Brain Injury and the Culture of Neglect: Musings on an Uncertain Future.

As medical ethicists, we find ourselves at the intersection of the humanities and the sciences, a confluence that is too often underpopu- lated and an intellectual space that needs more engagement. Following in Snow’s tradition (Fins 2009; Fins and de Melo-Martin 2010; Fins 2010), we see the two-culture divide as a barrier to solving challenging questions such as those posed by severe brain injury. So in the spirit of reconciling these two cultures, we hope to employ both the tools of the sciences and the insights of the humanities in our description of disorders of consciousness and analysis of the ethical challenges posed by these minimal states of consciousness. Indeed, our paper is the product of authors from differing disciplines, with the two of us representing a broader investigative team that draws upon a number of disciplines with many ways of knowing and understanding.