Scientists find brain's "moral compass"

DailyMail.co.uk (March 30, 2010); Wisdom Quarterly

[MIT] scientists have discovered a real-life "moral compass" in the brain that controls how we judge other people's behavior.

The region, which lies just behind the right ear, becomes more active when we think about other people's misdemeanors or good works.

Morality is a better guide than parents, gods

In an extraordinary experiment, researchers were able to use powerful magnets to disrupt this area of the brain and make people temporarily less moral.

The study highlights how our sense of right and wrong isn't just based on upbringing, religion, or philosophy -- but by the biology of our brains.

Dr. Liane Young, who led the study, said: "You think of morality as being a really high-level behavior. To be able to apply a magnetic field to a specific brain region and change people's moral judgments is really astonishing."

Red does not indicate the compass (mit.edu)

The moral compass lies in a part of the brain called the right temporo-parietal junction. It lies near the surface of the brain, just behind the right ear.

The researchers at MIT, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, used a non-invasive technique called transcranial magnetic stimulation to disrupt the area of the brain.

The technique generates a magnetic field on a small part of the skull which creates weak electric currents in the brain. These currents interfere with nearby brain cells and prevent them from firing normally.

In the first experiment, 12 volunteers were exposed to the magnetic field for 25 minutes before they were given a series of "moral maze" style scenarios.

Religion is a problem: Advice to Kalamas

For each of the 192 scenarios, they were asked to make a judgment about the character's actions on a scale of 1 for "absolutely forbidden" to 7 for "absolutely permissible."

In the second experiment, the magnetic field was applied to their heads at the time they were asked to weigh the behavior of the characters in the scenario.

In both experiments, the magnetic field made the volunteers less moral. More
 
How can anyone tell anyone else what's right or wrong? 
Dhr. Seven, Amber Dorrian, Ashley Wells, Wisdom Quarterly (COMMENTARY) 

Has U.S. lost its moral compass?

Debating "right" and "wrong" is futile. Buddhism speaks not in this simplistic way but rather of skillful (kusala) and unskillful (akusala) behavior: what acts lead to suffering, when they come to fruition, and which do not. We do not make decisions based on rational bases, reasoning, calculating, and arriving at some objective plan. We depend on emotions and our "guts" (the sources of many neurons and most of the body's serotonin). To follow our bliss we first have to be mindful enough to notice it. It is a subtle joy one feels, not a logic one deduces. One never feels happier, more buoyant, more relieved, more effervescent than when entering the early absorptions, meditative jhanas, based on virtue, concentration as the mind/heart begins to cohere, and ease. Piti and sukkha, joy and happiness are the natural result. In daily life, little contentment, bliss, or joy occur spontaneous to flood the body; likewise little moral dread (otappa) occurs when we engage in behaviors (breaking precepts) that are sure to bring unwelcome, unwanted misery.  
 

The Buddha said "come and see" not "believe!"

Killing, stealing, sexual harm, perjury, intoxication occasioning heedlessness cannot lead to happiness but, clearly, someone who steals can enjoy ill-gotten gains. Why? The act (karma) has not matured and borne its result. When it does it will surely be experienced as misery. This is what the Buddha taught and what made him a karmavadin, a teacher of actions with moral consequences. If it were not so, we would not say so. Who wouldn't rather do whatever s/he wanted? Mystics teach what they see as seers (rishis) not what will make them popular and lauded in their day. Truth is true whether anyone sees it or not. Fortunately, all that the Buddha said is personally verifiable in this very life. The Buddha taught the path to that knowledge and vision.  
 

There is no blind faith in Buddhism to act as beacon. Ironically, as Americans, most of us prefer Zen under the mistaken assumption that it's a DIY religion of no religion, a rebel stance, an anachronistic hodgepodge of senseless koans, blunts, and aphorisms no one really understands. In fact, "zen" means jhana, which is almost synonymous with moral blamelessness. Without virtue, the heart/mind remains uneasy, full of misgivings, worried about things done (unskillful karma) and left undone (skillful karma), and unconcentrated. And it is exactly a calm, cool, collected and therefore intensely concentrated (samadhi) mind/heart that leads to zen (meditation), that is Zen, that bears the fruits of the path: virtue --> concentration --> wisdom.

By ourselves is good/evil done

Or left undone.

By ourselves are we

purified or defiled.

   

No one saves us but ourselves;

No one can and no one may.

We ourselves must walk the path;

Buddhas only point the way!