http://www.engadget.com/2010/02/24/thought-control-research-brings-mental-channel-changing-ever-clo/ Engadget Comments for Thought-control research brings mental channel changing ever closer http://www.engadget.com/media/feedlogo.gif http://www.engadget.com en-us Copyright 2012 Weblogs, Inc. The contents of this feed are available for non-commercial use only. Blogsmith http://www.blogsmith.com/http://www.engadget.com/2010/02/24/thought-control-research-brings-mental-channel-changing-ever-clo/http://www.engadget.com/2010/02/24/thought-control-research-brings-mental-channel-changing-ever-clo/
Why would I ever want to change the channel with my mind? Is it so hard to pick up a remote and change the channel. Oh, wait why I am sitting in front of this television in the first place I need to go do something productive. I'm out.

Go learn people.]]>Feb 24th 2010 2:23AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2010/02/24/thought-control-research-brings-mental-channel-changing-ever-clo/http://www.engadget.com/2010/02/24/thought-control-research-brings-mental-channel-changing-ever-clo/
"Is it so hard to pick up a remote and change the channel."

Is is for people who are quadriplegic, have Lou Gherig's Disease, have multiple sclerosis, have cerebral palsy, have transverse myelitis, have Morvan's syndrome, have Parkinson's, have dystonia, have....

You get where I'm going with this, I think.]]>Feb 24th 2010 3:44AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2010/02/24/thought-control-research-brings-mental-channel-changing-ever-clo/http://www.engadget.com/2010/02/24/thought-control-research-brings-mental-channel-changing-ever-clo/Feb 24th 2010 9:29AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2010/02/24/thought-control-research-brings-mental-channel-changing-ever-clo/http://www.engadget.com/2010/02/24/thought-control-research-brings-mental-channel-changing-ever-clo/
Yes, but if you watch the movie Surrogates, you'll understand what would happen if this came out...

Except turn the robots into mind control, and there you go.]]>Feb 24th 2010 10:06AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2010/02/24/thought-control-research-brings-mental-channel-changing-ever-clo/http://www.engadget.com/2010/02/24/thought-control-research-brings-mental-channel-changing-ever-clo/I smell zombie soup ]]>Feb 24th 2010 2:28AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2010/02/24/thought-control-research-brings-mental-channel-changing-ever-clo/http://www.engadget.com/2010/02/24/thought-control-research-brings-mental-channel-changing-ever-clo/
Well I hope you look at you account icon a bit hader and say that.]]>Feb 24th 2010 2:33AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2010/02/24/thought-control-research-brings-mental-channel-changing-ever-clo/http://www.engadget.com/2010/02/24/thought-control-research-brings-mental-channel-changing-ever-clo/
How is that called for?]]>Feb 24th 2010 2:49AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2010/02/24/thought-control-research-brings-mental-channel-changing-ever-clo/http://www.engadget.com/2010/02/24/thought-control-research-brings-mental-channel-changing-ever-clo/
Well, I don't know maybe it could be (and I might not be spot on) this whole image we are presented with about brand names has gone to far. The new part of the game is to provide people with the illusion of "we are individuals", and the stuff we buy make us so instead of ourselves as a human being. Go and ask someone with a Mac computer what they think of it outside of the computing aspect.]]>Feb 24th 2010 3:36AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2010/02/24/thought-control-research-brings-mental-channel-changing-ever-clo/http://www.engadget.com/2010/02/24/thought-control-research-brings-mental-channel-changing-ever-clo/
I have a Mac computer and I think you're talking rubbish.

It's a computer, get over it?

You on the other end of the spectrum are just as bad.]]>Feb 24th 2010 3:49AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2010/02/24/thought-control-research-brings-mental-channel-changing-ever-clo/http://www.engadget.com/2010/02/24/thought-control-research-brings-mental-channel-changing-ever-clo/
There is an easy way to settle this argument. Whip out your cock and get a measuring tape.]]>Feb 24th 2010 3:53AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2010/02/24/thought-control-research-brings-mental-channel-changing-ever-clo/http://www.engadget.com/2010/02/24/thought-control-research-brings-mental-channel-changing-ever-clo/
Anyone can think differently but can you think for yourself. ]]>Feb 24th 2010 3:55AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2010/02/24/thought-control-research-brings-mental-channel-changing-ever-clo/http://www.engadget.com/2010/02/24/thought-control-research-brings-mental-channel-changing-ever-clo/
I am all for critiquing, where it's due though. Which is why I called you up on yours, it was unjustified.

I am getting a sense of a real elitist attitude from you though, and I'm not interested in being part of it, it's really infuriates me.

So cheerio.]]>Feb 24th 2010 4:04AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2010/02/24/thought-control-research-brings-mental-channel-changing-ever-clo/http://www.engadget.com/2010/02/24/thought-control-research-brings-mental-channel-changing-ever-clo/
Not that I think his assessments of you are appropriate or accurate, but I think what Jehryan is talking about are correct statements. We do live in a world where people exhibit corporate allegiance, as if some sort of nationalistic pride, and we do wear logo's as if some sort of militaristic emblem.

Go read the iPhone mod thread... most of those posts refer to how commonplace the iPhone has become (and therefore unappealing because they individually chose the phone to be different), and how that mod is appealing because it's "unique". Really, the difference doesn't occur at the skin of the device. And it doesn't matter if every person chose to use the iPhone, it is pointless to try to be different just to not be the same... that's equivalent to the logic of intentionally being wrong because everyone else is being right. I know many people choose this path, but it doesn't mean others cannot point out the fallacy in that choice.

So yeah, there is a lot of material to critique even with an avatar on a blog especially when there is irony and self-incrimination involved. Zombie soup indeed. :)

I think that's what Jehryan was basically getting at.]]>Feb 24th 2010 8:07AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2010/02/24/thought-control-research-brings-mental-channel-changing-ever-clo/http://www.engadget.com/2010/02/24/thought-control-research-brings-mental-channel-changing-ever-clo/
http://www.ted.com/talks/rebecca_saxe_how_brains_make_moral_judgments.html]]>Feb 24th 2010 2:35AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2010/02/24/thought-control-research-brings-mental-channel-changing-ever-clo/http://www.engadget.com/2010/02/24/thought-control-research-brings-mental-channel-changing-ever-clo/Feb 24th 2010 2:44AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2010/02/24/thought-control-research-brings-mental-channel-changing-ever-clo/http://www.engadget.com/2010/02/24/thought-control-research-brings-mental-channel-changing-ever-clo/Feb 24th 2010 2:56AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2010/02/24/thought-control-research-brings-mental-channel-changing-ever-clo/http://www.engadget.com/2010/02/24/thought-control-research-brings-mental-channel-changing-ever-clo/


]]>Feb 24th 2010 3:10AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2010/02/24/thought-control-research-brings-mental-channel-changing-ever-clo/http://www.engadget.com/2010/02/24/thought-control-research-brings-mental-channel-changing-ever-clo/Feb 24th 2010 3:37AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2010/02/24/thought-control-research-brings-mental-channel-changing-ever-clo/http://www.engadget.com/2010/02/24/thought-control-research-brings-mental-channel-changing-ever-clo/
Who's working on the reverse of this technology... where I can't possibly be allowed to think of changing the channel? I'm sure someone is, I want names!!!]]>Feb 24th 2010 8:09AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2010/02/24/thought-control-research-brings-mental-channel-changing-ever-clo/http://www.engadget.com/2010/02/24/thought-control-research-brings-mental-channel-changing-ever-clo/Feb 24th 2010 3:44AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2010/02/24/thought-control-research-brings-mental-channel-changing-ever-clo/http://www.engadget.com/2010/02/24/thought-control-research-brings-mental-channel-changing-ever-clo/
We try to engineer super intelligence from scratch. But this article got me thinking: We already have the parts necessary for this super intelligence developed. The incredible processing power of a computer and the intelligent thinking of the human brain. All we may have to do is to construct a minimal interface for interaction between the two.

As it is now, our brain finds a problem and we spend lots of time and resources searching for data in databases, developing algorithms for computation and so on. And when we finally find our way to that data, we have to manually process it to valuable information; all because, after all, computers cannot read our minds (yet).

That is, we cannot efficiently formulate the problem we are thinking of so that the computer knows how to search for the solution. What we have to do is to manually break down the problem into a series of questions and then think of solutions that can be formulated as algorithms, and from there on let the computer do the work.

An example: "I want to calculate [this] angle of [this] specific triangle [imagines triangle]". What if we could make the computer "see" the triangle as I am imagining it? I wouldn't have to spend any time manually entering coordinates nor point to the specific angle using text or mouse input. The computer would analyze and digest all this information by itself, look for the appropriate equations and solve them. In time we would develop software to analyze more complex thoughts. Perhaps it would even be possible to create libraries to store ideas.

But even that is just talking of one-way communication. If the computer can see the entirety of our problem, it should also be able to feed back only relevant information (I'm looking at you Google). We would hardly need to do any additional processing of the information ourselves. Going a bit further, imagine feeding that information straight into the mind somehow. Then we have got ourselves the super-computer we are looking for: Extremely fast problem solving, accelerating innovation which in turn accelerates problem solving.

I'd better sign off before I write a sci-fi novel.]]>Feb 24th 2010 6:38AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2010/02/24/thought-control-research-brings-mental-channel-changing-ever-clo/http://www.engadget.com/2010/02/24/thought-control-research-brings-mental-channel-changing-ever-clo/"However, some doubt whether we could ever emulate human intelligence like that. Others realize it may be possible but take a century or two."

I don't think it'll take long at all. We just have to improve the resolution of imaging to a neuronal level and we'll be really close to at least figuring out what each neuron is doing in a pattern.

The real question is whether once we can build a cybernetic 1:1 copy of the neurons if each of these brain sections (like sight, reason, senses, abstraction) will work together to form a "whole" that makes for consciousness.

I think there's pressure to drive us towards decoding our minds on multiple fronts. Not only is it useful for medical applications like paralysis, but entertainment will undoubtedly make use - particularly the game industry, as you see already they're trying to incorporate more and more immersion. Ultimately immersion will become a necessity for virtual work environments. By that time, we should be able to do things in reverse and instill such senses in machines.

As technologies more accurate than fMRI begin to surface, and non-invasive brain stimulation expands I imagine their market application will be swift. If we went back in time to '99, our past selves would be shocked to hear us say that in a decade we're bored with the wiimote and youtube. In ten years we'd probably shock ourselves now to hear that we're then bored of exoskeletons, utility robots, and augmented everything!]]>Feb 24th 2010 8:25PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2010/02/24/thought-control-research-brings-mental-channel-changing-ever-clo/http://www.engadget.com/2010/02/24/thought-control-research-brings-mental-channel-changing-ever-clo/Feb 24th 2010 8:35AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2010/02/24/thought-control-research-brings-mental-channel-changing-ever-clo/http://www.engadget.com/2010/02/24/thought-control-research-brings-mental-channel-changing-ever-clo/Feb 24th 2010 9:20AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2010/02/24/thought-control-research-brings-mental-channel-changing-ever-clo/http://www.engadget.com/2010/02/24/thought-control-research-brings-mental-channel-changing-ever-clo/Feb 24th 2010 1:22PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2010/02/24/thought-control-research-brings-mental-channel-changing-ever-clo/http://www.engadget.com/2010/02/24/thought-control-research-brings-mental-channel-changing-ever-clo/Feb 24th 2010 1:52PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2010/02/24/thought-control-research-brings-mental-channel-changing-ever-clo/http://www.engadget.com/2010/02/24/thought-control-research-brings-mental-channel-changing-ever-clo/Feb 24th 2010 3:31PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2010/02/24/thought-control-research-brings-mental-channel-changing-ever-clo/http://www.engadget.com/2010/02/24/thought-control-research-brings-mental-channel-changing-ever-clo/
If your neurons actually change configuration by thinking, then actively thinking about something previously unimagined definitely builds a new section in your mind.

I want to imagine two extra arms, and have an exoskeleton over my shoulders pick up those signals. ROBOGORO!

I want contacts with displays wirelessly connected to a swarm of wireless robots with cameras that move when I think about crawling on all fours. Issuing sub-vocalized voice commands to subgroups to position for a better view.

I want to imagine flapping my wings, and being able to switch between using those thoughts to control a flying drone or a jump pack.

There are a whole myriad of gestures you can imagine - they don't even have to be parts of your physical body. As long as you can consistently reference the same 'feeling' you might as well imagine shooting lasers from your eyes to change channels.]]>Feb 24th 2010 7:59PM