Neil Messer brings together a range of theoretical and practical questions raised by current research on the human brain: questions about both the 'ethics of neuroscience' and the 'neuroscience of ethics'. While some of these are familiar to theologians, others have been more or less ignored hitherto, and the field of neuroethics as a whole has received little theological attention. Drawing on both theological ethics and the science-and-theology field, Messer discusses cognitive-scientific and neuroscientific studies of religion, arguing that they do not give grounds to dismiss theological perspectives on the human self. He examines a representative range of topics across the whole field of neuroethics, including consciousness, the self and the value of human life; the neuroscience of morality; determinism, freewill and moral responsibility; and the ethics of cognitive enhancement.

Chapter 1: Introduction: Where Science, Theology and Ethics Collide?Chapter 2Pious Primates with Believing Brains: Evolutionary, Cognitive and Neuroscientific Accounts of ReligionChapter 3Selves, Souls and Consciousness: Uncle Charlie Revisited Chapter 3Neuroscience, Moral Judgement and the Theological Suspicion of EthicsChapter 4'Like God, Knowing Good and Evil' The Neuroscience of Morality and the theological suspicion of ethics Chapter 5Freedom, Responsibility, Sin and Grace: 'Mr Puppet' meets St AugustineChapter 6Messing with Our Minds: The Ethics of Technological Interventions in the BrainChapter 7Conclusion: Collision or Creative Meeting?BibliographyIndex