the effects of "mapping the brains" on our society - Porfolio 5

Most of people think “reading people’s mind” is an idea that could just be in fairy tales. But this fairy tale is coming true with the development of the technology named Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). The technology promises positive potentials in some related-brain diseases treatment and also criminal investigation as well. However, ethical and legal issues in the development and application of fMRI that are thought to be the negative effect of the technology are still under experiment and public consideration.

How fMRI could affect our society?
Firstly, fMRI can detect and locate brain activity, so enable computer analyze then determine correctly what words and visual images the person is thinking of. In the term of investigation, on the one hand, the technology could function well in detect the information the person’s brain. A terrorist’ brain, for example, will contain many information and visual images of weapons, bomb and shooting. In the group of people are being considered as the criminals, the police could distinguish and arrest the right person more easily by using fMRI. Moreover, in a company, the boss could also check if his managers and worker are lying or cheating him. On the other hand, evaluating this technology on the aspect of ethical issues, many questions could be raised. “Who have the right to use this technique, read and store data of people’s brains?” “What would be happening if the computer did not function well and give the wrong data?” “Are the visual images and information from brain are reliable to determine the nature of the person?” As the result, a good person could be thought to be a bad worker, a liar in work place and in society accidentally; a man could be arrested because of some criminal information obtained from his brain.
Secondly, in the issues of testing with children, the technology could create a chaos among parents’ opinion. Parents want to know whether their children are talented at a particular subject. That might be a good idea when you have directional orientations for your children and support their talents. On the contrary, the talents and interests could be able to change in the effect of surroundings. Then the above idea “checking children’s talents” could have negative effects when parents themselves get confused about the “talent- orientation” from children’s brains overtime.
Furthermore, development of fMRI could support the techniques in treatment of some serious brain-diseases. “The technology could eventually lead to the use of brain scans to identify thoughts and could have applications in the study of autism, disorders of thought such as paranoid schizophrenia, and semantic dementias such as Pick’s disease.”(“National Science Foundation”, 2008).

In the perspective of a researcher of brain mapping, I think minimizing potential unethical abuses depends mostly on governments. The governments should decree the laws and regulations of use of the technology fMRI in some limited aspects of life such as criminal investigation and medical treatments. It is also necessary to have the data and information obtained from human’s brains saved and stored safely once the computer has scanned brains for treatments.
In summary, although fMRI has negative effects on our society that must be considered in terms of ethical and political issues, the technology promises the positive potential in criminal investigations and medical treatments. Beside scientist and engineering are working to develop this technology, the governments also need to build laws of usage of fMRI so that the technology could be developed and applied legally with the agreements and support from public.

References
National Science Foundation. (2008, May 30). A computer that can “read” your mind
[Press release 08-091]. Retrieved August 6, 2008, from http://www.nsf.gov/news/news_summ.jsp?cntn_id=111641&org=olpa&from=news