DARPA Working on Spidey Sense for Soldiers 191
anti-human 1 writes to tell us Wired is reporting that DARPA is developing a new optics system to help soldiers identify threats earlier. "The most far-reaching component of the binocs has nothing to do with the optics: it's Darpa's aspirations to integrate EEG electrodes that monitor the wearer's neural signals, cueing soldiers to recognize targets faster than the unaided brain could on its own. The idea is that EEG can spot 'neural signatures' for target detection before the conscious mind becomes aware of a potential threat or target. [...] In other words, like Spiderman's 'spider sense', a soldier could be alerted to danger that his or her brain had sensed, but not yet had time to process."
1 step closer (Score:5, Funny)
Well for starters... (Score:5, Funny)
{no....I just can't bring myself to finish that one.....}
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Ever hear of the "Sixth Sense" (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Ever hear of the "Sixth Sense" (Score:5, Insightful)
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True about entire societies. The more evolved, the truer — one may even perish completely, when confronted by another, which manages to concentrate on the mission of killing the enemy, instead of "seeing his side".
Re:Ever hear of the "Sixth Sense" (Score:4, Informative)
Okay, here's one:
Pick someone, anyone, out of a crowd, on the highway (not recommended if you are driving), etc., from who you are out of their field of view. Stare at them intensely for a few seconds. Direct a strong emotion towards them if you can -- hate, fear, rage, etc. I guarantee you that most of them will look back at you nervously. It may not work for everyone because some people are less aware of their '6th sense' than others.
Re:Ever hear of the "Sixth Sense" (Score:5, Informative)
Pick someone, anyone, out of a crowd, on the highway (not recommended if you are driving), etc., from who you are out of their field of view. Stare at them intensely for a few seconds. Direct a strong emotion towards them if you can -- hate, fear, rage, etc. I guarantee you that most of them will look back at you nervously. It may not work for everyone because some people are less aware of their '6th sense' than others.
Re:Ever hear of the "Sixth Sense" (Score:4, Insightful)
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They never admit defeat (Score:4, Insightful)
When people want to believe in something extraordinary there's no way an experiment, no matter how well performed, will convince them of the contrary. They will always assume the experiment itself was faulty in some way.
It seems that for some people the need to believe in something is so strong it overrides reason.
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Except that I do not refuse to believe in something extraordinary. I believe in anything extraordinary, as long as it's backed by extraordinary proof.
There was a time, little more than 100 years ago, when many illustrious scientists doubted a heavier than air machine could fly. In the 1940s a high-ranking manager at IBM said there was a market for only five
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Far from being killed by scientific skepticism, psychic abilities have been given more than a fair trial. Any strictly scientific idea with the track record of psychic abilities would have been abandoned a long time ago, but psychic abilities have a special appeal that guarantees continued scientific testing. The appeal of psychic abilities has a rational side -- the enormous advantage they would confer on the first person or group to master they, or the enormous fame they woul
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there is no conclusive proof either way, because we don't know squat about the brain yet
A hundred years ago all we knew is that it was a spongy tissue. Then scientists discovered neurons and their connections. They studied the results of lesions in different regions of the brain and learned something about its macro structure. Scientists studied the chemistry
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Science is not as much about airtight logic and proof as you think, but I wasn't making a scientific argument anyway. I didn't claim that science has
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1 In the beginning ?
2 the question can/should be asked
3 the question can/should be answered
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Speak for yourself, human. Besides, how wonderful
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Re:Ever hear of the "Sixth Sense" (Score:4, Insightful)
Then get scientific evidence for it: Make absolutely sure that the observer cannot affect the environment of the subject in any way, and record the results.
All sorts of EMP studies have been tried, and there is still no evidence for it. Given how easy it would be to get evidence if it did work, I think the only conclusion has to be that it doesn't.
My own opinion of this sort of anecdotal evidence is that 1) it is very startling when someone who you are sure cannot see you looking at them turns and looks at you (hence we tend to remember it as important event), 2) it's not very remarkable when people don't turn when you are looking at them (so we tend to forget it), and 3) our brains very very good at making connections between tiny bits of sensory data and the possibility that someone is looking at us (so in our everyday lives we are likely to see a bias towards people noticing us watching them).
quantum mechanics (Score:2)
Sorry, LOST is on tonight. I expect jumps from shaky science to Einsteinian physics to be explained on message boards on Wednesdays.
OT: lost (Score:2)
It neatly ties in why the baby doctor had to be poisoned before arriving on the island, and the events of last week's episode.
I shall be very surprised if it doesn't turn out to be either A) an experience machine or B)the writers have just been makin' stuff willy nilly since episode 3.
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... from who you are out of their field of view
I think that's the problem right there. Most people have roughly a 180 degree field of view, especially when it comes to detecting eyes or faces looking in their direction. I can tell if someone is looking at me even if they are standing slightly behind me to one side, because I have a 210 degree peripheral field of view. That's with my eyes locked straight ahead. Also, people tend to scan their environment a little bit with their eyes, which increases that field of view without even turning their hea
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And no, this is not meant as a joke. Go to an airport terminal, find an attractive lady, and then watch how many guys stare at her 'goods' all the time. And she never realizes that fact.
And before saying anything about women not having a 6th sense, let me reverse the example: pick a handsome guy, and watch how many ladies stare at him. And he never realizes.
Finally, if you are in the geek category, pick a friend of yours and put him in watchin
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This has more to do with empathy. Picture your enemy is a 14 y/o iraqi girl with an AK. looking her in the eyes will cause you to connect, question and pause. all of which can be fatal under threatening conditions.
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If 14 year old girls that you have apparently freed from the oppression of a ruthless dictator are your enemy, then something has already gone very, very wrong
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This is what separates normal people from sociopaths and it isn't a good thing to head down that road. You should think about what you're doing, who you're doing it to, and be able to do it anyways and deal with the thoughts of it later. This is what it is to fight in the most limited way and not come to enjoying the kil
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Humans (and animals) are constantly scanning their environments, usually subconsciously.
One input that instantly grabs our attention is someone staring at us.
So if someone has not noticed the 'bush' slowly moving towards them because it has not registered on their conscious mind, the presense of two eyes staring at them from under the 'bush' will trigger alerts and raise the awareness of that input to a conscious level.
Comes from millions of years of lions and ti
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Maybe you mean "tangible", and not "reliable and objective". There are many things we consider real that are not be defined reliably nor objectively. Art is something of that sort. What differentiates a common object from an art object ? It is pretty subjective, but never the less real. Yes, we can come to an agreement on what art is, but thats just it: an agreement, a convention. It is not
tinfoil, please (Score:2)
That's not 6th sense.
That's 6th nonsense.
The "don't look at them" thing is a matter of subtle patterns of sounds, smells, lighting, etc. indicative of someone staring - not "quantum entanglement". You've learned to screen out the perceptions you have of people around you who are not going to interact with you; those who stop nearby for unusual periods, move toward you, emit fight/fligh
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I'm young enough to pretty much confirm this, though I don't have a link to prove any of it. Anybody?
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For instance, If three kids are playing hide and seek, statistically, the kid who thinks of something else other then the game will be less likely to be found then the one who is thinking about the game (Why it's taking so long, or "OMG HES RIGHT ON TOP OF ME!!11")
I'm young enough to pretty much confirm this, though I don't have a link to prove any of it. Anybody?
If your constantly thinking that you are more likely to move unconsciously because your mind isn't on keeping yourself totally still and quiet.
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Re:Ever hear of the "Sixth Sense" (Score:5, Insightful)
Science doesn't have to explain it. That part comes after proving that it actually exists.
Re:Ever hear of the "Sixth Sense" (Score:5, Interesting)
My guess is that this type of perception is what they are alluding to. The "gut instinct" of it.
Re:Ever hear of the "Sixth Sense" (Score:5, Funny)
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Stop Eating Spiders, Make Money Fast! (Score:2)
Number two, snopes says that this little tidbit is false.
Number three, snopes says that this bit of misinformation started out in the 50s in a list of common insect misconceptions, and was used in the early 90s in an experiment of fake facts on the internet to show how gullible people are.
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As for "gut
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I kinda have a 'sixth sense' that someone is staring at this post right now.
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Try this today.
1. Get in a car and drive until you reach a red stop light.
2. Look at other person.
3. Watch them instantly look back at you.
Or in reverse
1. Get in a car and drive until you reach a red stop light.
2. Don't look at other person until you feel them looking.
3. Look at them quickly and watch them turn their head away.
One of th
Moving head? (Score:1)
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*If* you are going to kill someone, particularly someone who can/will fight back, then you damn well better be prepared to pay attention to what you are doing. The whole reason that one is admonishe
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Re:Ever hear of the "Sixth Sense" (Score:5, Informative)
Humans see principally in three "channels", red, green and blue due to the opsins in your photoreceptors. There is some evidence that some women are tetrachromats however. At any rate, these three opsins give us color discrimination in three mathematical dimensions. However, fish and amphibian eyes are much more complicated than ours. For example, the turtle likely sees in at least seven channels of vision, perceiving a world we could never hope to imagine and here is another fact: In the zebrafish, despite their retinas being much more complex and sophisticated than ours, can repair their retinas from damage whereas we are currently screwed if our retinas go bad.
IAAVS (I am a vision scientist), and neuroscientist.
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However, lateral lines are found on a lot of vertebrate sea life. They are lines of neural tissue that run down the body of the critter. The exact structure differs dependi
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Think color dimensions, not time/space/x dimensions.....
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Couldn't have anything to do with looking at where you're going, or maybe not having the whites of your eyes give you away -- humans are good at identifying faces, so face down makes that more difficult. It probably also is intended to not make you dwell on the fact that you're about to kill a person.
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Experiments have shown exactly the opposite. Test subjects are unable to tell if someone was looking at them or not in a rigorous test. The real question is why people believe you can, which can be answered by psychology: you remember the hits and not the misses. When you turn and someone is
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People want so bad to find patterns and magic in the world. That's why people believe in gods, supernatural phenomena, astrology, etc.
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a sixth sense, the ability to know someone is looking at you even though they are not in your field of vision. I have yet to see science explain this...
Okay, it is a known fact [citation needed] that we see small details with the central part of our field of view, the peripheral area being more sensitive to movements and variations of light. These detections have their own fast circuits to react to dangerous things. People dodge before looking when a dark thing appear on top of their head, catching or deflecting a ball is slower than a reflex but faster than conscious act.
It is less known that the resolution of this peripheral area is better than what
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"Sixth Sense" == subtle details (Score:2)
Higher cognitive processes screen out LOTS of material to prevent overloading - that doesn't mean lower cognitive processes aren't getting that material and doing something useful with them. There's a tremendous amount of auditory/visual/etc. stimulus which _does_ have meaning, but which is not rationally considered. You subconciously perceive them, and part
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Fact is, it is very easy, near trivial, to test if people can infact detect being looked upon from behind.
Fact is, if you did, and succeeded, you'd qualify for a cool million bucks from the Randi Foundation
Sad fact is, neither you, nor any of the rest of the crackpots will bother attempting this, instead you'll go on babbling, repeatedly *claiming* that it is true, rather than *demonstrating* that it is, infact, true. Because deep down i
Edgy Perception? (Score:3, Funny)
There's something wrong with my Malibu Stacey doll (Score:1)
Sorry for the obligatory Simpsons quote.
I think this is a great idea... (Score:2)
How is this better? (Score:2, Interesting)
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As the OP mentioned though if every piece of trash tumling by sets it off that would be a great recipe for a psychotic breakdown. Paranoia here I come!
What I'd like to do... (Score:2)
Altered Carbon (Score:3, Interesting)
In the book, ordinary people with enough money can get the tech. If you meet someone who has better tech than you, they can almost certainly take you down with little effort. Every move you make, they see first and move faster to counter.
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And yet soldiers don't want this crap (Score:5, Insightful)
Within the article:
"It's unclear what the final system will look like." but "Darpa says it expects to have prototypes in the hands of soldiers in three years."
Sure. It's like the Popular Science covers of the 1960s "Flying cars tomorrow! Pick your model today!"
If we really want to helps soldiers brains, help them come back from a bogus war with fewer instances of PTSD and other psychological damage.
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Just off the top of my head, in the last few months there have been slashdot articles about:
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Complex systems also increase the chances of an equipment failure. German tanks in WWII were overengineered and prone to breakdowns.
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I saw a documentary on the development of the joint strike fighter - and the simulator. they bought kids in and let them use it. they incorporated their feedback. they wanted to make it feel as close to a video game as possible... the experience of flying the jsf.
my mother tried texting once. she quickly gave up. i text frequently... but i'm apparently not as cool a texter as my nephew - who at 11 whizzes across a
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Win != done (Score:2)
Filling the resulting power vacuum is something else, still underway.
To use an analogy relevant to
Just because a product has successfully shipped doesn't mean development work is done. Bug fixes, enhancements, documentation, etc. all follow for a prolonged period.
Likewise, successfully removing a tyrranical dictator from power doesn't mean troops can just go home
Almost like forcing "DSI"... (Score:5, Insightful)
A tactile DSI, would always feel like they just put that watch on, it can be quite irritating after a while. Tactile DSIs often do things like cut tags off of thier clothing and take other such steps to minimize the sensory overload they are exposed to.
I'm an auditory DSI, I have a hard time blocking out background noise and often times, it competes with what I should be paying attention to. My work-around is to wear wireless full-coverage headphones that pipe in soft classical music. Thus, I reduce the distractions to a single source that is easy to manage.
These days however, I have an office so I can also just close my door.
Based upon my experience, I say this won't work like they hope it will.
great (Score:1, Troll)
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The more gear you have to wear . . (Score:1)
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Book: Blink (Score:2, Insightful)
This technology would merely make your subcontious more contious. But it doesn't tell you anything that you don't already know. Green recruits dropped into combat with this technology wouldn't get any use out of it,
Cut the funding already (Score:2)
Forget this AND forget the armor they don't have. We don't need enough armored vehicles for a large scale offensive anyway. What we need to preserve what we have. Congress needs to grow some balls and recall the troops by refusing to grant addition
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Even if you want to spend on developing technology that has no potential for use anytime within the next few decades, you don't do it in the middle of a war where the biggest problem is that soldiers are dying because they don't
Articulation != perception (Score:2)
Just because you can't explain something in a rational symbolic cognitive socially-accepted linguistic framework doesn't mean you haven't perceived it.
Tools that help enhance and articulate these perceptions would be very useful - especially in war.
On a related note: may I suggest The Science and Art of Tracking [amazon.com].
Keep this away from potential recruits (Score:2)
"Danger Danger young Will Robinson! Don't go in there! Try community college first at least!"
obligatory Richard Farina quote... (Score:2)
He's the kind of cowboy got a hot trigger finger
Shoots his boot 'cause he's drawing kind of slow...
'Course you gotta have gray hair (if any) to remember that ditty.
They should ask Lanier instead (Score:2)
There were some posts about a "sixth sense" i.e. electromagnetic or something spooky. Maybe so, maybe we can sense quantum phenomena even but most likely this is an illusion that is based on a "background thread" circuit that is triggered by matching combina
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My guess (Score:2)
Not good (Score:2)
The article and the project bother me.
The Wired headline makes it sound like this is a sure-fire thing. Umm... DARPA sometimes makes stuff that will work on the battlefield, but lots of times their projects fail. That's the nature of their mission. "As early as three years" really means, "We hope it makes it into service in three years, but it'll likely be more like six, if at all."
As for the actual combat effectiveness of a system like this, it seems like it *might* be helfpul for one of those free-fir
Shoot before thinking (Score:2)
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100% Flamebait
That's "Flamebait" only if there's no reasonable response possible to saying how the Pentagon is killing our soldiers and playing with toys instead of honoring our commitments to protect them while they protect us. Thanks, TrollMods, for admitting your guilt the only way you know how: by trying to suppress the truth about it.