[Phil153]

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Pure nonsense masquerading as science. They take very broad results and making ridiculously specific claims which are not supported by the evidence. This is very common in psychology and neurology.

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You got all that from the article in the newspaper?
Do you ever look more in depth before you say things like this? (based on our earlier debates on race and IQ, I'd say no)

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You know, you've been little but a troll in those discussions. Go and reread them. Your contribution was repeated assertions with vague references to decade old debates, you rarely discussed specifics or tackled any of the points I made. You're the perfect example of someone in an intellectual ivory tower. I know, based on our earlier debates, that you won't understand a word of that.

Back on topic...what exactly have researchers found that's news? I haven't read the original research, and frankly I don't care to. The lack of meat in the article says it all. This is my summary of the research findings:

- When the researchers change the functioning of a part of a person's brain that may be involved in decision making, they made a decision that coincided more strongly with their rational self interest (according to the researcher's definition of rational self interest). That's the only data point I can see here. What a truly shocking discovery. They then go on to speculate wildly about all manner of things, based on this single data point.

From what I can see, the only reasonable statements that can be made from this "discovery" are:

1. There are parts of the brain involved in decision making
2. People can make more or less emotionally based decisions when these parts are subject to stress.

Everything else is non evidence based speculation on things that have been known for decades. If I've left anything out, please state exactly what else you think this discovery proves or indicates.

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As for people rejecting free money, it has more to do with avoiding the emotional and social obligations it imposes than brain wiring for game theory.

"And you're sure of this because..."

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Just an observation. There is more to self interest than just economic self interest, a fact which they downplay early on but give a nod to later in the article (completely undermining the false dichotomy they'd set up in the first place in order to frame the useless research).

Below is an example of the crap that fills areas such as neuro economics. This is not science, nor does it offer any insight. It's nothing more than highly unsophisticated speculation, and it should be discouraged instead of celebrated.

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Why might the brain want to overrule self-interest in the first place? Colin Camerer, Professor of Business Economics at the California Institute of Technology, says that it probably evolved that way.

If we always accepted low offers for the sake of tiny gains, we would rapidly get a reputation as a soft touch. Everybody else would try to bilk us at every turn. By acting apparently against our interests, we do better in the long run.

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Thanks for the insight, professor, but a 5 year old can tell you this.

So I ask again: In plain English, what actual real world insight does this give us into the human mind, or behavior, that we didn't have already.