The Brain Sciences Against the Welfare State

Abstract

In order to explore how neoliberal ideology shapes theories and practices of the new brain sciences, this chapter closely reads a study that integrates neuroscience, evolutionary psychology, and behavioral economics. One of the goals of this analysis is to understand the basic underlying theory that connects the different neuroliberal discourses, and although many individual scientists might reject my characterization of their fields, I will argue that their work is only possible because of the belief in the idea of discoverable biological determinism. In short, neuroscientists, evolutionary psychologists, and behavioral economists must accept the rejection of the psychoanalytic unconscious in order to promote a theory of non-conscious thinking that is derived from mental programs determined by evolutionary forces. Moreover, this mode of new social Darwinism is reliant on the idea that inherited mental traits can be connected to specific brain regions, neurons, and genes, and even when there is a recognition of the roles played by culture, learning, experience, and subjectivity, the need to articulate a universal form of human nature overrides all other sources that could shape thinking and behavior.