University of Tasmania
Browse

File(s) under permanent embargo

The inheritance, power and predicaments of the 'brain-reading' metaphor

journal contribution
posted on 2023-05-17, 06:16 authored by Frederic GilbertFrederic Gilbert, Burns, L, Krahn, T

Purpose: With the increasing sophistication of neuroimaging technologies in medicine, new language is being sought to make sense of the findings. The aim of this paper is to explore whether "brain-reading" metaphor used to convey current medical or neurobiological findings imports unintended significations that do not necessarily reflect the genuine findings made by physicians and neuroscientists.

Methods: First, the paper surveys the ambiguities of the readability metaphor, drawing from the history of science and medicine, paying special attention to the sixteenth through nineteenth centuries. Next, the paper addresses more closely the issue of how metaphors may be confusing when used in medicine in general, and neuroscience in particular. The paper then explores the possible misleading effects associated with the contemporary use of the "brain-reading" metaphor in neuroimaging research.

Results: Rather than breaking new ground, what we see in current scientific language is a persistence of both a constraining and expansive set of language practices forming a relatively continuous tradition linking current neuroimaging to past scientific investigations into the brain.

Conclusions: The use of the readability metaphor thus carries with it both positive and negative effects. Physicians and neuroscientists must resort to the use of terms already laden with abstracted meanings, and often burdened by tradition, at the risk of importing through these words connotations that do not tally with the sought-after objectivity of empirical science.

History

Publication title

Medicine Studies

Issue

4

Pagination

229-244

ISSN

1876-4533

Department/School

School of Humanities

Publisher

Springer

Place of publication

Munich

Rights statement

Copyright 2010 Springer Science + Business Media

Repository Status

  • Restricted

Socio-economic Objectives

Expanding knowledge in philosophy and religious studies

Usage metrics

    University Of Tasmania

    Exports

    RefWorks
    BibTeX
    Ref. manager
    Endnote
    DataCite
    NLM
    DC