Lowering the voting age

Among neuroscientists, the consensus seems to be that the brain doesn't finish its progression from adolescence to maturity until around or after the mid-20s. Interesting snippets:

From Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT):

"As a number of researchers have put it, "the rental car companies have it right." The brain isn't fully mature at 16, when we are allowed to drive, or at 18, when we are allowed to vote, or at 21, when we are allowed to drink, but closer to 25, when we are allowed to rent a car".

"According to recent findings, the human brain does not reach full maturity until at least the mid-20s".

MIT - Young adult development project > Brain changes

From University of Rochester Medical Centre:

"Understanding the Teen Brain

It doesn’t matter how smart teens are or how well they scored on the SAT or ACT. Good judgment isn’t something they can excel in, at least not yet. The rational part of a teen’s brain isn’t fully developed and won’t be until age 25 or so.

In fact, recent research has found that adult and teen brains work differently. Adults think with the prefrontal cortex, the brain’s rational part. This is the part of the brain that responds to situations with good judgment and an awareness of long-term consequences. Teens process information with the amygdala. This is the emotional part.

In teens' brains, the connections between the emotional part of the brain and the decision-making center are still developing—and not always at the same rate. That’s why when teens have overwhelming emotional input, they can’t explain later what they were thinking. They weren’t thinking as much as they were feeling."

University of Rochester Medical Center - Understanding the Teen Brain

Well those links don't quote much origional reserch. They're just pop science. The few refrences to origional reserch in them are MRI studies and I caution that interpriting how anotomical changes in the brain efect its function can be very subjective. For example this profesor derived a theory of the brain structure underlying psycopathy based on MRI scans. then scaned his own brain and descoved he met the critera inspite of being relitivly well adjusted (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_H._Fallon)

But lets just take it as read that you are right about brain stucture? So what? Alcoholics have impaired prefrontal cortexes. Some people have surgicaly removed Corpus callosum. 2 of the brain reageons refrenced in you links. Should they not be allowed to vote? Why should impulse controle be a factor for voting? Lots of people with ADHD have impaired impulse controle. 'Abnormalities' in the prefrontal cortex are implicated in autism. Should we not be allowed to vote?

For better or worse in this country the current standard for adults voting is mental capacity which is based on the abilitity to reasion about information; not judgment which is a broarder and I would argue more subjective consept. The mental capacity act spicificly says poor judgment doesn't invalidate capacity. ("A person is not to be treated as unable to make a decision merely because he makes an unwise decision.") So why should the 'judgment' matter at 16 but not 18 where the ability to make reasoned dessisions is enough?

Well those links don't quote much origional reserch. They're just pop science. The few refrences to origional reserch in them are MRI studies and I caution that interpriting how anotomical changes in the brain efect its function can be very subjective. For example this profesor derived a theory of the brain structure underlying psycopathy based on MRI scans. then scaned his own brain and descoved he met the critera inspite of being relitivly well adjusted (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_H._Fallon)

But lets just take it as read that you are right about brain stucture? So what? Alcoholics have impaired prefrontal cortexes. Some people have surgicaly removed Corpus callosum. 2 of the brain reageons refrenced in you links. Should they not be allowed to vote? Why should impulse controle be a factor for voting? Lots of people with ADHD have impaired impulse controle. 'Abnormalities' in the prefrontal cortex are implicated in autism. Should we not be allowed to vote?

For better or worse in this country the current standard for adults voting is mental capacity which is based on the abilitity to reasion about information; not judgment which is a broarder and I would argue more subjective consept. The mental capacity act spicificly says poor judgment doesn't invalidate capacity. ("A person is not to be treated as unable to make a decision merely because he makes an unwise decision.") So why should the 'judgment' matter at 16 but not 18 where the ability to make reasoned dessisions is enough?