Autonomic and autonomous thinking as preconditions for criminal liability

This chapter builds on recent findings of cognitive psychology about 'The New Unconscious', relating this to Judith Butler's exploration of the constitutive opacity of the self. The argument will be that the interplay between autonomic and conscious thought is the precondition for autonomous action, constituting the possibility to blame a person for wrongful action. Autonomic computing environments, however, could manipulate our autonomic behaviours in ways that do not reach the threshold of consciousness, thus easily manipulating us into being nice and decent (or horrible and dangerous) individuals without us having a clue as to why we act as we do.