Intro, History & Ethics

Prehistory - Ancient Rome

• Alcmaeon = Brain centre of sensation

• Hippocrates = Brain seat of emotion and intelligence

• Aristotle = Heart is centre of intellect, but brain cools blood

• Galen = Cerebrum responsible for sensation, cerebellum commands muscles.

Renaissance

• Vesalius = Body a hydraulic machine, muscles pumped by fluids from brain, going through nerves

• Descartes = Brain mechanisms control behaviour, but there is an additional god given soul or mind. Pineal gland acts as the seat of the soul and the place in which our thoughts are formed

• Mind-body problem = Split between Dualism = The mind and brain are separate, and Nonism = Mind and brain are combined

17th - 19th Century

• Grey matter = High concentration of nerve cell bodies

• White matter = Mostly nerve fibres

• C.19th C: CNS found to contain brain and spinal cord, the PNS to control all nerves and cells outside the brain and spinal cord

19th Century

• Galvani, Bois-Reynolds = Nerves as wires that conduct electrical signals to and from the brain. Bidirectional communication (Bell)

• Localisation = Experimental ablation, brain mapping,certain brain areas perform a specific function

• Neuron = Deiters dissected individual nerve cells from fixed tissue

• Cajal = Neuron docrtine - neuron basic functional unit

Changes across history

• Better observation using scientific tools e.g. Dissection, microscopy and clinical description made structures observable

• Better experiments using physiology and lesions as their basis allowed competing theories to be tested

• Better measurement using electrical recording and brain imaging, opened new scales of brain function.

Psychophysiological methods

• Eye tracking to measure attention and perception

• Electroencephalography to measure neural activity throughout the brain

• MRI to measure blood oxygen concentration in the brain

• Psychopharmacology - How drugs modify the brain and behaviour

Minimalist position in animal research

• Animal research is accepted under certain conditions, depending on

  • Value of research

  • Distress to the animal

  • Kind of animal

Abolitionist position

• Absolutely no acceptable form of animal research

  • Animals have same rights as humans

  • Keeping pets is equivalent to slavery

  • Killing animals is murder

3 Rs in animal research

• Reduce the number of animals used. Use same individuals for a number of different studies.

• Refine procedures to minimise pain and suffering, alleviate pain, suffering and distress

• Replace animal experiments with alternatives where possible e.g. create computational models based on animal data to simulate neural activity

Animal welfare

• Animals only used in worthwhile experiments - advance knowledge of the NS

• All necessary steps taken to minimise pain and distress experiences by the experimental animals

• All possible alternatives considered