Investigating the ‘neuro' in neuroethics: The implications for neuroethics of the multiplicity of neuroscience and the brain

Accompanying the recent proliferation of neuroscience, there has been a so-called 'neuro-turn' in the social sciences and humanities, of which the birth of ‘neuroethics’ is one example. Like many of the new ‘neuro-disciplines’, neuroethics makes bold claims about the implications of neuroscience in terms of, in this case, creating ethical dilemmas and changing how we understand ethics. Elsewhere, there is a growing critique of the enthusiasm for all things neuro, and calls for the meaning of this category, and of neuroscience itself, to be problematised. This paper interrogates the ‘neuro’ of neuroethics, drawing on data from a sociological study which used ethnographic methods to examine how ethics intersected with everyday work in a translational neuroscience group researching neurodegenerative diseases. The findings of this study debunk the monolithic construction of neuroscience within neuroethics: the daily work of this group involved a diverse array of practices and entities, which group members did not view as contributing to a coherent body of knowledge. Furthermore, the brain itself took on many forms in this setting. Following Annemarie Mol, it is argued that both neuroscience and its commonly understood referent, the brain, are not fixed entities, and are better understood as multiple, only being enacted through practice. This multiplicity calls for a re-evaluation of neuroethics as a meaningful pursuit, when its object of ethical analysis is no longer stable. Through this discussion, the paper contributes to sociological understandings of both neuroscience and ethics, whilst helping to take the ‘neuro’ out of its black box.