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How Brain Scientists Forgot That Brains Have Owners

Yong, Ed
http://theatlantic.com/science/archive/2017/02/how-brain-scientists-forgot-that-brains-have-owners/517599/

Publisher:  The Atlantic
Date Written:  27/02/2017
Year Published:  2017  
Resource Type:  Article

Five neuroscientists argue that fancy new technologies have led the field astray.

Abstract: 
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Excerpt:

There are many other examples where behavior led the way. By studying how owls listen out for scurrying prey, neuroscientists discovered how their brains -- and later, those of mammals -- localize sound. By studying how marmosets call to each other, Ghazanfar has learned more about the rules that govern turn-taking in human conversation. Critically, these cases began with studying behaviors that the animals naturally do, not those that they had been trained to perform. Likewise, bats, sea slugs, and electric fish have all told us a lot about how brains work, because each has its own specialized skills. "If you pick a species that does one or two behaviors super-well, you can identify the underlying circuits more clearly," Ghazanfar says. "Instead, mice are treated as if they’re this generic mammal that have smaller versions of human brains -- and that"s preposterous."

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