Abstract
Gerben Meynen invites us to consider the potential ethical implications of what he refers to as “thought apprehension” technology for psychiatric practice, that is, technologies that involve recording brain activity, and using this to infer what people are thinking (or intending, desiring, feeling, etc.). His article is wide-ranging, covering several different ethical principles, various situations psychiatrists might encounter in therapeutic, legal, and correctional contexts, and a range of potential incarnations of this technology, some more speculative than others. The speculative nature of the technologies under consideration raises a broader question about how to provide a fruitful ethical analysis of not-yet-realized neurotechnologies. Such analysis is certainly a valuable part of the ethics of neuroscience—neurotechnological developments can raise pressing and sometimes quite novel ethical issues, which should be carefully analyzed and anticipated before these technological developments become a reality. Or sometimes an identification of parallels with existing problems can allow us to delve into existing theoretical resources, giving us insight on how to best equip ourselves to handle problems before or as they arise.