There are only a handful of scientific revolutions that would really change the world. An immortality pill would be one. A time machine would be another.
Faster-than-light travel, allowing the stars to be explored in a human lifetime, would be on the shortlist, too.
To my mind, however, the creation of an artificial mind would probably trump all of these – a development that would throw up an array of bewildering and complex moral and philosophical quandaries. Amazingly, it might also be within reach.
When you feel you are being touched, usually someone or something is physically touching you and you perceive that your “self” is located in the same place as your body. Neuroscientists at the Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL), Switzerland, investigated the relationship between bodily self-consciousness and the way touch stimuli are spatially represented in humans. They found that sensations of touch can be felt and mislocalised towards where a “virtual” body is seen. These findings will provide new avenues for the animation of virtual worlds and machines.
Everyday human interaction is not what you would call perfect, so what if there was a third party added to the mix – like a metallic version of us? In a new article in Perspectives on Psychological Science, psychologist Neal J. Roese and computer scientist Eyal Amir from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign investigate what human-android interactions may be like 50 years into the future.
From the Hollywood film Firefox to the television show Heroes, science fiction writers have always dreamt of the day when humans could control machines with the power of thought alone.
Now British scientists are turning the vision into reality with a device that allows objects to be manipulated with brain waves.
The prototype, developed at Essex University, can already be used to play simple computer games. By imagining a movement, the wearer of the hat-shaped device can tell the computer to move an object around a screen or a robot around a room.
The researchers hope their technology will eventually allow people to move wheelchairs and drive cars with their thoughts.
Are our thoughts made of electricity? Not the familiar kind of electrical signals that travel up and down wires in our computer or nerves in our brain, but the distributed kind of electromagnetic field that permeates space and carries the broadcast signal to the TV or radio.
The device works by switching on and off certain sections of the brain and so unlocking its hidden potential, reported The Daily Telegraph newspaper in London.
The hairnet-like cap uses tiny magnetic pulses to change the way the brain works and has led to improved artistic ability, mathematical ability and proof-reading skills.
Carole Smith describes claims that neuroscientists are developing brain scans that can read people’s intentions in the absence of serious discussions about the ethical issues this raises, despite the fact that the research has been backed by government in the UK and US.
‘The Brain Scan that can read people’s intentions’, with the sub-heading: ‘Call for ethical debate over possible use of new technology in interrogation”.
“Using the scanner, we could look around the brain for this information and read out something that from the outside there’s no way you could possibly tell is in there. It’s like shining a torch around, looking for writing on a wall”, the scientists were reported as saying.
Distraction through virtual-reality technology was found to reduce pain perceptions after repeated exposures in a University of Maryland study published in The Journal of Pain. The test subjects did not, as expected, adjust their pain perceptions or become habituated to the stimulation over time.
The human psyche is now, more than ever, affected by the abstract environment that we create for ourselves through virtual realities and technology.
James Blascovich, co-director of the Research Center for Virtual Environments and Behavior at the University of California, Santa Barbara, spoke Friday about the market of virtual reality.
He is a guest speaker of the Institute for Prospective Cognition.
“Our test was to define consciousness,” Blascovich said.
Virtual reality is a product of consciousness, according to Blascovich. For most of us, the Earth is our grounded reality and screens and games are our virtual reality.
We live in a world mediated by flickering screens. But do ‘people of the screen’ think fundamentally differently to ‘people of the book’? What will the brain look like in generations to come? Eminent neuroscientist Baroness Susan Greenfield paints an apocalyptic picture of an identity lost, and cognition fundamentally compromised, forever stuck in the sensory chaos of early childhood.
“Many groups have been working devices that make objects invisible,” Che Ting Chan tells PhysOrg.com. “Most of these devices, however, encompass the object to be cloaked.” Chan, a scientist at The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, believes that it is possible to create a cloaking device that would be able to render an object invisible without encompassing it.
Invisibility cloaks work by steering light around a region of space, making any object inside that region invisible. In effect, an invisibility cloak creates the illusion of free space. This is possible because of a new generation of artificial materials called metamaterials that can, in principle at least, steer light in any way imaginable. Indeed, various teams have built real invisibility cloaks that hide objects from view in both the microwave and optical bands.
Honda unveiled a new technology that allows humans to control a robot with their minds, the Associated Press reported.
A helmet-like device that measures the users brain activity and sends signals to the machine controls the robot, allowing it to perform tasks such as dancing and running.
The technology works by reading patterns of electric currents on the operator’s scalp as well as changes in cerebral blood flow when the user thinks about four simple movements – moving the right hand, moving the left hand, running and eating.
How often have you wondered what your spouse is really thinking? Or your boss? Or the guy sitting across from you on the bus? We all take as a given that we’ll never really know for sure. The content of our thoughts is our own – private, secret, and unknowable by anyone else. Until now, that is.
Interaxon team harnesses brainwaves to operate video games, gadgets and even levitating chairs.
While they ready the chair you can levitate with your mind, there’s time for a little concert.
Water squirts and pools on the floor as Steve Mann’s fingers fly across his “hydraulophone,” coaxing “Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star” out of the tadpole-shaped instrument.
Recent advances in neuroscience and brain-imaging technology have offered researchers a look into the physiology of religious experiences. In observing Buddhist monks as they meditate, Franciscan nuns as they pray and Pentecostals as they speak in tongues, Dr. Andrew Newberg, a radiologist at the University of Pennsylvania, has found that measurable brain activity matches up with the religious experiences described by worshippers.
Honda said Tuesday its research subsidiary has jointly developed technology with two other entities that enables human thought alone to send rudimentary commands to a humanoid Asimo robot.
MIT assistant professor Hugh Herr is an advanced prosthetics researcher and a bilateral leg amputee, two conditions that have allowed him the rare experience of testing his gadgets on himself.
My jaw hit the floor tonight watching a 60 Minutes segment on the emerging neuroscience of brain-only computer interfaces. In the clip (included in full below), see how a completely paralyzed man, who could otherwise only communicate by moving his eyes, uses his mind to type out thoughts on a computer screen.
Not content with running your computer, Microsoft now wants to read your mind too.
The company says that it is hard to properly evaluate the way people interact with computers since questioning them at the time is distracting and asking questions later may not produce reliable answers. “Human beings are often poor reporters of their own actions,” the company says.
Imagine a world where machines know you on a personal level. By modeling a virtual “you” into their programming—including how you think and your expertise on a subject—it would know just how to accommodate your particular preferences. It’s the kind of world where your car understands how you drive and compensates for your weaknesses, and where your home computer knows not to greet you too cheerfully when you’re having a bad day.
Science and technology is starting to delve into the possibility of creating a humanoid robot that can feel, think and act in the same way as any human. They are experimenting on the human brain, linking robotic hands to our brain synapses, creating full models of humanoid robots that are now in the beginning stages in their design, now taken on as a technological challenge. What is to become of this technology in the future and to what limits will we take our exploration into the arena of creating humanoid robots?
Researchers from Japan’s ATR Computational Neuroscience Laboratories have developed new brain analysis technology that can reconstruct the images inside a person’s mind and display them on a computer monitor, it was announced on December 11. According to the researchers, further development of the technology may soon make it possible to view other people’s dreams while they sleep.
This blog is a showcase of writing from the internet, work that is written by different authors, that relates to topics surrounding the mind and personal perception of reality. It features various articles and information that focus on areas of the mind such as personal awareness, new discoveries in science and technology, information on topics relating to personal perception of the world around us.
This blog created by:
Stacey T. Pollock is a writer who enjoys delving deep into the mind for answers to life and experiences.
‘Democratic and Republican government officials warned this morning that a United Nations summit in December will lead to a virtual takeover of the Internet if proposals from China, Russia, Iran, and Saudi Arabia are adopted. ‘It was a rare point of bipartisan agreement during an election year: a proposal that Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Puti […]
Why CNN’s Fareed Zakaria is being called a traitor ‘The ‘King Makers’ are holding their annual closed door meeting in Chantilly, Virginia this year. ‘The Bilderberg Group meeting is this weekend and they are expecting huge protests. ‘Ahead of the meeting CNN anchor, Bilderberger, globalist, and author of “The Post-Am […]
We now have google video for each program episode on the Theories of Everything website. All programs can be viewed via our Programs page (see left menu). Or, you can scroll down to the Quick Episode Links at the bottom of every page.
Welcome to the Theories of Everything website. Here you can find our science and philosophy programs that were previously broadcast on Community Television across Australia and are currently available for downloading on your player from Google Video and YouTube as well as on social networks and websites globally. last year the programs were also broadcast we […]
Make no mistake. Flu season isn’t over. I was in my doc’s office the other day for something routine, and he’s still pushing the H1N1 vaccine. I don’t know why the other patients were in the waiting room, but I do know a few of them were sniffling and sneezing. There was a video on the TV about the importance of hand washing during flu season, to prevent the […]
Brent Staples is an editorial writer for the New York Times and a University of Chicago-trained psychologist. He is also African-American, and back in the 70s, when he was doing his graduate studies, he discovered that he could threaten white people simply by walking down the streets of his Hyde Park neighborhood. When white couples saw him coming, especiall […]
My all-time favorite description of what time is comes not from a scientist but from a writer of pulp science fiction, the late Ray Cumming. In 1922, he observed that time is “what keeps everything from happening at once.” This is more than a not-half-way-bad way of describing time. It’s such a doggone-good way that even [...]
I took a look the past couple of days to see if I could find any evidence of a breakthrough in the area of breakthrough thinking, and I didn’t find one. This isn’t to say that there aren’t some interesting things going on. For example, the guys and gals at Idea Champions are still touting the benefits [...]
I had the strangest experience recently. I was sitting in my music room and a bell started ringing over by my piano. So much goes through your mind when something like this happens. The left brain tries to make sense of it all and immediately goes into overdrive analyzing everything. I decided to test the sound to see if I could get a response so asked that […]
I've had a peaceful couple of months and although I don't mind spirit activity per se, I do not like how everything else malfunctions when spirits are present. I guess it was too good to last. The other evening around the usual 9:00-10.00 P.M. hour, when most of the unusual stuff occurs around here, my smoke detectors started screaming again. Reade […]
Recently, I recalled practising meditation so I became good at it. What do I mean by good? Well, I wanted to meditate easily, enjoyably, with minimum distraction, being relaxed and still. Oh yeah, I wanted to be less stressed with less anxiety too. That's a lot of wants isn't it? I managed it with a simple practise that I built upon after spending […]
Like millions of other people upon this planet, I enjoy watching videos online. I felt it was time for an audio visual treat. I've watched some excellent instructional videos recently and I've embedded three of them here. I think you'll like what they show you. The topics are in the broad areas of Relaxation and Well Being. They cover themes o […]
Day 5 Today I am cheating. I’m handing over to Nicholas Cooper, the Curate at St.Mildred’s, Tenterden, soon to be Priest-in-Charge at St. Peter and St. Paul, Saltwood near Hythe. Over to you Nicholas. The work has been rewarding. For most of us carpentry has been entirely new experience, for others it brings back memories [...]
Fellowship My previous blogs have harped on about the Tenterden team and the North-East team. Considering the incredible friendship that is developing between us all I feel it is time to introduce the North-East team and from then on we shall all be considered as one team. We have Stephen Squires Callum Squires Adam Squires [...]
Some time ago I heard an interview with a writer, Kennedy Douglas. He said that “People who say that they have balance in their lives are either liars or they don’t know what they say”. It kept me thinking about what he said. It is true that sometimes when you read or hear people reassuring [...]
“Leadership can be thought of as a capacity to define oneself to others in a way that clarifies and expands a vision of the future” said Edwin H. Friedman and I totally agree with the statement. It is not the whole truth about leadership though. Wonderful vision is not enough to make people follow it. [...]
Als Pflichtversicherung muss jeder Autofahrer eine Kfz-Haftpflichtversicherung abgeschlossen haben. Wenn es mal kracht, dann springt die Versicherung ein und übernimmt...
What can The Ultimatum Game tell us about how people cooperate? → The GUTS of Depth Psychology -- terrific insight for uptight times -- at www.WhyWeSuffer.com. PsyBlog's How to Be CreativeIf we can all be creative, why is it so hard to come up with truly original ideas?It's because creativity is mysterious. Just ask any scientist, artist, writ […]
What would this guy do? Perspective taking offers a way around the egocentric bias. → The GUTS of Depth Psychology -- terrific insight for uptight times -- at www.WhyWeSuffer.com. PsyBlog's How to Be CreativeIf we can all be creative, why is it so hard to come up with truly original ideas?It's because creativity is mysterious. Just ask any sci […]
There are only a handful of scientific revolutions that would really change the world. An immortality pill would be one. A time machine would be another.
How often have you wondered what your spouse is really thinking? Or your boss? Or the guy sitting across from you on the bus? We all take as a given that we’ll never really know for sure. The content of our thoughts is our own – private, secret, and unknowable by anyone else. Until now, that is.
Honda said Tuesday its research subsidiary has jointly developed technology with two other entities that enables human thought alone to send rudimentary commands to a humanoid Asimo robot.
Researchers from Japan’s ATR Computational Neuroscience Laboratories have developed new brain analysis technology that can reconstruct the images inside a person’s mind and display them on a computer monitor, it was announced on December 11. According to the researchers, further development of the technology may soon make it possible to view other people’s dreams while they sleep.
