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DARPA's Cortically-Coupled Computer Vision System
BluePariah writes "Wired News has an article on a 'cortically coupled computer vision' system being developed at Columbia University and funded by the ever-curious folks at DARPA. Essentially, it uses the extremely powerful visual recognition ability of the human brain and couples it with a computer's raw processing power to allow a user wearing an EEG cap to filter through scores of digital images at high-speed and pick out something of interest. This has applications in military intelligence, face-recognition, anti-terrorism, and hunting down replicants."
Blip-Verts!
The TV networks will love this!
Why, oh why, didn't I take the Blue Pill?
[...] allow a user wearing an EEG cap to filter through scores of digital images at high-speed and pick out something of interest.
hi-speed pr0n!
Stop Computers/Cars Analogies on S
So DARPA's invented something else now. How long before Al Gore goes on CNN to claim he invented this all by himself as well?
Say it with me now... Porn!
GetOuttaMySpace - The Anti-Social Network
Now I'd imagine then that the results would vary from user to user. So would this system require the "right" person then for testing and calibration? Very interesting indeed.
http://religiousfreaks.com/*Banana clip for your face sold separately
Where does the school board find them and why do they keep sending them to ME?
Suprise: I thought that the human visual systems is way superior to the existing computational image-processing systems. But I guess this technology switch directions as well, switching the roles and using human brain as co-processors in surveillance and security applications. Any volunteers for this?
I tried to go there to see the forgotten cylcotron, but just as I got to the bottom of a stairwell, a hulk jumped out of the shadows and tried to beat the crap out of me. I ran back upstairs, trying not to step on the glowing three-eyed rats.
Where were you when the voynix came?
I may be missing something here. But isn't this just like the security guard pressing a button when he sees something suspicious? Except you don't have to press a button here.
There are 10 kinds of people in the world - those that know binary, and those that don't.
We complain about /. but try digg. You will think a million monkeys are out there banging on keyboards.
Jumpy, spazzed, feds from a nightmarish barrage of images 6 hours a day.
seems like a first case of positive usage of subliminal messages. I wonder though, who would accept his brain to be fried in such a way.
cut this signatures madness. stop reading them now!
This has applications in military intelligence, face-recognition, anti-terrorism, and hunting down replicants
I don't know what replicants is, other then this Replicant (but who would want that).
This has HUGE applications in finding that perfect pr0n pic.
I mod down so you can mod up. Your welcome.
"and hunting down replicants."
Hey, they are only guilty of DNA copyright infringement! It's not like it's an actual crime, bud!
Where were you when the voynix came?
I've already seen like 20 films where they had this fully working! Pfff, talk about tardy.
---
"The chances of a demonic possession spreading are remote -- relax."
So who's seen the new Doctor Who series? The news station where peoples' brains moderate the news feeds and television shows- and the "controller" put in place at birth to moderate all video streams...
Furthermore, can you say porn?
+5, Truth
The government will just strong arm (threaten) the university into turning it over to them so they can "keep it safe from the terrorists." Then just in case the technology leaks out a law will be passed banning everyone except law enforcement, military, and government personel from using it.
Ooo man the floppy drive is broken. No wait. The computer is just upside down.
Replicants is a reference to Blade Runner. A move by Ridley Scott.
The IMDB link: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0083658/
The move is based on the work of Phillip K. Dick. It also stars Harrison Ford in his least favorite role.
So, basically completely the opposite to the /. description, to whit:
.I picked that up within 5 seconds of clicking the link. Sort it out, editors.
Meta will eat itself
"This has applications in military intelligence, face-recognition, anti-terrorism, and hunting down replicants"
... where the Coyote tried using it to pick out the roadrunn behind a moving train with a slingshot. I didn't work for him.
Yeah, I've seen this one before
But maybe, Coyotes are just funny like that!
-brian -- Brian D. McGrew { brian at visionpro dot com } --- > But his grip on his santiy hovers somewhere bet
I hope someone will bring this kind of science to a court. God didn't make humans to become slaves of machines.
Computer hardware that uses your brain, thats sound dangerous. Some people think some radio singnals of mobiles are bad, but this is much more worse. What would do this to the human spirit?
humans are not a set of tools to be used in computer hardware this is dangerous technology. It should be the other way, we should use computers to do our things.
Don't let someone else use your brain for them in this way. Because what is going to happen after this a kind of "the matrix" will someone program you to hate some person that badly you will kill him (because you where also programed to love guns). Or will you without choice become someonelse soldier?.
I know you're out there. I can feel you now. I know that you're afraid. You're afraid of us. You're afraid of change.
"You will think a million monkeys are out there banging on keyboards."
Those must be pretty small monkeys, in order to fit two of them on a keyboard to make love. Golden lion marmosets, I presume?
Where were you when the voynix came?
"Computer hardware that uses your brain, thats sound dangerous.....Don't let someone else use your brain for them in this way."
If paranoid luddites who have delusions of this technology making us into Borg aren't using their brains, why not let someone else make some good use of wasted grey matter?
Where were you when the voynix came?
Sounds to me a bit frustrating for the user.
Imaging sitting there for an hour or more, looking at endless streams of boring security footage. Every time something interesting flashed by, the machine would record the brain activity, but the stream would just continue. Say you saw the image of a known terrorist flash by, it seems to be human nature would make you want to take a closer look - natural reaction would be to want to pay a little more attention. Unless the stream of images slows down a little when a "hit" is registered, the whole process would be a bit of a tease.
Your Brain + EEG + LEGO Robots = Brainstorms
How soon until we get distributed-image-glancing teams together, racking up spare brain cycles for high scores and bragging rights?
Slashdot Burying Stories About Slashdot Media Owned
If this technology feeds a series of digital images directly into the brain, what would happen when connected to the brain of a blind person? Would the person, with time, be able to interpret the new information?
I imagine if this is the case, then connecting it to a camera worn by the user can possibly allow the person to see again.
Stat.
Weaselmancer
rediculous.
..... I'm sure all 4 guys on /. who didn't get the reference have mod points and you'll end +5....
1. No sig. 2. ???? 3. Profit!!!
Well, it looks similar but it's got more tin foil.
ZOMGWTFPWNtKKTHNXBIBI!!!ONE!111!!!
IXO (DARPA'S Information eXploitation Office) just made awards for their VACE (Video Analysis and Content Extraction) BAA and this sounds a lot like some of the technologies they were trying to develop through that program. I'll have to do more digging, the article itself is somewhat suspect (some jackass with a Ph.D. in *transport systems* flaunting his ignorance of computer vision isn't exactly a good source to quote). I particularly like the bit about "They are limited in their ability to recognize suspicious activities or events." Turns out that he hasn't read Grimson and Stauffer's (fellow MIT alums) papers. Or, you know, about 20-30% of the computer vision literature.
Shees, next it's going to be 2001, The Time Machine, and Ice Pirates
Wait, wrong argument
- where will it end - check
- think of the children - skip
- work of terrorists - skip
- violation of civil rights - check ^H^H - skip
- end of civilization - change civ to cult - check
OK, back....to allow this affrontery to continue will undoubtably lead to the end of Western Culture as we know it, for without due veneration of our classical arts, we shall indeed be doomed to an eternity of Jerry Springer and Teletubbies. Oh the humanity of it all.
Sometimes we spend hours looking through Getty/Veer/Corbis/iStock stock photo collections looking for 'just the right image'.
;-p I mean communications platforms and revenue enhancement strategies...
This could cut it down to minutes. I'd just sketch out the image I was looking for and stare at it for a few... then turn on and tune out for a few, voila... instant banner ad
A fool throws a stone into a well and a thousand sages can not remove it.
They have already hooked up a device to sex offender's penises to measure arousal, a penile plethysmograph (PPG), and shown the subjects various pr0n images to determine interest in the particular photographs. Switching this to a EEG is only a minor change, the results bypassing the subjects ability to control a physical response. Unfortunately for researchers, using a EEG, the subject must confirm each individual EEG result as positive or negative because the subject's EEG responses are not universal enough to establish a positive or negative threshold. Although it is easy enough to confirm whether a subject recognizes a photo as this makes a unique result in a EEG that cannot be controlled by a subject. A Scanner Darkly anyone?
7h3$3 4r3n'7 7h3 Ðr01Ð$ ¥0 4r3 £00|{1n9 f0r. M0v3 4£0n9. --OB1
Don't tell the MPAA! By feeding digital images directly into the brain of the viewer, they've finally managed to get rid of that nasty analog hole that pirates are always exploiting.
Support Right To Repair Legislation.
But I guess this technology switch directions as well, switching the roles and using human brain as co-processors in surveillance and security applications. Any volunteers for this?
Gives a shuddersome new meaning to human resources.
If it's for-profit but free, you're not the customer -- you're the product (e.g., the Slashdot Beta's "audience").
This research actually make sense. We should call these people "Watchers". They can look over thousands of photographs of wanted persons, and then sit them in front of sensitive security camera feeds, played at 2X or 3X normal speed. Every hour, review the still images of those portions of the video that the watcher's brain triggered. When multiple watchers trigger the same still images, make those the highest priority to investigate.
Even non-sensitive feeds can be used. McDonalds and Burger King drive through camera's could be routed to thousands of "watchers". ATM cameras, traffic cameras, etc.
How to keep Watchers from going insane is another story...have them work 1 day on, 1 day off, etc...
Now all we need is the technology from Spaceballs where videos can be released before the movie is finished. Have people watch security videos from the future and just have Tom Cruise round up the bad guys. Voila, no more crime.
I suspect Phillip K. Dick was a time traveller who escaped into the past to try and warn us.
But
We
Just
Won't
Listen
OUTSOURCE IT OUT..
It seems that they are using a varient on a EEG BCI which relies on what's called the P300 or oddball response. I've seen it implemented for things like a wordspeller. An eeg cap is placed on a subject. A series of letters are flashed up on a screen. When the subject sees the letter they want the P300 spikes and the system picks that letter. The problem I see in using this for what DARPA want is that the P300 will spike when you notice a picture of someone who looks sorta like your target (no real p[roblem there). It will also spike when you see someone who looks sorta like you brother, or mother or dog or your great aunt Ida becuase of the that huge boil she use to have on her nose.
I don't see it going far.
This device is the Matrix. I never believed that movie BS about needing humans' electrical energy. It needs our software libarary.
To hack through captchas for porn. It really is the hive mind.
--
make install -not war
1) put one of these on a suspect you are interogating. Hold up the photos. "ever seen the victim", watch if the eeg shows recognition.
2) grab a focus group, play them your Jingle or TV commercial or sound bite. Assess subliminal recognition
3) video game: good guy or bad guy that just moved too quickly to see.
4) soldiers on guard duty.
5) people looking through intel data for links, trying to process more info than their brains can recall.
Some drink at the fountain of knowledge. Others just gargle.
I, for one, welcome our brain-abducting optical regcognition overlords.
Well, you know the old saying: "Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from a rigged demo". - $RANDOM
Saw an article on the BBC news website re: micro IC neural implant. Ostensibly to be used for helping the paralyzed interact on their own again. Couple that with this tech, in a few years, you could have a remote control human (some assembly required). Great for intelligence work, just program a "client" to observe (and interact?) with a prospective target, execute a predetermined set of instructions, and promptly erase those instructions following execution, or even better, have the hardware "fire" all of it's contact points simultaneously, killing the "client". Instant deniability, and fairly secure...that is, until some enterprising soul figures out a way to hack the hardware and downloads their own code into it. As if bio-virii weren't bad enough, sheez!
Just round up all the homeless and other useless people and hook them all to feeding tubes and put search visors on their heads. Their brains can increase the accuracy of googles results and speed up search times.
We are not aware of all of the activity that occurs in our brain, but the EEG can read this activity. It is hard enough to elimnate human bias in our conscious mind. How do we know that our subconcious, assuming that is what this EEG is reading, is not as or even more biased than our conscious mind?
What else about a person can this EEG cap measure? Can one correllate what one is looking at with what one is thinking? Will there be a measureable response if the person looks at another individual and find them attractive?
I had an EEG ran once. Even asleep I am at the high normal for brain activity. There is a range of "norm" for people's brain activity. Will this be more effective for some than others? Does it need "training" like voice recognition software does?
It does raise some interesting questions. If this is sucessful, will we ever mount guns on soldiers that move/aim/fire based on these signals without conscious oversite from the soldier?
What other uses are possible of this combination? Can you use similar techniques on animals such as drug sniffing dogs? Their sense of smell is way keener than our sense of sight.
I only look human.
My mother is a halfling and my dad is an ogre, so that makes me an Ogreling
The obvious culprits are the researchers who make preposterous claims in order to get funding. But one can easily imagine a government body having aninterested in investing in a system like this because it serves as a deterrent by giving the impression that they have access to powerful technology, even if it doesn't really exist. And of course magazines like Wired are complicit in the scam because it makes a great story for them. All in all, everyone scores.
Doesn't it make you feel good to know that our freedoms are protected by politicans, lawyers and journalists.
It's spelled Geordi, moron.
Don't you think this would lead to a lot of soiled clothing, as people (some people, ahem) would find the "images of interest" before they've managed to unbutton their trousers?
It's not offtopic, dumbass. It's orthogonal.
At what point do we say enough is enough? Who the hell is stupid enough to allow their employer to put a data feed directly in their brain?
It's Walkenarific!
One of the basic tasks our visual system is much, much better at executing than computers is visual search. The basic 'experiment' is that you are asked either a question like "Is there a red car in this picture?" (natural images) or "Are all the lines the same orientation?" (more traditional psychophysics). Then images are displayed, and our response time is recorded. Early experiments in the visual search paradigm appeared to show that there was two classes of search stimuli: those that 'pop-out' and those that require incremental search. The difference is that in pop-out conditions, increasing the number of elements in the image does not increase search time, while in incremental it does at XXms/element... and generally it takes about twice as long for us to respond if there is no positive element.
One main theory on how our brain does this, Feature Integration Theory by Anne Treisman (or similar but more recent, Guided Search by Jeremy Wolfe), which many computer vision algorithms try to copy, asserts that there are various feature maps for certain quantities like color, orientation, depth, spatial scale, etc. These are combined into a saliency map which is a weighted average of the feature maps. Things pop-out when the target has high salience compare to the background, for example it's easy to find the red T in a background of blue T's, but not so easy to find the red L in a background of red T's and blue L's.
Now, it appears from the article, and what little they say on the Lab webpage, that they are trying to measure EEG responses (which are quite crude) during rapid serial search tasks, in order to prime a computer vision object recognition system, which is then only run on those images human's appear to find sufficintly salient when they see them. This saves the time of a person actually having to search and make a decision about an image, while utilizing the visual systems incredibly powerful early 'pre-attentive' form & object binding resources.
If there is a sufficiently high signal from the EEG to do that after say, 100ms display times, then I think this could be useful for certain types of search task. However, due to the time courses present in most visual search experiments, the fact that it's not totally apparent how efficient certain parts of our saliency system actually are (check our Jeremy Wolfe's reviews for more data), I'm totally unconvinced that this type of system will give you a sufficent signal to noise ratio to be worth using for anything. This is especially true because of another perceptual phenomenon in search, which is that your error rate basically shoots up exponentially as the probability of a positive goes down. This is to say, in an experiment where a normal observer would have a 99% accuracy rate with 50% of the images containing the target, this drops to 60% accuracy for 10% target positive, and only 30% accuracy at 1% target positive (numbers fudged, but ballpark, since I'm too lazy to look them up). If this has its roots in insufficient priming in early vision, for example, then this entire scheme flops just as badly as using a human for tasks like finding the bomb in the x-ray image of the suitcase... and we haven't even started to get into issues of the person not actually looking at the image because they're bored, etc.
As it is, DARPA is spending a mere 758k, which is chump change for them, and there's a decent chance that it'll work in certain specific but useful circumstances which may warrant the research.
I think this is a bad job for someone like me. I have a hard time remembering the names of ex-girlfriends I run into on the street.
Seriously though, go to istockphoto.com and look at how they categorize images. It's called keywords, and it's amazing. People sort the images by looking at them, and then type words to describe the image.
Interesting research though, but this sounds more like UI land rather than new kind of processing land.
Cool! Amazing Toys.
Who modded this "OffTopic"?
Back in the day it was tape machines & torture used to brainwash someone. Imagine how efficient Guantanamo will be when their guests's visual reality is dictated by a cluster managing terrifying images. If used w/ AI concepts & biofeedback gear it could allow the US (or any other nut-job w/ alot of money) to take torture to its highest level ever. Imagine an entire complex reprogrammed in a weekend through the use of advanced brainwashing methods. This is just what I want my tax dollars going towards developing, honest. Because deterrents work. Yeah, and Bush is the best thing that ever happened to the United States. Consumerism's worth forcing down the world's throat & we need to get it done. While I'm at it I've gotta say Windows is the best, too! Rip off the world. It's the right thing to do.
I deal with images every day at work, and at home. Inevitably, I lose some images; I can recall the image well enough to describe it, but can't find it in the vast sea of images I have. This system could be a very nice way to find those lost images (although realistically it will probably be a long time before it is cheap enough for home users)
On a related note, does anyone know of a good search tool that compares image contents to find matches?
I...I'm attacking the darkness!
Buddy, films don't predict the future. Name one film that has been reflected in reality.
Consciousness is a myth. Trust me.
5 points for the esoteric punch line!
I've always thought we'd find that the network guards on the boat in Ghost in the Shell 2: Innocence were actually fairly close to what network attadk and defense would be like in the future. Those helmets are actually EEG machines w/ displays for the users. They are getting fed a view based on dynamics of the network and the EEG is letting them know when they see something important.
I do security