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Minding Rights: Mapping Ethical and Legal Foundations of ‘Neurorights’

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Abstract

The rise of neurotechnologies, especially in combination with artificial intelligence (AI)-based methods for brain data analytics, has given rise to concerns around the protection of mental privacy, mental integrity and cognitive liberty – often framed as “neurorights” in ethical, legal, and policy discussions. Several states are now looking at including neurorights into their constitutional legal frameworks, and international institutions and organizations, such as UNESCO and the Council of Europe, are taking an active interest in developing international policy and governance guidelines on this issue. However, in many discussions of neurorights the philosophical assumptions, ethical frames of reference and legal interpretation are either not made explicit or conflict with each other. The aim of this multidisciplinary work is to provide conceptual, ethical, and legal foundations that allow for facilitating a common minimalist conceptual understanding of mental privacy, mental integrity, and cognitive liberty to facilitate scholarly, legal, and policy discussions.

Source: www.cambridge.org/core/journals/cambridge-quarterly-of-healthcare-ethics/article/minding-rights-mapping-ethical-and-legal-foundations-of-neurorights/2F3BD282956047E1E67AA9049A2A0B68

Further References

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General comment No. 34 Article 19: Freedoms of opinion and expression, CCPR/C/GC/34, paras 11–12; ECtHR (GC) 15 December 2005, appl.no 73797/01 (Kyprianou/Cyprus), § 174; Interamerican Commission on Human Rights, Declaration of Principles on Freedom of Expression, principle 2; Grossman, C. Freedom of expression in the inter-american system for the protection of human rights. ILSA Journal of International & Comparative Law 2001;7(3):619–47Google Scholar.
103

General comment No. 34 Article 19: Freedoms of opinion and expression, CCPR/C/GC/34, para. 10.
104

See note 77, Harris 2018, at 595. See, for example, EComHR 7 April 1994, appl.no. 20871/92 (Strohal/Austria); ECtHR (GC) 3 April 2012, appl.no. 41723/06 (Gillberg/Sweden), § 86; ECtHR 23 October 2018, appl.no. 26892/12 (Wanner/Germany), § 39–42. An important note: This suggests that the right to silence has been protected by the ECtHR. The response of the ECtHR to English attacks on the right to silence suggests otherwise. One can remain silent, but adverse inferences can be drawn from the person’s silence, which does not amount to much of a protection of the right to silence. In the future we might expect the ECtHR to extend its approach by saying a person can refuse brain-based lie detection that the state wants to employ, but if the person does so, adverse inferences can be drawn from the refusal.
105

See note 33, Ligthart 2022; see note 1, Ligthart 2020.
106

See note 33, Ligthart 2022.
107

Sententia, W. Neuroethical considerations: Cognitive liberty and converging technologies for improving human cognition. Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences 2004; 1013:221–28CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Bublitz, C, Cognitive liberty or the international human right to freedom of thought. In: Clausen, J, Levy, N, eds. Handbook of Neuroethics. Dordrecht, Netherlands: Springer; 2015:1309–33CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
108

See note 56, Farahany 2019, 2023.
109

See note 1, Bublitz 2020; see note 1, Ienca, Andorno 2017; see note 41, Bublitz, Merkel 2014.
110

Ligthart, S, Kooijmans, T, Douglas, T, Meynen, G. Closed-loop brain devices in offender rehabilitation: Autonomy, human rights, and accountability. Cambridge Quarterly of Healthcare Ethics 2021;30(4):669–80CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed; Kellmeyer, P, Cochrane, T, Müller, O, Mitchell, C, Ball, T, Fins, JJ, et al. The effects of closed-loop medical devices on the autonomy and accountability of persons and systems. Cambridge Quarterly of Healthcare Ethics 2016;25:623–33CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed.
111

See note 4, Committee on Bioethics of the Council of Europe 2019; § 21–22 (emphasis added).
112

See note 1, Bublitz 2020, at 397.
113

ECtHR 12 October 2006, appl.no. 13178/03 (Mayeka and Kaniki Mitunga/Belgium), § 83.
114

ECtHR (GC) 27 August 2015, appl.no. 46470/11 (Parrillo/Italy), § 153.
115

ECtHR (GC) 27 June 2017, appl.no. 931/13 (Satakunnan Markkinapörssi Oy and Satamedia Oy/Finland), § 137.
116

Either as an individual notion or as part of the right to mental integrity.
117

Ligthart, S, Meynen, G, Biller-Andorno, N, Kooijmans, T, Kellmeyer, P. Is virtually everything possible? The relevance of ethics and human rights for introducing extended reality in forensic psychiatry. AJOB Neuroscience 2022;13(3):144–57CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed.

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