ABSTRACT
This chapter begins with the discovery by Benjamin Libet that the brain is active in advance of their conscious decision to act. The dynamic systems theory is an attempt to counter the prevailing view in neuroscience that denies moral choice. The chapter considers two main issues: moral intuition and the biological origins of moral values. It takes the neuroscience to task for its adherence to hard determinism and ontological reductionism. Neuroscience can both inform and misinform the educational task of cultivating moral values. Educators should view neuroscience with critical eyes. The chapter employs very much within the foothills of moral values development and its neurobiology, in the belief, where it begins to gain some purchase on the origins of moral values and some fundamentals for cultivating moral values in education. A holistic notion of the conscious/subconscious self, and of the brain as inherently embodied and environmentally embedded, would seem to have implications for cultivating moral values in education.
