One of the participants for the experimental game. University of Washington experiments with linking to human brains by transmission signals. (via UofW)
Hollywood writers and directors have been dreaming of mind reading for years. Though some people are convinced they have other worldly powers, it's been seen as nothing as a fantasy. Now, the University of Washington have created something that sounds too good to be true. Researchers at the university recently used a direct brain to brain connection to allow participants to play a question and answer game. The catch is the game is played by transmitting signals from one brain to the other over the internet.
How does it work? One person (the respondent) wears a cap connected to a machine that reads brain activity called an electroencephalography (EEG), while the other person (the inquirer) who is in a different room, is presented with a list of of possible options relating to what the first person is looking at. The inquirer then sends a question with the click of a mouse and the respondent answers “yes” or “no” by focusing on one of two flashing LED lights attached to a monitor that flashes at different frequencies.
Both choices send a signal to the inquirer over the internet and activates a magnetic coil located behind the inquirer's head. The thing is only a “yes” answer channels a response intense enough to stimulate the visual cortex and causes the inquirer to see a phosphene or a flash of light. This is created via a brief disruption in the person's vision and tells them the appropriate answer. Both participants were in separate dark rooms located almost a mile apart where they played 20 rounds of the question and answer game. To make sure those involved couldn't use any outside help, researchers provided them with earplugs to prevent them from hearing the different sounds made by the stimulation of the “yes” and “no” responses. They also changed the stimulation intensities with each game and randomly used three different intensities for each answers to further limit the chance that sound gives any clues.
Sounds interesting, but does it actually work? Well, participants were able to correctly guess the object in 72 percent of the real games compared with 18 percent of the controlled rounds. Any wrong guesses could've been the result of different factors, like being unsure whether a flash of light actually went off.
“While the flashing lights are signals that we're putting into the brain, those parts of the brain are doing a million other things at any given time too,” said co-author Chantel Prat, a faculty member at the Institute for Learning and Brain Sciences. Though the results are impressive it still sounds a little iffy. Who knows what this could do for technology, but don't expect to be able to read what your spouse is reading anytime soon.
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