Over the next decade, the objective study of subjectivity will transform the academy and the world beyond.
Westerners have long labored under the assumption that objectivity and subjectivity operate in distinct and mutually exclusive realms. Traceable at least back to Plato's gleaming white horse of reason and unruly black horse of passion, fighting to control the chariot of the self, the theme reappears in Descartes's politically expedient split of the mind from the body. A similar divide may critically distinguish C.P. Snow's two academic cultures—with the sciences revering the objective and the humanities reveling in the subjective. Forces on both sides continue to support the distinction.
Thanks to accelerating technological advances, however, the gap between the objective and the subjective is closing fast. Scientists are beginning to objectively study subjectivity. By "subjectivity," I refer here not only to the more traditional topics involving awareness of input (as in the case of perception) or output (as in the case of action), but also intermediate processes related to emotion and thought. Beyond simple input and output, these flexible and dynamic forces interpret and animate, transforming perception to action.
The quiet revolution fomenting the objective study of subjectivity feeds on data rather than rhetoric. Armed with new technologies that can resolve changes in brain activity on a spatial scale of millimeters and a time scale of subseconds, neuroimagers are exceeding the dreams of their peers a scant decade ago. Already, they can infer not only when people see or hear something, or are preparing to move, but also when people are committing something to memory, when they feel excited about something they want, when they are inhibiting an impulse, when they are paying attention, when they experience conflict, and even when they are thinking about themselves. At present, those inferences are crude and sometimes even irresponsible, but their sophistication will improve as scientists insist on adhering to predictive standards. The end product will be maps of subjective experience. Because prediction inevitably implies modification, the maps insinuate plans—ways of changing the flow of activity to alter behavior. Inevitably, scientists will crack the neural code of subjectivity—it's only a matter of technology and time.
What might these developments mean for the academy? Many disciplines purport to study human behavior at different levels. Yet these disciplines are fractionated and operate largely independently. Dynamic maps of subjectivity and their implications for behavior might provide a conceptual spark that could meld disparate realms.
Witness the rise of new hybrid fields like "neuroeconomics" and "social neuroscience," where consideration of the mind necessarily implies consideration of the brain. Of course, academic adoption may not provide a leading indicator of change (often resulting from changes in staff rather than minds, goes the joke). Lay interest in subjective inference continues to rise, including such broad applications as predicting market choices and improving psychiatric diagnoses.
While practical applications inevitably raise ethical issues, the objective study of subjectivity also poses existential questions. Given human limits on time, energy, and insight, what if the subjective maps turn out to know us better than we know ourselves? "Know thyself" was carved explicitly into the walls at the Oracle of Delphi and implicitly into the foundation of the academy—but how well do we really want to know ourselves?
Comments
1. richardtaborgreene - August 30, 2010 at 09:06 am
How nice the TREND of the next ten years is EXACTLY what this guys already does---how nice how nice.....let me see do I need fMRI machines to guess why this guys thinks HIS area if THE area???????? Do I really need big expensive machines for that????????
No......this is Pre-socratic stuff, pre-civilization stuff... this is one monkey trying to out rank out copulate other monkeys....pretty boring stuff really.
2. paulabergowen - August 30, 2010 at 11:35 am
Only the shallow know themselves - Oscar Wilde
3. eyeswideopen - August 31, 2010 at 08:13 am
It seems the author has pushed some buttons. I, for one, am anxious to see what comes of objectively studying subjectivity, although I am concerned with the metaphysical materialist orientation held by neuroscientists that a priori restricts their scope of explanation. If my mind is nothing more than electronic signals in my brain, how is it I never experience it that way? I sure wish I could meet one of those shallow people that knows the answer to that question.
4. cwinton - August 31, 2010 at 09:04 am
This is the best he could come up with for a defining idea? It's nothing more than an attempt to inflate the importance of his own area, and not much of one at that.
5. rsmulcahy - August 31, 2010 at 12:51 pm
What the hell is #1 talking about? The Chronicle asked specialists the question about future trends, what do you think a researcher in his field is going to point out, black will be the hot fashion color in 2020? And really, cognitive neuroscience is pre-socratic, pre-civilization stuff? Wow, who knew? And people involved in research are merely copulating monkeys trying to outscrew each other? #1, did you just lose tenure or fail to land a major grant? You sound kind of unhinged. Just an observation.
6. philosophy - August 31, 2010 at 03:16 pm
When brainscans - or some such - can enable an objective scientist, looking at my brainwaves or whatever, can say,correctly, "Aha! I see that you are now thinking about the second step in Euclid's proof that there is no greatest prime number!"
Until they can do that, I'm deeply skeptical of the objective study of subjectivity business.
7. gahnett - August 31, 2010 at 03:31 pm
I think this is just a re-phrasing (albeit very important) of the request for a science of qualities, as explicated by Brian Goodwin and others.
The author makes a point about representing objective information that underly subjectivity, which was not available in the past, irrespective of whether the idea's been around.
8. maxbini - August 31, 2010 at 08:55 pm
"Inevitably, scientists will crack the neural code of subjectivity---it's only a matter of technology and time."
This is a genetic fallacy. Not all questions are captured by the methods of science - the real questions are matters of interpretation.
By the way, also above the entrance to Apollo's temple at Delphi along with "Know thyself" was the inscription "Avoid excess."
9. gahnett - September 01, 2010 at 05:44 pm
What does "genetic fallacy" mean?
Also, what does "the real questions are matters of interpretation" mean?
10. maxbini - September 01, 2010 at 08:15 pm
Sorry #9 gahnett for being too quick and not elaborating. In this context, by genetic fallacy I mean assuming that "subjectivity" or anything that is referred to as mental is a "neural code" or anything physical because we have collaborative measurments of electrical or chemical activity which coincides with such described activities. (This may be a gentetic cause but that is not the same "thing.") E.g. Dreams can be mapped by recording brain activity but that does not mean that all dreams are is brain activity and certainly not that is therefore what we mean by "dreams."
There are assumptions and interpretations underlying the way we approach a study and the way we understand and analyse the results. Many questions are begged. Many questions are misunderstood. Many questions are treated as though they are empirical matters when they are matters of the meanings of words. The assumption that there are only scientific questions and correspondingly that all questions can be answered by science is barbaric.
11. johndjayakumar - September 03, 2010 at 12:50 pm
Don't ry to catch the large bull by the last hair of its long tail. However, God never stopped any one trying to play god. The bear went over the mountain and what did it see? Teh other side of the mountain and many more mountain ranges beside.
John D.Jayakumar
12. keitaro202 - September 24, 2010 at 04:40 pm
how about the defining idea is the rejection of the objective/subjective dichotomy? Is there really such a distinct gap at all? When do my thoughts go from subjectivity to objectivity? What does "objective" even mean? Is this emphasis on the scientist's objective nature an old positivist myth? Didn't we establish fifty years ago that the scientist was a human being without any means to observe from a "view from nowhere?"
Is it not obvious to those who have been in this field for quite some time that thinking in these terms has caused more confusion that clarification?