(Credit:
PopSci.com)
Last week, we told you about Mindflex, a Mattel toy that lets players move objects with their brains. This week comes word that the same technology is making its way into a more functional application--a wheelchair that users can maneuver with thought alone.
Toyota has developed the wheelchair in collaboration with researchers in Japan. The system analyzes brain wave data using signal-processing technology and delivers neuro-feedback to the driver.
Brain wave-detecting technology, or electroencephalography (EEG), isn't new. In layman's terms, a device, usually a cap wired with sensors, detects a person's brain waves. That information is analyzed by a computer and applied to the device in question. Scientists have pursued the technology for decades, but have had difficulty achieving short response times, explains the Associated Press.
Toyota's mind-controlled wheelchair, however, has what appears to be the quickest response time yet: 125 milliseconds, or 125 thousandths of a second. The user can almost instantly steer right, left, and forward. To stop, the person in the chair must puff up a cheek, a motion that's then detected by the headpiece.
Because of this quick response time, plans are under way to turn the wheelchair into a commercial health care product. The most practical use would be for rehabilitation patients who have been paralyzed, suffered a stroke, or have other conditions that hinder their muscle control. So far, the research has centered on brain waves related to imaginary hand and foot control. However, Toyota hopes the system could ultimately be applied to brain waves generated by emotions.
... Read moreYou've been thinking, "Hey, where are all the updates on mind-reading devices?" All the appropriate scientists already knew this, so they decided to give you what you want today.
(Credit:
New Scientist)
Here's this week's mind-readers' digest.
- Microsoft applies for mind-reading patent: According to this New Scientist blog post, Microsoft applied for a patent in August that would help the company figure out what people really think about its products. The technology in the patent application, titled "Using electroencephalograph signals for task classification and activity recognition," would read a user's brain states while testing Microsoft's interfaces. This would determine the effectiveness of each test UI and eliminate the possibility of test users telling Microsoft what Microsoft wants to hear. No, this technology is not included in Windows Vista SP1. Yes, you would have to volunteer to have your brain waves recorded. And hey, stop thinking about Bill Gates in a Speedo. [Via Boing Boing.]
- Brain-computer interface helps man cope with ALS: According to this DelawareOnline feature article, University of Pennsylvania professor Scott Mackler, who was diagnosed with Lou Gehrig's Disease (ALS) nine years ago, is using a unique system that helps him communicate with people and technology. Mackler wears a cap fitted with 16 electrodes that relay his brainwaves to software that identifies what he is focusing on, helps him perform lectures, and creates written documents. The software is also configured to interact with his TV remote, which lets him trick his wife by changing the channel from girly movies to SportsCenter. More power to you, Scott. Keep fighting the good fight. [Via Delaware Online.]
- Control 'Second Life' with your mind: Just in case Second Life isn't enough like your real life, the Biomedical Engineering Laboratory at Japan's Keio University have created a brainwave-reading interface that lets users move avatars around with their minds. According to ScienceBlogs, the headset/computer system pinpoints brain activity in the motor cortex and makes on-screen characters move around accordingly. Apparently, all a player has to do is imagine the avatar performing a movement and it actually happens. There's even a YouTube clip of the system in action. [Via ScienceBlogs.]
- Can brainwaves identify child molesters preemptively? Whenever news of a new touch-screen interface hits the Web, a thousand Minority Report references are close behind. But this story is more Minority Report than all those screens combined. According to this BBC News story, a team of Yale University researchers have discovered a pattern in the way pedophiles' brain activity responds to adult pornographic images. In comparison to other patients in the test group, patients with pedophilic tendencies showed lower hypothalamus activity when they looked at adult pornography. Don't apply for the thought police just yet; rather than using these brain-activity patterns as a way to identify potential child molesters, lead researcher Dr. Georg Northoff says it is a key step in finding new and effective means of therapy for those with pedophilic thoughts. [Via BBC News.]
Every morning, generals across the world wake up and wonder what the enemy is thinking. Well, it depends: Are they "chicken" or "Rambo"?
That's the bottom line for a new DARPA-funded software program based on the child's game "Capture the Flag." The strategy-predicting software BEE (Behavioral Evolution and Extrapolation) is designed to anticipate enemy actions and deceptions--ideally in time to do something about them.
(Credit:
Alibaba)
BEE works by replacing large numbers of combatants with digital avatars on a simulated battlefield, assigning them individual personalities (e.g., alive enemy, injured friendly), factoring in beliefs and desires, triggering an event (like an attack), then crunching the whole mess in a computational model of emotions (PDF) aggravated by combat stress, anger and fear. The end product is "adversarial intent."
If a unit avoids enemy contact and weapons fire, BEE pegs it as cowardly, or "chicken"; if it rushes in to mix it up, it's irritable, or "Rambo." Chicken units are easier to identify, according to program developer New Vectors, because they linger longer, even in cyberspace. Rambos, on the other hand, come and go--or, as New Vectors' Van Dyke Parunak put it, "The brave die young."
The idea that you can predict an enemy's moves based on past behavior is hardly news. But creating and "evolving" enemy behaviors based on past performance in virtual combat zones is innovate enough that New Vectors is patenting the technique.
Government and private industry already use variants of this program to streamline production and logistics, as well as to hone competitive business strategies. Readers may be familiar with it from multi-player computer games.
So put away your Clausewitz and Sun Tzu and never mind ol' sarge and his hunches; if you want to know the best way to take out those guys defending Hamburger Hill, just ask their avatar.
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