한국윤리교육학회

This study aims to examine recent achievements in neuroscience research on moral judgment, review major research findings in neuroscience research on moral awareness, and suggest the significance and tasks of ethics education concerning neuroethics research. To this end, this study examined the overall background of neuroethics and the flow of ethical discussions, and suggested the claims that have been presented by the studies of neuroscience research on human mind. Studies of neuroscience point out that the existing ethical discussions are limited to metaphysical or theoretical aspects and raise the necessity to pay attention to the natural features of humans to practice morality. These claims require reflective considerations and a new approach to the issue of mind and body, and free will and decision making. In the meantime, the development in cognitive science and neuroscience raises new questions such as the moral issues of using new scientific technology and improving the cognitive and emotional capability of humans. Therefore, ethics education should be expanded to include problems that arise from the development of neuroscience. At a time when human life is expected to improve based on cognitive-neuroscience, ethics education should serve the major role of preventing ethical absence due to the development of neuroscientific technology through moral exploration and ethical introspection about human improvement.