镜像神经元的发现及其对身心二元论的超越

镜像神经元是意大利帕尔玛大学Rizzolatti等人在恒河猴大脑腹侧运动前皮层F5区发现的一种神经元。这种神经元在猴子操作和观察同一个指向某种目标的动作时(如伸手抓食物)皆被激活，似乎这种神经元映射了其它个体的动作，因此被命名为“镜像神经元”。镜像神经元通过具身的模拟把动作的执行和动作的知觉结合在一起，把观察过程与身体运动过程相融合，克服了二元论在身心之间所设置的障碍，为人们正确认识身心关系开辟了新的视角。

The discovery of mirror neurons and its beyond over mind-body dualism

It was discovered originally by neuroscientist Rizzolatti and his group in university of Parma, Italy, in the early 1990s, mirror neuron represent a special class of brain cells that can fire both when the macaque executes a goal-directed motor act and when it observes another agent performing the same or a similar goal-directed motor act. They were called mirror neurons just because they seemed to directly reflect another individual’s act in observer’s brain. Functional neuroimaging studies demonstrate that there is also a mirror neuron system in human being. This kind of mirror mechanism allows us to directly understand the meaning of the actions of others by internally simulating them without any conscious efforts. Mirror neurons appear to form a cortical system that may match act execution and act observation, and connect cognition with body’s sensor-motor systems. Therefore, it seems that mirror neurons bridge the gap between mind and body, and open a new vision for reconsidering the mind-body relationship.