Facebook Plunges Again
Tumblr 101: Tips And Tricks To Get Started
Weird Wednesday: software that records your dreams?
Each Wednesday Download Squad takes a look at the weirdest software out there. From future tech being cooked up in the lab to bizarre shareware, we'll cover the offbeat and off-the-wall. If you have a suggestion for a strange application, leave it in the comments.Scientists are working on ways to read your mind using software. It makes sense that if you know how to read brainwaves you'd be able to reconstruct what the eyes are seeing, right? But Yukiyasu Kamitani is taking it to another level: using a an MRI to scan your brain and recreate what you see in your mind on a computer screen. Ultimately the technology could be used to read your mind with enough fidelity to create a video of your thoughts or dreams.
As the article in New Scientist points out, all of this raises ethical concerns should the tech work from a distance. Do you want marketers to read your mind? What would Google do if they could put contextual ads in your life? Can you upload your brain to Flickr?
Of course, this is a long way off. Not only does the software need a lot of refinement, the hardware challenges of reading brainwaves with enough fidelity to recreate an image is a giant hurdle. In the meanwhile, keep buying Lightspeed Briefs to match your tin foil hats.
Comments
4
Subscribe to commentsJimmy the ChipFeb 4th 2009 5:28PM
Victoria! Please, some more consideration in your reporting of scientific endeavours!
"It makes sense that if you know how to read brainwaves you'd be able to reconstruct what the eyes are seeing, right?" - Really?
The main point here is that the image is reconstructed in the simpler parts of the visual cortex. In essence, blood flow to areas of the brain corresponding to specific areas of your retina is related to the light falling on it. This is before any complex processing is done by the brain. A dream, obviously, does not work in the same way.
You use for your headline "software that records your dreams?", yet the only reference to dreams in the article is;
"The research also hints that scientists might one day be able to access dreams, memories and imagery ... providing the brain processes dreams in a way that is analogous to visual stimuli."
Hmmmn. Well, as you take hints so seriously, might I possibly hint that you don't know what you are talking about and are desperate to abuse scientific reporting to draw readers attention?
Jimmy the ChipFeb 4th 2009 5:35PM
However, Victor, I am sorry I called you Victoria :s
aidsgrenadesFeb 4th 2009 7:50PM
OH MAN WHAT MOVIE IS THAT PICTURE FROM?
That scared the crap out of me when I was a kid and I've been trying to find it for years!!
Bewar MaronsiFeb 4th 2009 10:19PM
Brainstorms - http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0085271/ =)