signature profiling of experiential knowledge. Annual Conference: BPS Division of Forensic Psychology. Edinburgh.

Professor Emily Jackson first joined the LSE Department of Law in 1998. Emily’s research interests are in the field of medical law. In addition to publishing in this area, she is a member of a number of regulatory and advisory bodies, such as the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority, and the British Medical Association Medical Ethics Committee. Bios Blog has had a chat with Emily…

—

 BB: What are the legal issues with this technology, or other emerging technologies like this?

 EJ: I foresee problems relating to consent with this technology. Consent, as the right to say yes or no to things done to one’s body, is the cornerstone of medical ethics. Without consent, touching someone amounts to a violation of the right to determine what is done to your body. But these new noninvasive technologies can evade consent issues by claiming they don’t actually do anything to your body. In reality, we need to rethink the legal framework that assumes we only do things to people by touching them, by invading their bodily integrity. Clearly, noninvasive technologies have effects as well, and potentially harmful ones at that. For example, it is possible that new embryo testing technologies can test for molecular changes in the culture medium instead of invasively testing the embryo. It is interesting to think about whether the fact that it is non-invasive makes a difference to the rules under which embryo testing is legitimate..

 BB: How do you…

 EJ: Oh, and data security will certainly be an issue. Despite encryption, human error is always a potential problem; people leave laptops on trains, people make mistakes. So, storing data in the form of brain images could lead to other unforeseen legal issues.

 BB: How do you regulate non-invasive technologies?

 EJ: It’s much harder to regulate. Non-invasive testing brings a situation with the same ethical dilemmas that accompany invasive testing, but with new regulatory dilemmas that require an updated legal framework.

 BB: Some might argue that racial profiling exists at security checkpoints in airports or other public areas. Do you think this type of technology will increase, decrease, or not alter current practices of racial profiling?

 EJ: The MALINTENT scanner might lend scientific credibility to what will be the “rounding up” of the  usual suspects. It suggests that there is some objective scientific basis for racial profiling even though humans will be interpreting the scanner results, as well as deciding who gets the subsequent additional testing. It will be much harder to accuse someone of racial profiling if a machine is implicated and the human component is said to be absent, when in reality, that is just not the case.

 BB: But will juries deny this same human component?

 EJ: It is indeed hard to say what juries will think, but juries latch on to facts; they want a causal relationship that this scanner cannot provide. Giving a suspect a percent based risk profile makes sense only on a statistical level, not on an individual one. The interesting thing about scientific evidence is that something which can be presented as “objective scientific fact” has real weight with juries, perhaps more weight than it should. What doctors work with is uncertainty, but what courts want is certain fact. For example, there have already been huge issues surrounding the accuracy of DNA profiling.

 BB: Ok, how would you feel if you had to go through this scanner?

 EJ: I’d feel quite nervous that they were going to pull me over! Who isn’t nervous when they’re going through the airport? I would hate to be one of the false positives.

 BB: So can we depend on trained security intelligence with emerging scientific technology such as this scanner?

 EJ: If you trust the machine, the human person becomes dependent on the machine, instead of intelligence methods. I think widespread use of this scanner will actually decrease security personnel’s actual intelligence when it comes to security threats. After the September 11th terrorist attacks, I had a worrisome experience travelling internationally. After going through numerous security checkpoints where I had to remove my shoes, my belt, etc…had my bag searched, I realized no one had actually looked at my passport! Even if intelligence doesn’t decrease, I worry that people with explosives under their jumper don’t feel like they’re doing anything wrong so they won’t exhibit the nonverbal cues that alert the scanner, but some man going to visit his mistress will.

We talked with Prof Rose about some related questions in the use of brain imaging and scanners in public places, such as for security in airports. Here are some highlights from the conversation:

BB: What is your initial reaction to the MALINTENT scanner or this type of technology?

NR: The belief that you can read intentions is certainly bogus. The technology cannot attempt to read an intention, nor should we believe that there is somehow a measurable objective state when you intend to do something, albeit, a very specific something. So, when it comes to reading intentions, I am very skeptical that it would work with any degree of accuracy.

BB: Is it the problem with the limits of technology?

NR: Well, brain imaging can be problematic in general as it is based on oxygen levels (or other metabolic measurements) in 3D space, based on a standard grid brain. There are so many assumptions regarding the brain’s anatomy that are built into this technology. For instance, whose brains compromise the “standard brain” that is used as a reference? Is it a group of 25-35 year old white males? Will this work across cultures? Is the American brain the same as the European brain? I mean recently, the Japanese have argued that they should have their own standard reference brain. So, the problem might be what the technology seeks to measure.

BB: Ok, so what we’re saying is that the technology can work, in the sense that it can scan brains to recognize a response, however, maybe just not a response that indicates an “intention”?

NR: Clinically speaking, patients already have signs and symptoms of pathology that a brain scan can confirm. However, to use brain imaging on people walking through a scanner, without any pathology, is completely different. Plus, you have to remember that those most interested in evading the scanner will be the most skilled at it as well. You cannot assume that the people you want to catch will not understand the system. That is just wrong.

BB: We wonder what kind of security technology, that remains non-invasive, could exist to provide further security measures with some degree of certainty. Have you any thoughts on this?

NR: It does exist, just look at the Iris Scan being used at Heathrow airport. This is well established, you enroll your iris and this is linked to your passport. The iris remains the same in a fetus and does not change as an adult. With this technology, either you are who you are, or not who you say you are.

BB: This seems odd to us, in a way, how can the US Government, or any agency, be investing in a technology that has a low practical output? We wonder if the strength lays in the public looking for answers, and allowing the discussion of studies (such as with the MALINTENT scanner) to hold an element of hope to combat uncertainties. In this case, uncertainties with knowing who is a terrorist or is trying to cause harm.

NR: Yes, a lot of money is being available for this type of research, to hope for a technical fix for a social and political problem.  What you should really ask is: What is the problem to which this is a solution and is this ‘solution’ not wholly out of proportion with the level of threat? We have very dangerous bugs, like Anthrax, that are extremely difficult to form into weapons. There has been much more death and injury caused by conventional weapons; much more than the destruction caused by chemical and biological weapons. So why does the threat of chemical and biological weapons generate so much more fear?

BB: And people believe in this fear and think the technology has the answer?

NR: The big problem is between public impression of this kind of scanner and the actual abilities of the scanner. There is a large difference between popular claims of brain scanning and scientific understanding of its limitations. In general, people want technology to give them the ‘right’ answer. If this technology is implemented, it removes the assumptions or uncertainties, as it gets built into the machines…

BB: Do people have trust in the machines?

NR: …You would be surprised by how much people depend on machines.

BB: But machines require people to interpret the results and this goes back to the human intervention in the accuracy of technology.

NR: Yes, and this is where discriminatory judgments are likely to come in. Machines and scanners give risk profiles based on statistical cross referencing with other databases. This sort of scanning regime is likely to give you multiple ambiguous results requiring a degree of interpretation from personnel that is still subject to bias and discrimination. People believe if we “technologize” something we remove the discrimination, but they forget to question whether discriminatory assumptions are built into the machine.

BB: Wait, because the machines are built by humans?

NR: Well, it is important to question what biometric data is being used and what other databases it is linked with. Biometric data based on stable physical attributes of the body are reasonably well established. Recognition software, for example, can ascertain whether you are who you say you are. But the biometric data taken in the MALINTENT scanner is not trying to recognize you but is trying to measure intent. That is a whole other problem all together, as I said before. Really, I’d like to know what other databases they are accessing and what sort of information they are assessing as ‘risky’ – ie. Whether or not you paid in cash? Whether you recently travelled to the Middle East?  This is what I mean by discriminatory assumptions being built into the technology.

BB: Machines and humans, this sounds like a science fiction novel.

NR: But that is it, to some extent, this article has such a gripping mixture of science and science fiction that it will get much publicity. The public will read these headlines and believe that the MALINTENT scanner can read intentions and this will fuse with popular imagery from movies like “The Minority Report”. Brain imaging can tell you a lot of interesting things, despite its poor acuity, about lesions and other clinical pathology. However, if you’re trying to measure an intention, you must assume that there is an objective state linked to a specific intention, in this case a specific hostile act that is detectable. Again, as I said initially, at this point in time, that is technologically infeasible and entirely bogus.