Neuropolitics

El auge experimentado por las neurociencias desde la llamada década del cerebro –por el presidente americano George H. W. Bush– que se inició en 1990, no ha dejado de crecer. Tanto que la neurociencia ha intentado asumir desde su propio seno una pertinencia normativa
y experimental que ha culminado, como ya señaló A. Cortina hace dos años, en el planteamiento que un buen número de neurocientíficos hace de su saber como una «nueva filosofía que da razón del funcionamiento de la economía, la religión, el arte o la moral»

In its emphasis on the feedback loops of top-down and bottom-up signal processing in the brain, and the exquisitely muddy area where they meet, the last century of psychology and neuroscience supports a model of aesthetic engagement wherein we meet the world halfway. In its unavoidable mustering of the totality of a person’s taste, expectation, and memory, as well as the social and political forces of the world around them, aesthetic engagement is thus far from a passive act. Yet too often the dialogue between art and neuroscience pulls the analysis of aesthetic engagement into the apolitical, sanitized, averaging language of science—-treating art as an exotic stimulus and the brain as a universalized end-domain for us to plant our flag of understanding. From the pitfalls of neuroaesthetic inquiry to a real-world case study of interdisciplinary dialogue run amok, this chapter examines critical stumbling blocks and possibilities for future engagements.

La profesionalización de la política en todos sus aspectos nos ha llevado a la interacción de ésta con otras disciplinas para conseguir una mayor eficacia. El novelista C.P. Snow acuñó hace más de cincuenta años esta interacción con el nombre de «tercera cultura» que no es otra cosa que “el acercamiento y cooperación de todas las ramas del conocimiento, con el fin de acabar con la clásica distinción entre ciencias y humanidades”. En las últimas décadas, ha proliferado la interacción de la neurología y la política ya que el cerebro es el centro de la acitividad humana, dando así lugar a una disciplina conocida con el nombre de «neuropolítica», que es la ciencia que “trata de explicar las bases neurobiológicas del comportamiento político”. Un mayor conocimiento del cerebro de nuestros electores puede dar lugar a campañas electorales más centradas y personalizadas, sin olvidar, en todo caso, los límites y problemas de estas técnicas.

Raised by Wolves follows the aftermath of a war caused by the polarizing strife between two factions: atheists and believers. Failing to find common ground, they resort to violence, nearly leading to mutual annihilation. Sent to uncharted territory where imminent danger is always around the corner, a pair of androids are programmed to foster a new civilization. The series carries all the traits of the sci-fi genre and is a classic Ridley Scott production. The Tyrell Corporation's slogan in Blade Runner (1982), "more human than humans," resonates in the desperate attempt to give humanity another chance, relying on self-intuitive machines designed to express emotions and mimic behavior. Father (Abubakar Salim) is no match for the strength and complexity of Mother, a more evolved android. Mother (Amanda Collin), the benefactress of the newly founded colony, is also a deadly necromancer of astonishing power, going on killing sprees during hysteric attacks when danger is imminent and using her primal sonic scream as a weapon. Her powers emanate from her eyes. She carries another set of regular eyeballs in a pouch and uses them for everyday life, changing to necromancer-superpower eyeballs when in attack mode. Eyes are a window to the soul-or, in this case, to the android's internal struggle between fostering or destroying life. This is similar to Blade Runner, where the Voight-Kampff test monitors physiological responses and determines if the subject is human or replicant. Blade Runner's Los Angeles urban space covered in Japanese billboards, dark streets with multicultural crowds speaking various languages in a time when Japan appeared to be the next global power and Japanese investors flocked to buy US real estate, alludes to real fears and precedes Huntington's anxiety-packed Clash of Civilizations. Rising environmental awareness is seen in the foggy and dusty skyline, while grimy, tarnished streets provide a stark contrast to gleaming skyscrapers, highlighting class division and acting as a prelude to the discourse about the 1%. The series and the genre rely on preying on anxieties. Both Raised by Wolves and Blade Runner reflect the very polarizing world we live in.

En nuestra presentación proponemos conjugar las genealogías foucaultianas sobre el gobierno de la vida y del cuerpo con la inyunción deleuziana que nos insta a elaborar un estudio socio-técnico de las sociedades de control. Para ello, sin hacer de la hipótesis de ‘las sociedades de control’ una sucesión mecánica y no problemática, desarrollaremos una lectura de la biopolítica  a partir de su relación con las transformaciones epistémicas y tecnológicas contemporáneas y las mutaciones recientes  del capitalismo. A partir de ellas, intenta componer un diagnostico que nos permita dar cuenta de la dimensión no sólo molecular, pre-individual y pre-subjetiva, sino también maquínica, informática y post-humana en la que se juega el control de la vida en las sociedades contemporáneas.

The neuroscientific revolution of the last twenty years played a role not only in the medical sector; this revolution led to new discoveries and innovations also in other field such economy, finance, marketing as well as politics. The analysis proposed in this paper will focus on what we call the "Neuropolitics 2.0". The initial part of our analysis will focus on the relationship between Politics and the use of Big Data; in the second part we are going to explore the impact of the above mentioned revolution on both decision makers (politicians) and political consumers (citizens).

En este trabajo  abordo el concepto de «marco mental» como clave para entender la concepción que la neuropolítica tiene de la deliberación pública y la democracia. En un primer lugar expondré los puntos centrales de las teorías de Jonathan Haidt y George Lakoff sobre el marco mental y la deliberación pública. Después pondré en relación la idea del marco mental con el concepto de «marco referencial» de Taylor. Finalmente, analizaré críticamente el modelo de deliberación pública y de democracia que cabe extraer del concepto de marco mental en la neuropolítica.

Je weiter die technische Entwicklung der Zivilisation voran schreitet, desto deutlicher wird, wie umfassend die menschlichen Angelegenheiten mit den materiellen und technischen Apparaturen der Lebenswelt verschränkt sind, – wie grundlegend der Mensch von den instrumentellen Arrangements, in denen er steht, formatiert, strukturiert und in seinem Handeln gelenkt wird, wie sehr sich die Geschicke des Menschen mit denen der von ihm selbst teils geschaffenen, teils nur umgearbeiteten materiell-technischen Formationen verschlingen, deren unablösbarer Teil der Mensch immer schon ist und es stets wieder auf neue Weise wird. Für die Zwecke der folgenden Überlegungen greife ich nur einen Ausschnitt aus diesem sehr weiten Feld heraus: die Art und Weise, wie die instrumentellen Arrangements der Human-Neurowissenschaften eine spezifische Wirksamkeit entfalten, welche sowohl in der Binnenperspektive humanwissenschaftlicher Praktiken als auch in der Perspektive der Wirkung dieses Wissenschaftszweiges in der Gesellschaft folgenreiche Effekte zeitigen.

El trabajo analiza el rol del neuromarketing aplicado dentro de la dimensión político-ideológico [NPI], como herramienta comunicacional para construir discursos hegemónicos: su influencia en la sociedad y su esfuerzo por invisibilizar elementos subordinantes; lo que le asigna un rol como arma para Operaciones Psicológicas [PsyOps], y una ventaja para las guerras híbridas informativas, dentro de las que se disputa el poder, local e internacionalmente. Para esto, se realiza una revisión bibliográfica para plantear las principales variables para el análisis del NPI, en la construcción y justificación de la lógica de dominio, y sus posibles usos, para elaborar narrativas contrahegemónicas.

In this article I analyze the academic reception of Jonathan Haidt’s seminal article "The emotional dog and its rational tail: A social intuitionist approach to moral judgment". My thesis is that in the spheres of philosophy and psychology, this article was initially studied within the neurocentric paradigm, which dominated the field of scientic reflection in the fifteen years following its publication. This neurocentric reading established a specific interpretation of the text with several limitations. However, more recently a digital paradigm has emerged and come to prevail in academia, providing a new perspective from which to return to Haidt’s text. Indeed, this approach makes it possible to unravel elements of the famous article that in the neurocentric paradigm went unnoticed by researchers. Moreover, the digital paradigm manages to better integrate Haidt’s seminal article into his later work as a whole.

Resumen
El presente escrito propone una lectura crítica de la utilización de la teoría de las 'neuronas espejo'por parte de Paolo Virno (2006) para formular una serie de hipótesis respecto a la existencia de una "intersubjetividad originaria " y su relación con el lenguaje como base la socialidad humana. En primer lugar se reconstruye la argumentación de Virno que desarrolla una dialéctica que va de las neuronas espejo a la socialidad humana por medio de la negación lingüística. Luego se propone comprender el planteo de Virno a partir de su lectura del célebre debate en torno a la naturaleza humana entre N. Chomsky y M. Foucault mostrando como en Virno pesaría la misma "hipoteca naturalista" que sobre el primero, lo cual se expone a partir del anclaje epistémico-político del saber neuromolecular contemporáneo sobre el que funda Virno sus hipótesis. Finalmente, se señala el riesgo que dicha hipoteca implica en un presente signado por la conformación y progresiva extensión de unos mecanismos de control o de servidumbre maquínica que operan en el nivel neuromolecular.
Palabras clave: neuronas espejo, naturaleza humana, biopolítica, servidumbre maquínica.

Abstract
The aim of this paper is to propose a critical reading of P. Virno attempt to found the common and human sociality on the assumptions of the theory of mirror neurons and a biolinguistics derived from it. In first place the paper propose a recontruction of Virno´s argument and his dialectic between mirror neurons, language and human sociality. Then, the paper comes back to the older debate between N. Chomsky and M. Foucault on human nature and shows that Virno's attempt has the same difficulties that Chomsky position. It is explained through the epistmic and political ground of the neuromolecular knowledge on which Virno bases his hypothesis. Finally, the article points out the risk that this position implies in a present marked by the progressive extension of mechanisms of control or machinic servitude working in the neuromolecular level.
Key words: mirror neurons, human nature, biopolitics, machinic servitude

In this article we make an approach to morality from a neurological point of view that try to stand out the prosocial points and the neuroplasticity that we can find in the brain. We show as well some problems that appear in the usual explanations which, consciously or not, offer a simplistic framework –and often deterministic– about human nature. Besides, we claim for a responsible use of neurosciences, which should be interdisciplinary. Neurology provides a knowledge which is really
useful for a biological exploration of morality, as in the case of mirrons neurons, whose existence shows the importance of the other, maybe as one of the crucial components of morality.

Mediacracia: Comunicação e Política na era da Mediatização oferece ao leitor uma introdução à especialidade da Comunicação Política, apresentando textos que discutem e exploram alguns dos efeitos mediáticos e políticos do processo de mediatização profunda das nossas sociedades. O tema do livro gravita em torno da intersecção entre o campo da comunicação e a esfera política, analisando as dinâmicas impostas pela colonização da política pelo cam-po dos media, o predomínio de estratégias centradas no marketing e no spin doctoring , as relações entre política e entretenimento, as ameaças do populismo e da desinformação para as democracias contemporâneas, o fenómeno da pós-verdade, as relações entre mentira e política, a actualidade dos escândalos de corrupção e outros temas que resultam da interface entre a Comunicação e a Política nas sociedades mediatizadas.

Il pointe la difficulté de hiérarchiser les informations dans un monde qui en est saturé. Vous travaillez depuis dix ans sur l'émergence de la « post-vérité », un concept que le grand public a découvert en 2016, au moment du référendum pour le Brexit au Royaume-Uni et de l'élection présidentielle américaine. Qu'est-ce que la post-vérité ? Jayson Harsin.-Avant, le journalisme moderne jouait un rôle d'intermédiaire entre le gouvernement, la science et diverses institutions d'un côté, et l'opinion publique de l'autre. Le journalisme professionnel et la science moderne recueillaient la vérité publique et la presse la diffusait. La démocratie reposait sur la confiance du public dans cette institution et ses vérités, que des intérêts politiques différents acceptaient et utilisaient pour défendre leurs projets. Aujourd'hui, les études montrent que les gens ne font plus confiance aux médias. Cette perte de confiance a généré une crise de la vérité : c'est cela, la post-vérité. Mais comment est-ce arrivé ? Le président américain, Donald Trump, à Oxon Hill (Maryland), le 24 février. JONATHAN ERNST / REUTERS « La post-vérité a radicalement transformé les campagnes électorales »

Motivated by the seemingly chaotic state of affairs of contemporary world political actions, I describe a possible psychological masses domination strategy called " contradictory stimulation ". Assuming that there is the possibility of a genuine intention on the part of some families and powerful organizations in guiding humanity in the way of their interests, I point through mathematical and computational models that contradictory stimulation can be effective in inducing a subservient mentality in the political citizens. Recognize the existence of artful stratagems of manipulation and " brainwashing " sharpens our critical sense and changes our world view. It is the first step in a reaction that try to ensure individual freedoms, if they are desirable.

Recent literature has presented significant findings in the field of political psychology regarding the evolutionary connections between rightists and leftists. Michael Ryan’s book, The Genetics of Political Behaviour: How Evolutionary Psychology Explains Ideology, is the result of such efforts, attempting to explore the relationship between psychology and politics through an evolutionary psychological framework. For this purpose, the author compiles an extensive range of literature regarding neuroscience, genetics, and psychology in order to explain the biological differences between rightists and leftists that lead to ideological differences. With the help of this theoretical framework, the author details how specific personality traits that are attributed to leftists or rightists have shaped human history and the future of civilisation, economy, and religion.

Neuropoder é uma forma de conhecimento produzido pelo poder tecnológico em aliança com o poder político, que actua por meio da modulação de processos mentais, funções e expressões, dirigido a indivíduos e a agregados populacionais. Por meio de imagens cerebrais, tratamentos médicos e farmacologia, extensões técnicas, redes digitais, regimes jurídicos e paradigmas conceptuais orientadores, o neuropoder actua nas funções mentais que antes eram invisíveis, ignoradas ou ingovernáveis. O neuropoder é uma lógica capacitadora de uma governamentalidade que vê na regulação da cognição, da sensação, da atenção, do humor e da aptidão mental, um novo e singular território de influência e soberania.

Humans are in many ways more complex than other living beings. When it comes to the political decision-making processes of this complex creature, it becomes even more difficult to understand. Through upcoming academic research in the fields of neuropolitics and psychopolitics, which is a valuable and analysis-oriented field of political psychology, it became even more valuable to understand what the political tendency of this political creature is, what kind of political leader profile it is influenced by, what motivation it votes for and which party it votes for.

The starting point of this study is the question “When trying to understand human political attitudes and behaviors, can we achieve better results by making use of the multidisciplinary aspects of neuroscience and psychology, such as implicit association testing, in order to go beyond classical research methods?”

In the theory part of the study, approaches examining voter behaviors and neuropolitics, which is a new approach, are discussed, and both neuroscience and implicit association test, which is a psychological research method, are explained.

In the experimental part of the study, the hypothesis that the implicit association test gives better results than the explicit association test while trying to measure the perception of voters about the Republic's Alliance and the Nation Alliance was tested and the hypothesis could not be verified due to the reasons stated in the conclusion part.

Keywords: Neuropolitics, Psychopolitics, Voter Behavior, Political Communication, Political Psychology; Political Science

This work sets out to analyse the model of deliberative process developed by Haidt in his theory of Social Intuitionism. Specifically, I intend to submit to analysis the two illusions which, according to Haidt, govern public deliberation. I shall argue that those illusions do not exist in reality, but result from an erroneous approach to the deliberative process. In his proposal, Haidt forgets to acknowledge the epistemic dimension of deliberation and the place occupied by moral emotions in the communicative process. In my opinion, this emotional dimension of deliberation should be defended from deliberative democracy. Resumen:

O principal objectivo deste ensaio consiste em examinar em que circunstâncias se dá a redescoberta das categorias pathêmicas nos fluxos comunicacionais da actividade política. Deste modo, analisamos a política das emoções como uma das tendências da comunicação política contemporânea, procurando indagar como o neuropoder ajuda a compreender e a explicar uma parte importante do nosso comportamento político. Articulando a emoção e a razão na teoria democrática, o nosso excurso subdivide-se em três partes: num primeiro momento, procuraremos definir o campo da comunicação política; posteriormente analisamos a importância do " universo dos afectos " nos processos de comunicação; por fim, procuramos evidenciar como o conhecimento do " cérebro político " é, actualmente, essencial nas estratégias eleitorais.

This chapter locates two neurological turns: one against networked media in recent critiques of the internet by, for example, Nicholas Carr; the other in networked media R&D departments such as Google and Facebook using machine learning and data mining and deploying techniques of 'neuro-perception'. What is at stake in these turns and why do they radically miss yet implicitly complement the culture and politics of each other? I trace the different neuropolitics at work here via the materialities of fMRIs and their strategic deployment by all networked corporations and their critics. I also ask how we might unfold images of the brain differently, shifting them from their indexical status of revealing 'neural correlates' toward a more diagrammatic rendering of a dynamic, machinic brain. Despite having celebrated 'the decade of the brain' from 1990–1999, Catherine Malabou reminds us that we still do not know what we should do with our brains (2008). Yet philosophy is perhaps confronting such risks too late, as an entire technics of search, query, databasing, pattern matching and machine learning is already attempting to determine what our brains must do. Such a technics seeks out that share of mind that is nonconscious, staking a claim on what we should be thinking and feeling, how we should be behaving, before we register that this entanglement is something we might desire. Take, for example, Google's aspirations beyond its constitution as the 'ultimate' search engine. Its construction of and investment in 'the future' rests on its capacity to

This work sets out to analyse the model of deliberative process developed by Haidt in his theory of Social Intuitionism. Specifically, I intend to submit to analy­sis the two illusions which, according to Haidt, govern public deliberation. I shall argue that those illusions do not exist in reality, but result from an erroneous ap­proach to the deliberative process. In his proposal, Haidt forgets to acknowledge the epistemic dimension of deliberation and the place occupied by moral emotions in the communicative process. In my opinion, this emotional dimension of deliberation should be defended from deliberative democracy.

Electors are affected by not only rational arguements but also emotional and subconscious arguements. Political preferences are related to emotional changes. Neuro-sciences cooperate with politics, and this caused the emergence of neuropolitics. Neuropolitics is a phenomena that questions the relation between politics and brain and brings together the science of politics, neuro-sciences, and psychology. Neuropolitics question how people decide politically and establish coaliations through neouro-sciences. There hasn't been so many researches on neuropolitics, however recent studies show really effective results. It is estimated that these recent studies will contribute to this scope and open new perspectives. This study is based on content analysis and experimental method. The subjects are selected via stratified sample method. The subjects are chosen from firat university students and academicians. The y generation is constituted by 18-26 aged male and female students, the x ge...

Electors are affected by not only rational arguements but also emotional and subconscious arguements. Political preferences are related to emotional changes. Neuro-sciences cooperate with politics, and this caused the emergence of neuropolitics. Neuropolitics is a phenomena that questions the relation between politics and brain and brings together the science of politics, neuro-sciences, and psychology. Neuropolitics question how people decide politically and establish coaliations through neouro-sciences. There hasn't been so many researches on neuropolitics, however recent studies show really effective results. It is estimated that these recent studies will contribute to this scope and open new perspectives. This study is based on content analysis and experimental method. The subjects are selected via stratified sample method. The subjects are chosen from firat university students and academicians. The y generation is constituted by 18-26 aged male and female students, the x genarations is constituted by 26-44 aged academicians. On the first stage, the photos of ten state leaders are presented to the volunteers in this experiment which is isolated from exterior effects. The volunteers are not told that these photograhs belong to the world leaders. They are requested to order these photos according to stated criterias in ten seconds. Each criteria is a modul. They are requested to number the photos between 1-10 according to the charisma, power, trust, and peaceable moduls. Each stages are conducted again in ten seconds. After they order these photos they are asked if they know them or not. Then, they are asked to estimate about their countries. After this estimation process they are asked if they answer consciously. The results show that the volunteers couldn't estimate to whom these photographs belong however there has been similar orders. According to these orders, the most charismatic, the most reliable, the most powerful, and the most peaceable leaders are stated and vice versa. The volunteers couldn't estimate who are these leaders. These studies show that it is because of the changing perception of image by the generations. Although the results of these study are based on the city of elazig, the majority of this sample group was grown up in different cities. For this reason, the results of this study can be generalized and applied to larger sample groups. A neuropolitic experiment on state leaders on the grounds of power, charisma, trust and peacebility. With the development of new technology neuroimaging techniques have been used in different disciplines like economy, politics and marketing. With using neuroimaging techniques new interdisciplinary areas have been emerged. Neuropolitics has found its place in social sciences after the use of neuroimaging techniques in political science. Neuropolitic examines the mental process of voter and focus on better understanding og voting behavior. (grafman vd, 2006; 27) neuropolitics is in a critical position in terms of understanding the political trend and preferences of voter. Neuropolitics has developed a new method using brain imaging techniques to examine especially individual's political decision process and understand how their thoughts arise about political associations. Especially observing the emergence of individuals political thoughts will provide to determine the way of political science. (çakar ve ülman,2012;358). Neuropolitics methods have been actively used by the politicians. Neuropolitics methods used especially in u.s. Presidential elections and with this methods voters preferences have been influenced. Applied research company which is founded by tom freedman examined the decision making process of the voter and tried to understand how the brain reacts to leadership attributes. In 2003 the company used fmri device in order to measure the influence of campaign ads in the presidential contest between bush and kerry.

Modernity has changed the conditions of reality representation and the consequent actuality that is produced. The technics of representation are complex and diverse with the outcome even more mesmerizing. This has produced a reality that is mutually intersected with its reflections, simulations and counterfeit. Baudrillard(1988) argues that the conditions of modernity effectuated a virtual and counterfeit reality of reality itself, that it is hard to distinguish the object and its reflections and objectivity from subjectivity. In his Sophist, Plato distinguished the faithful production(ideal) from its copy(form) and the distorted image from the original. Baudrillard, furthermore posits that a simulacrum is produced that is no longer a copy of the real but has gained genuine reality and truth in its own. The simulacrum(or the counterfeit) overtakes the genuine real itself. Baudrillard then categorizes reality representations into four: reflections, perversions, pretence and simulacrum.

In recent decades, addiction has been medicalized anew through the rise of an influential ‘brain disease paradigm’. This questions the equivalence of addiction to drug dependence by re-emphasizing loss of self-control over unhealthy impulses as the disease locus. While showing continuities with the nineteenth-century vision of addictions as ‘diseases of the will’, neurobiology objectifies disease as disrupted neurochemical transmission and lasting neuroadaptation. The brain disease paradigm emerged together with rapid advances in neuroimaging technology as well as intensified research efforts to confirm cigarette smoking as nicotine addiction. After smoking achieved such recognition in the late 1980s, numerous other unhealthy impulses and appetites have likewise come under neurobiological investigation as prospective cases of addiction. Despite its technoscientific sophistication, neurobiology's biomedicalization of addiction remains as partial and ambiguous as past medicalizations. By confirming moral self-transformation anew as an indispensable component of treatment and recovery, neurobiology revives addiction as a moral disease in the process of its objectification. Furthermore, through its rediscovery of a classic nineteenth-century ‘liberal disease’ at the molecular level, the neurobiology of addiction is acting as a vital moralizing resource in the biomedicalization of health and illness more generally today.

With the rise of neuroscience as a dominant and respected science, there is an eagerness on the part of philosophers dealing with consciousness to validate their respective approaches with ‘science’, so as not to be confused with mystics, transcendentalists, or theologians and thus end up being left out of the materialist dominated hegemony within academia. This is of course understandable given the huge challenges such research presents to the philosophy of mind and consciousness. To ignore them would indeed be equivalent to burying ones head in the sand. Certainly there have been previous attempts by notorious Sartrean’s (such as Hazel Barnes) to enter Sartre into a dialogue with neuroscience. However it is coming increasingly common to find that such approaches, not just in Sartre studies, have cherry-picked certain ideas in order to vindicate their respective philosophies, without proper consideration.

As such this paper seeks to examine the extent to which neuroscience undermines, reinforces, reconfigures or outright rejects Sartre and how reliable such research is, through surveying the various neuroscientific theories of consciousness. Certainly we must not forget that neuroscience, as with all science, relies on philosophical intuitions and metaphysical principles. Thus as tempting as it may be to vindicate Sartre through coaxing his philosophy in scientific jargon, we must stay open, attentive and philosophical in our deliberations.

Critically through exploring the neuroscientific challenge in such a way, the paper argues three things: first that as far as the neural-correlates of consciousness (or indeed the scientific explanation of it) is concerned, the jury is still out. Thus the demand that Sartre (or Sartreans) must scientifically prove intentional consciousness is unreasonable and absurd; second, the one theory to actually and completely undermine intentional consciousness - the classical computational or functionalist approach – has become increasingly untenable. Despite encountering the hard problem of consciousness, it is generally agreed that the subjective, qualitative and intentional feel of consciousness are real properties. In this way the phenomenology underpinning Sartre’s theory of consciousness has remained relevant (at times presenting itself as neurophenomenology); third, despite not knowing the exact cause of consciousness, neuroscience and neurophenomenology certainly has found some rather interesting things regarding neural networks, memory, perception and embodiment that certainly do require consideration if the Sartrean is to remain relevant. To this extent I consider Varela’s ‘enactive’ model and Damasio’s ‘somatic markers’ hypothesis. The third point is crucial for our understanding and development of Sartre’s dialectic of the self. It is the nature of embodiment that truly presents a challenge to ‘absolute freedom’ and negation.