Levy Neil
Centre for Applied Philosophy and Public Ethics, University of Melbourne, Parkville, Australia.
Am J Bioeth. 2007 Sep;7(9):3-11. doi: 10.1080/15265160701518466.
The extended mind thesis is the claim that mental states extend beyond the skulls of the agents whose states they are. This seemingly obscure and bizarre claim has far-reaching implications for neuroethics, I argue. In the first half of this article, I sketch the extended mind thesis and defend it against criticisms. In the second half, I turn to its neuroethical implications. I argue that the extended mind thesis entails the falsity of the claim that interventions into the brain are especially problematic just because they are internal interventions, but that many objections to such interventions rely, at least in part, on this claim. Further, I argue that the thesis alters the focus of neuroethics, away from the question of whether we ought to allow interventions into the mind, and toward the question of which interventions we ought to allow and under what conditions. The extended mind thesis dramatically expands the scope of neuroethics: because interventions into the environment of agents can count as interventions into their minds, decisions concerning such interventions become questions for neuroethics.
延展心灵论题主张，心理状态超出了拥有这些状态的主体的头骨范围。我认为，这一看似晦涩离奇的主张对神经伦理学有着深远的影响。在本文的前半部分，我概述了延展心灵论题，并为其辩护以应对各种批评。在后半部分，我探讨了其对神经伦理学的影响。我认为，延展心灵论题意味着以下观点是错误的：仅仅因为是对大脑的内部干预，所以对大脑的干预就特别成问题，但许多针对此类干预的反对意见至少部分地依赖于这一观点。此外，我认为该论题改变了神经伦理学的关注点，从我们是否应该允许对心灵进行干预的问题，转向我们应该允许哪些干预以及在何种条件下允许这些干预的问题。延展心灵论题极大地扩展了神经伦理学的范围：因为对主体环境的干预可以算作是对其心灵的干预，所以有关此类干预的决策就成为了神经伦理学的问题。
