How seriously should we take Darwinian hypotheses in formulating ideas about the mind? The old nature-nurture arguments have gained added heft and new twists with our sophisticated brain-mapping and genetic technologies. In the US, the NIMH has recently put funds into mapping disorder in the brain, which, it is claimed, can be linked to schizophrenia as well as bipolar depression. Prediction and preventive medication may soon be available for major disorders. Other scientists have argued that early childhood environments help to shape and create the infant brain: resulting disorders may have more to do with environmental triggers than with biological inheritance. Anthony David, Professor of Psychiatry at King's College probes the disordered mind with Professor Peter Hobson, author of The Cradle of Thought and prize-winning novelist A.S. Byatt. Philosopher David Papineau, of the King's Centre for the Humanities and Health, chairs.
© Copyright King's College London.
Films directed by Poppy Sebag Montefiore
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