Day 340: Law Reform through Mirror Neurons

Photo by Tuva Mathilde Løland on Unsplash

I’m spending much of my time this summer walking in the footsteps of a man who made bad decisions.

Actually, in researching his life, I want to interrogate whether he made decisions at all, and in what sense they were “bad.” Certainly, the policies he helped implement had devastating consequences for hundreds of thousands of displaced or persecuted people. But how much agency did he have? How much did he know? Did the alternate values he honored matter?

And most importantly, knowing only what he knew when he knew it, would we have done differently?

Through intimate interrogation of this one life a century ago, I hope to trigger deeper understanding of the choices we face today over modern migration conflicts and crises.

Today I happened upon a theory that explains why I’m attracted to this study: mirror neurons.

Mirror neurons are located in many areas of the brain. These neurons activate when we act and also when we observe someone else acting.

Pscyhologists are still learning about their function, but they seem to be critical to physical, mental, and emotional learning, as well as empathy development. When we see someone run, the same neurons fire as when we run; when we see someone sad, the same neurons fire as when we feel sad.

Moreover, mirror neurons don’t just teach us what another person is doing or how they are doing it. They also, someone, allow us to understand why the person is acting as they are.

By intimately studying the life of one mid-level bureaucrat in the Department of State, I feel those motor neurons firing. By putting myself as closely in his shoes as I can based on the sources that have survived, I hope to feel — not just think — of the best response to the migration crises we face today.

And I hope to write that story genuinely enough that readers’ own mirror neurons will teach them what they need to know about how to handle the wicked problem of migration.