Sunday, May 16, 2010

Material for a control experiment on politicians

Returning to what I wrote earlier today, I now read in a BBC report that (according to one politician) the Labour Party "may have been reluctant to do a coalition deal with the Lib Dems because they knew what was in store for an incoming government".

So perhaps the frontal cortex in the brains of these politicians was exerting some control on the subcortical reward centres of their brain, preventing them from triggering the operations that would lead to immediate reward.

If only the brains of these politicians could have been scanned at that time, and the activity in these brains compared to that of politicians who wanted immediate reward in spite of long term difficulties, we might have had an interesting insight into the operations of the brain.

I daresay there will be many more such opportunities in the future.

4 comments:

natselrox said...

would have been nice to do this with Indian politicians.

S.Z. said...

All politicians, from all countries!

Yonni said...

Hello sir. I am a Korean college senior specializing in Aesthetics at Seoul National University. Ever since I read your epoch-making articles and theses on neuroesthetics, I have truly admired you so much from the bottom of my heart. As a prospective graduate student willing to explore the unrevealed areas of Aesthetics, I would like to pay my greatest homage to you and engage myself in the field of neuroesthetics as well. Hope to have an audience with you someday. Bye! :)

S.Z. said...

Thanks for you very nice and encouraging comments. I wish you every success in your efforts and hope that we will have the occasion to meet in the future.

I have not been posting a lot over the past 3 months, but hope to return to a more regular contribution soon.

Regards and good wishes, Semir Zeki