ABSTRACT
This chapter traces Catherine Malabou's intervention into neuroscience in order to demonstrate the need for a materialist theory of the brain that, as Althusser might say, prevents certain forms of ideological/idealist appropriation of science. There is an argument that a similar intervention is needed in education. Briefly outlining some broad aspects of the emerging field of brain-based learning to conceptualize the underlying understanding of plasticity and inform not only the scientific research conducted but also educational applications and proposals. Much of Malabou's work concerns the concept of plasticity, both in the history of philosophy and in current neuoroscientific work on the brain. The chapter draws a correlation between the rise of learning discourses and practices and the turn toward neuroscience in educational research. This correlation is important for demonstrating how neuroscience offers a neuro-ideology for justifying learning on objective grounds and how learning offers a location or practice base for socializing this ideology as good common sense.
