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maybe a lower level desire to act violently. maybe we want to shift the line. right now where society has chosen to draw the line is to be pretty harsh with respect to we will include as people who are agents of responsibility versus nonagents of responsibility. neuroscience could change that. once we understand and have a better understanding of human behavior and we recognize that there is a much finer graduation that we can draw than this bright line, perhaps it will shift the line or start over. it's not all that consistent, inconsistent with the way to do things. >> i think it i...

theoretically whether we can distinguish preferences from action, but whether we can identify those either before the fact or after the fact that had that inability to control their actions. >> yeah, but what we do know is that even like the one that kent presented, the pedestriano file out of virginia, that the vast majority of people who have a tumor like that who may have preferences and desires to act on sexual impulses don't. though we may not know in any particular case whether a person is an automoton, usually you can. the law has a bright line. it says if you engage in a wong...

cake may not have control over it, how do we want to account for that if at all in the criminal justice system? to date, we haven't. in the future, we may wish to. >> i agree with that. i think that, first of all, the fact that everybody in the audience could control themselves raising their hands gives me some comfort as i walk out the door, but one of the problems with the disconnect that i was alluding to earlier between how science deals with this question and how lawyers deal with this question is that you actually get a fundamental disconnect between the two systems. so you men...

which you may not have control versus action choices and in law, we punish you for bad actions, not for bad preferences and desires. so then the question is, how do we take account for preferences and desires that may be outside of your control? that may be things like gray matter lighten kent showed us that showed us that people like psychopaths have decreased gray matter in particular regions of their brain. it could be something like the guy who he was talking about out of virginia who had the large tumor in his brain and chose to act on but didn't have control over having the tum...

problems with the disconnect that i was alluding to earlier between how science deals with this question and how lawyers deal with this question is that you actually get a fundamental disconnect between the two systems. so you mentioned that lack of emotional control or lack of ability to control your preferences might lead to insanity, but, in fact, in most jurisdictions as you know, that's not true. after hanky was acquitted under the american law institute test because he could not control his behavior, congress in most state jurisdictions changed the law, got rid of the lack of e...