Science Sunday Bonus

Via EurekAlert!:

How fairness is wired in the brain
PASADENA, Calif.--In the biblical story in which two women bring a baby to King Solomon, both claiming to be the mother, he suggests dividing the child so that each woman can have half. Solomon's proposed solution, meant to reveal the real mother, also illustrates an issue central to economics and moral philosophy: how to distribute goods fairly.

Now, researchers at the California Institute of Technology have discovered that reason struggles with emotion to find equitable solutions, and have pinpointed the region of the brain where this takes place. The concept of fairness, they found, is processed in the insular cortex, or insula, which is also the seat of emotional reactions.

"The fact that the brain has such a robust response to unfairness suggests that sensing unfairness is a basic evolved capacity," notes Steven Quartz, an associate professor of philosophy at Caltech and author of the study, voicing a sentiment that anyone who has seen children fight over a treat can relate to.

"The movement to look into the neural basis for ethical decision making is only about seven years old," Quartz says. "This is the first study where people made real decisions with real consequences."...

Related:

• Response to "If there is no God, then why be moral?"
• Religion: A man-made, two-edged sword
• Letter to A Christian Nation
• Religion in Public Policy discussed on Talk of the Nation (includes audio)
• Dan Dennett: A secular, scientific rebuttal to Pastor Rick Warren