Comments on: Is Guilt Written in the Brain?

By: Deception Blog / Research round-up 2: New technologies and deception detection

Deception Blog / Research round-up 2: New technologies and deception detection — Sun, 28 Dec 2008 06:01:11 +0000

[...] test and is based on measuring Event-Related Potentials (electrical activity across the brain). Neurologica blog and Neuroethics and Law have a write-ups and links for those who wish to know [...]

By: Roy Niles

Roy Niles — Tue, 16 Sep 2008 18:50:25 +0000

That was a good reference, and led to an even better reference – one which discusses the deceptive aspects involved as well:

http://cercor.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/content/full/bhn037v1

http://cercor.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/reprint/bhn037v1

By: Conrad Reeder

Conrad Reeder — Tue, 16 Sep 2008 18:13:24 +0000

And a watched “brain” doesn’t boil.

But what an idea. I’d start with the liars in the political arena. Fan out from there.

By: Steve Page

Steve Page — Tue, 16 Sep 2008 17:38:43 +0000

PP, this isn’t about belief per se, it’s about the different parts of the brain that recall real memories from fabricated ones. There was a study on this a while back, but I forget who by; I’m sure that it was mentioned on the SGU podcast. I’ve had a quick google and it might be this one. http://www.jneurosci.org/cgi/content/abstract/27/45/12190

By: pendens proditor

pendens proditor — Tue, 16 Sep 2008 16:11:24 +0000

Whatever happens, I hope even the “perfect” lie detector will never replace or take precedence over external evidence. The test only confirms that the person believes he committed the crime, not that he actually did. And we know how unreliable beliefs can be (especially in the mentally ill).

By: Michael.Meadon

Michael.Meadon — Tue, 16 Sep 2008 15:36:41 +0000

The embedded link doesn’t seem to be behaving, the url is: http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v453/n7197/abs/nature06976.html

By: Michael.Meadon

Michael.Meadon — Tue, 16 Sep 2008 15:35:40 +0000

Great post Steve, thanks. I've emailed it to all my lawyer / jurisprudence friends... You're right about the technical limitations, but we should also not forget about the inherit limitations of current technologies. C.f. Logothetis "What we can do and what we cannot do with fMRI" (Nature).

By: Jim Shaver

Jim Shaver — Tue, 16 Sep 2008 14:42:43 +0000

From the referenced article:

“Technologies which are neither seriously peer-reviewed nor independently replicated are not, in my opinion, credible,” said Dr. Rosenfeld, a psychologist and neuroscientist at Northwestern University and one of the early developers of electroencephalogram-based lie detection. “The fact that an advanced and sophisticated democratic society such as India would actually convict persons based on an unproven technology is even more incredible.”

No kidding! This is very scary stuff.

BTW, Dr. Novella, you somehow ended up with “lye” instead of “lie” twice up there. Maybe you could use an fMRI scan yourself…

By: KristinMH

KristinMH — Tue, 16 Sep 2008 14:22:24 +0000

A “lye” detector?

Wouldn’t that be litmus paper?

By: Diane Henry

Diane Henry — Tue, 16 Sep 2008 14:12:03 +0000

Is the Indian machine the same as the one featured in yesterday’s Seattle Post-Intelligencer?

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/local/379082_brainwave15.html

The inventor is calling it a “brain fingerprinting machine.” It sounded pretty fishy to me…