25-08-2014, 02:23 PM
mind reading
mind-reading.docx (Size: 163.37 KB / Downloads: 13)
Abstract
A computer can, in a very real sense, read human minds. Although the dot's gyrations are directed by a computer, the machine was only carrying out the orders of the test subject.
The computer mind-reading technique is far more than a laboratory stunt. Though computers can solve extraordinarily complex problems with incredible speed, the information they digest is fed to them by such slow, cumbersome tools as typewriter keyboards or punched tapes.
The key to his scheme: the electroencephalograph, a device used by medical researchers to pick up electrical currents from various parts of the brain. If we could learn to identify brain waves generated by specific thoughts or commands, we might be able to teach the same skill to a computer. The machine might even be able to react to those commands by, say, moving a dot across a TV screen. So far the S.R.I, computer has been taught to recognize seven different commands—up, down, left, right, slow, fast and stop.
Introduction
People express their mental states, including emotions, thoughts, and desires, all the time through facial expressions, vocal nuances and gestures. This is true even when they are interacting with machines. Our mental states shape the decisions that we make, govern how we communicate with others, and affect our performance. The ability to attribute mental states to others from their behavior and to use that knowledge to guide our own actions and predict those of others is known as theory of mind or mind-reading.
Existing human-computer interfaces are mind-blind — oblivious to the user’s mental states and intentions. A computer may wait indefinitely for input from a user who is no longer there, or decide to do irrelevant tasks while a user is frantically working towards an imminent deadline. As a result, existing computer technologies often frustrate the user, have little persuasive power and cannot initiate interactions with the user. Even if they do take the initiative, like the now retired Microsoft Paperclip, they are often misguided and irrelevant, and simply frustrate the user. With the increasing complexity of computer technologies and the ubiquity of mobile and wearable devices, there is a need for machines that are aware of the user’s mental state and that adaptively respond to these mental states.
Advantages and uses
Mind Controlled Wheelchair
This prototype mind-controlled wheelchair developed from the University of Electro-Communications in Japan lets you feel like half Professor X and half Stephen Hawking—except with the theoretical physics skills of the former and the telekinetic skills of the latter.
A little different from the Brain-Computer Typing machine, this thing works by mapping brain waves when you think about moving left, right, forward or back, and then assigns that to a wheelchair command of actually moving left, right, forward or back.
The result of this is that you can move the wheelchair solely with the power of your mind. This device doesn't give you MIND BULLETS (apologies to Tenacious D) but it does allow people who can't use other wheelchairs get around easier.
The sensors have already been used to do simple web searches and may one day help space-walking astronauts and people who cannot talk. The system could send commands to rovers on other planets, help injured astronauts control machines, or aid disabled people.
Disadvantages and problems
Tapping Brains for Future Crimes
Researchers from the Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences, along with scientists from London and Tokyo, asked subjects to secretly decide in advance whether to add or subtract two numbers they would later are shown. Using computer algorithms and functional magnetic resonance imaging, or fMRI, the scientists were able to determine with 70 percent accuracy what the participants' intentions were, even before they were shown the numbers. The popular press tends to over-dramatize scientific advances in mind reading. FMRI results have to account for heart rate, respiration, motion and a number of other factors that might all cause variance in the signal. Also, individual brains differ, so scientists need to study a subject's patterns before they can train a computer to identify those patterns or make predictions.
While the details of this particular study are not yet published, the subjects' limited options of either adding or subtracting the numbers means the computer already had a 50/50 chance of guessing correctly even without fMRI readings. The researchers indisputably made physiological findings that are significant for future experiments, but we're still a long way from mind reading.
Still, the more we learn about how the brain operates, the more predictable human beings seem to become. In the Dec. 19, 2006, issue of The Economist, an article questioned the scientific validity of the notion of free will: Individuals with particular congenital genetic characteristics are predisposed, if not predestined, to violence.
Studies have shown that genes and organic factors like frontal lobe impairments, low serotonin levels and dopamine receptors are highly correlated with criminal behavior. Studies of twins show that heredity is a major factor in criminal conduct. While no one gene may make you a criminal, a mixture of biological factors, exacerbated by environmental conditions, may well do so.
Looking at scientific advances like these, legal scholars are beginning to question the foundational principles of our criminal justice system.
For example, University of Florida law professor Christopher Slobogin, who is visiting at Stanford this year, has set forth a compelling case for putting prevention before retribution in criminal justice.
It's a tempting thought. If there is no such thing as free will, then a system that punishes transgressedbehavior as a matter of moral condemnation does not make a lot of sense. It's compellingto contemplate a system that manages and reduces the risk of criminal behavior in the first place.
Max Planck Institute, neuroscience and bioscience are not at a point where we can reliably predict human behavior. To me, that'sthe most powerful objection to apreventativejustice system -- if we aren't particularly good at predicting future behavior, we risk criminalizing the innocent.
We aren't particularly good at rehabilitation, either, so even if we were sufficiently accurate in identifying future offenders, we wouldn't really know what to do with them.
Nor is society ready to deal with the ethical and practical problems posed by a system that classifies and categorizes people based on oxygen flow, genetics and environmental factors that are correlated as much with poverty as with future criminality.
In time, neuroscience may produce reliable behavior predictions. But until then, we should take the lessons of science fiction to heart when deciding how to use new predictive techniques.
The preliminary tests may have been successful because of the short lengths of the words and suggests the test be repeated on many different people to test the sensors work on everyone.
The initial success "doesn't mean it will scale up", he told New Scientist. "Small-vocabulary, isolated word recognition is a quite different problem than conversational speech, not just in scale but in kind."
Conclusion
TuftsUniversity researchers have begun a three-year research project which, if successful, will allow computers to respond to the brain activity of the computer's user. Users wear futuristic-looking headbands to shine light on their foreheads, and then perform a series of increasingly difficult tasks while the device reads what parts of the brain are absorbing the light. That info is then transferred to the computer, and from there the computer can adjust it's interface and functions to each individual.
One professor used the following example of a real world use: "If it knew which air traffic controllers were overloaded, the next incoming plane could be assigned to another controller."
Hence if we get 100% accuracy these computers may find various applications in many fields of electronics where we have very less time to react.