Mind Over Machine 331
broKenfoLd writes "Monkeys moving robotic arms by manipulating a cursor on a computer screen, simply by thinking about it? Mice who cause their water tube to dispense some refreshing H2O just by wishing it? Signal processing and decoding has long been a dream of Matrix fans and lazy system administrators for years, and science is amazingly keeping up! Popular Science's Carl Zimmer has written a fascinating piece documenting recent progress in decoding brain signals and interpreting commands issued from thoughts alone. If you heard a single violin playing Beethoven's 5th, you would be able to tell what piece of music was being played even though the rest of the orchestra was not heard. In the same way, by monitoring a relatively few neurons, computers can recognize patterns and allow programming based on these patterns to say, know if a mouse is thinking about pushing his water lever.
You can pass the time waiting for Matrix-style video games and motionless system adminstration/utilization by reading the full article."
Cell Phone (Score:5, Insightful)
How about living in a way that our bodies were actually meant to. Exercising, working with our bodies, and communicating in person. Eventually we will just be sitting at home, in a lazy-boy with our brains plugged in to a network and all work from home. But, that would suck!
Re:umm.. not just yet. (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Maybe the Should Rename Magazine... (Score:3, Insightful)
This journal.... (Score:5, Insightful)
Mod me down, off topic troll
Average Person (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Controlling sexual predators through technology (Score:2, Insightful)
Is this a troll? (Score:5, Insightful)
I'd like to see a simple switch based on brain activity that would toggle on during sexual thought/arousal and toggle off in the absence of that.
Jesus sweet fucking christ I sure as hell don't want to see that! What the hell are you thinking?
Children could then be taught that if somebody's "face button" is glowing when that person is asking them to [get in the car|go play with a cute pet|have some candy|etc.], to run and get help.
Why don't we just teach children that when a "person is asking them to [get in the car|go play with a cute pet|have some candy|etc.], to run and get help" without the face-button shit?
GMD
Re:Controlling sexual predators through technology (Score:3, Insightful)
But we shouldn't stop there, the ultimate goal is to prevent crime. So we should implement it on everybody, just in case even a law-abiding citizen starts having impure thoughts about the validity of the president-for-life's reign on the country.
feedback loop? (Score:2, Insightful)
basicly we need this device to talk back to the brain, not just listen to it.
I don't understand something... (Score:5, Insightful)
they say in the article that they need to "train" the computer beforehand (no pun intended)
before it can
My question, which was not answered in the article, is: Are every brain emmitting the same signals for the same action
or do they need to "train" the program for every new user (monkey)? I would think that every individual have a somewhat
unique "brain signature" and if it is the case, how can a totally impaired person train a computer to use an artificial arm or
leg or whatever if anyway he isn't able to move a "joystick"?
Can the computer associated anything as an input to compare with the brain activity?
Could (let's say ) S. Hawking program the system by blowing in a tube harder or smoother for example?
Am I clear?
Re:Cell Phone (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:This is all cool, but... (Score:5, Insightful)
Does the mouse get water by thinking about water, or by thinking something completely different that happens to trigger the machine? Once he figures it out, he'll do it again when he's thirsty.
Re:Controlling sexual predators through technology (Score:3, Insightful)
Sounds double-plus-good to me.
Also sounds like those studies they did recently for "latent racism". Studies that were fatally flawed because they didn't take into account that people who are painfully aware of racism and who try to avoid it at all costs - including the appearance of being racist - are the same people who were labelled as being racist in the study.
Please, don't go down the thought-crime avenue. Actions are what count - not thoughts. And as noble as your goals might appear to be to you, consider this:
If you have a predisposition towards doing something (whether child molestation, smoking, drinking or breathing), it takes conscious thought to not do that act. And that thought will trigger the same "flashing button" that deciding to do that act will.
Try thinking about not breathing without thinking about breathing. It ain't going to happen.
Re:I don't think it will ever be like in the movie (Score:2, Insightful)
However, typing in to a computer "make me a sandwich" won't make my computer contact a sandwich-making robot over the intarweb and order a sandwich. You'll still have to issue the commands like you would now.
Re:Channel surfing (Score:4, Insightful)
They've got this thing with emotional bonding and sensible family life.
Nice try, but I know several women who do enjoy porn. You're just not getting to know the right women.
Porn isn't about objectification. It's about visual stimulation. It does not exclude or preclude emotional bonding or sensible family life - unless you have an unhealthy preoccupation with it.
Just remember: everyone's different. Not everyone shares your particular problems with sex.
the exciting part (Score:5, Insightful)
If you've ever tried learning an activity that instinctive reflexes like skateboarding or ice skating or even playing the piano, you realize that no matter how much instruction someone gives you, at some point you feel like once you've done it enough, you just "get it". It's the whole muscle memory thing, how your brain encounters something new and just adapts, learning exactly which neurons to fire at the right moments to get the desired affect. Seeing neuron's grow and cluster especially for the robot arm is indicative that the monkey's brain can assimilate the arm and treat it as a natural extension as opposed to a external tool with an awkward interface. In geekspeak, it's like a kernel that, on detecting a new device, can probe it, learn the API, and build its own device driver automatically, without ever knowing anything other than that it's something on the other end of a bus.
Extending that line of thought, who's to say that if the signal processing and classification algorithms advanced far enough to classify even our thoughts, our brains wouldn't be able to instinctively learn how the mind-readers worked and retaliate in return?
Re:Channel surfing (Score:5, Insightful)
In most cases, it just requires communication about the subject. If you explain why you like porn, it's not longer a problem.
No, it doesn't mean you love them any less.
No, you don't necessarily want them to do those things.
No, they're not being screwed*; they get paid thousands of dollars for this.
Explain that it's visual stimulation, and it means that you're not pawing at them for sex all the time - that it gives you options. Explain how men basically want sex all of the time (believe it or not, most women do too... it just surfaces in different ways - it's more emotional than physical).
And if you're going to watch porn with a woman, don't go for usenet stuff or bargain bin video store pornos. Get yourself some of the classy Adam & Eve stuff designed for couples, which actually have a real plot (or at least, more of a plot than most), and pick the video based on what you know turns her on.
You'll be surprised. Sure, not all women will react that way - a lot will react exactly as you've described. But the only way to truly find out is through in-depth, honest communication. And that takes effort.
* erm... well, you know what I mean.
Re: A Clockwork Orange? (Score:4, Insightful)
This was the main theme of A Clockwork Orange [clockworkorange.com] by Anthony Burgess.
In it, a violent young man is subjected to a psychological process that renders him unable to commit violent acts. Undergoing it is one of the conditions for his release from prison.
One of the main questions posed by the book (or film) is whether someone who is forced to be good can be considered to be good or if they're the same person as before, just in an enternal prison. It's a disturbing idea when dwelled upon - what happened to progress, development and redemption?
Equally disturbing is the the side-effects of this operation on the character. Aside from accidentally conditioning him to despise the music of Beethoven which he'd formerly adored, there is a horrible scene where he is picked up by two of his former friends and almost killed now that he is incapable of defending himself.
I am sure that there are people who think such control over others would be wonderful. In fact, it would render people little more than robots living according to their masters' (the police/judge's) ideals of correct behaviour. At that point you might as well just kill the people.
I also can't help thinking of the main characters last words in the film of 'Clockwork Orange.'
"I was cured alright."
At that point, the audience's sympathies are with him.We've lived through the mind-altering experience ourselves and we want to be free.
Re:This could be bad... (Score:3, Insightful)
Hahaha. You're absolutely right.
Now, enough
Penile plethysmograph (Score:3, Insightful)
The device already exists, only it works on your dick instead. Google for "penile plethysmograph" for more. It's a very good 1:1 mapping of sexual arousal. The real problem is that arousal and desire to commit the acts isn't - how many men get turned on by a hot lesbian scene, without wanting to be a lesbian?
The other fallacy is that the mind isn't one-dimensional. People can be in some way happy, yet in some way sad over exactly the same thing. In the same way, they can be both aroused and disgusted at the same time. There's a saying that "Most people wouldn't dream about doing what they dream about doing."
The mind is simply associative. Show it something sexual and it will connect, be it performed by an adult or a child. The only thing you measure is if you're able to drown it out by sending conflicting signals - much like your average male does when he wants to lose an embarrasing boner - think of a complete turn-off.
Kjella
Re:This could be bad... (Score:3, Insightful)
Chicken or Egg? (Score:4, Insightful)
have they learned that every time they think about death/sex/food the water comes?
I was interested until I saw "Popular ..." (Score:4, Insightful)
Entreprenurial posers.
Still it sells magazines.
Re:Cell Phone (Score:5, Insightful)
What about the idea that humans were "meant to" improve themselves technologically? Check out the book "Natural Born Cyborgs" [amazon.com] by Andy Clark -- he makes a pretty convincing argument that things like cellphone implants or robotic limbs aren't a bizarre aberration. Rather, they're incremental steps on the long road of technological self-enhancements that started the first time someone used the technology of writing to remember a piece of abstract information the unaided brain would have forgotten.
Even if you reject that argument, you have to figure out where to draw the line, and the answer isn't at all obvious. Were humans meant to see fine details on objects miles away? Toss out those binoculars. Were we meant to instantly kill other creatures without laying a finger on them? Forget your rough-hewn spearheads and boar traps, if not. Were we meant to survive heart failure? (Careful that your reasoning doesn't also conclude that gene therapy to live for 1000 years is fine too, if you want to be traditional but still humane.) To travel halfway around the globe in a matter of hours? To walk on the moon? The list goes on.
Humans are naturally unnatural. It's what makes us what we are.
Re:Cell Phone (Score:3, Insightful)
Meant to? Meant to by whom?
What am I thinking? (Score:3, Insightful)
Wrong focus? (Score:3, Insightful)
Why design an arm that has to figure out which brain signals mean "lift up?" Why not design an arm that will respond to brain signals in a number of ways, and one of them is by lifting up? We've each got the best learning device known to our species in our heads, why not use that skill? We all learned to use our original arms through trial and error (albeit when there was a lot less clutter in our heads), I've got the sneaking suspicion that we'd figure out how to make a mechanical one do whatever we want.
It would be no different than learning to swim, or ride a bike, or swing a golf club.
Then all you need is a way to get signals from the brain to the device, and you're set.
Re:I don't think it will ever be like in the movie (Score:2, Insightful)
The robot/machine that you are controlling will be no different than your usual body: there won't be anything out of your physical control.
First, when you think about an action, like suicide, it's a bit vague. What limb are you actually wanting to move? I'm willing to bet you would be thinking more on a high level: why is my life miserable? What did I get myself into? I want to die.. etc. This article isn't talking about machines actually interpreting these high level thoughts, it's talking about interpreting low level thoughts like "I want to grab that glass of water. Move my hand to the right, and squeeze, etc." These thoughts will generate a specific action.
If our bodies actually interpreted high level behaviours and thoughts on its own, there would be havoc. It's really the brain that does that, and tells the peripherals the specific movements.
Re:Cell Phone (Score:2, Insightful)
Every action being publicly known would cause you to think through everything you do. Every thought being public would cause you to fear thinking too much - about ideas that might be too controversial, sexual fantasies you might want to indulge in, feelings of hatred and hurt towards someone and so on. If your thoughts take you too far, perhaps you'll be an Enemy of the People(TM).
Pervasive telepathy will erase the concept of evil thoughts. Right now we have thoughts that embarass us. Many people have been taught to believe things that aren't true, for instance the idea that only bad girls like sex. For a person instilled with that belief, sexual desire is something to feel guilty about. With a brain that's hooked up to every other it becomes blatantly obvious that everyone shares these thoughts. If you can read minds you are immune to this kind of brainwashing and it is apparent to you that your brain works pretty much just like any others.
Likewise, feelings of hurt and hatred are felt by all people from time to time. In a pervasive telepathatic environment the object of your hatred can feel it as well. All people do mean things from time to time, but nobody wants to be hated. Telepathy is the ultimate behavioral feedback mechanism. No longer will people wonder why an associate is suddenly in a bad mood. No more guessing what you did to piss off your wife. With the silence of hurt out of the way, people can move on to healing with direct positive feedback to tell them if they have sucessfully made up.
I don't think it'll be a better world. I think peer pressure and desire of conformity would mold people into the same shape, strangling creativity, initiative and independent thought.
I disagree. Peer pressure is a very powerful factor already. Bland conformity is driven by a desire to belong and a fear of not being liked. Telepathy would provide confidence of belonging by creating much stronger rapport between individuals. Creative work has never happened in a vacuum, all creations are supported by many other people, directly or indirectly. Mind communion will strenghen the ability to colaborate, like SMP for creative acts.
The only way it would be a good idea is if you could directly point to an action it would cause, in order to prevent it from happening - much like Minority Report. But the film convieniently circumvents the issue since they see nothing but thoughts that do result in murder.
It is a mistake to think that there could only be one possible good outcome. This kind of change will have many unpredictible effects, good and bad. Crime would drop to practicaly nil as there would be no effective way to keep it secret. People will also develop a stronger sense of empathy and feel less isolated. Criminals generaly don't feel as if they belong in society and can't relate to the humanness of their victims. A mental connection would be a powerful tool to build empathy and inclusion.
All this depends on an internet-like pattern of connections between people rather than a big-brother-like system, but I think that's the direction we're already headed.
Dropping 'trodes into the heads of everyone at once and jacking them in together would probably be a bad idea, but that's not how things work. We didn't all get cellphones together at one instant in 1997, it's a gradual adoption process. It will probably take a generation for mind 'phones' to become ubiquitous.
I for one, welcome the end of privacy and the beginning of the new communication age, or should that be communion age? It's a brave new world indeed, and exciting thing we never imagined are bound to happen. Just try and imagine the dot-com bubble from the perspective of a 1950's file clerk.