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Study Suggests Magnets Can Force You to Tell the Truth
Estonian researchers claim that magnets can either force you to lie or make it impossible. Subjects in the study had magnets placed at either the left or the right side of the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex, and the results suggest that the individual was either unable to tell the truth or unable to lie depending on which side was stimulated. From the article: "Last year, researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology also used powerful magnets to disrupt the area said to be the brain's 'moral compass,' situated behind the right ear, making people temporarily less moral."
...how do they work?
"magnets to disrupt the area said to be the brain's 'moral compass,' situated behind the right ear, making people temporarily less moral"
Is that why people on cell phones act like assholes?
Yeah, I find the whole thing a bit dubious. It's not shocking to me that it might be possible to disrupt brain activity in such a way that a particular patient couldn't fabricate certain kinds of lies, but the idea that everyone's brain has a clear "lies on" and "lies off" switch that can be activated with a magnet.
Reading one of TFA:
The volunteers were presented a series of coloured discs, and told they could tell the truth or lie about the objects' colours while half were being stimulated on the left and half on the right.
Results showed that the eight volunteers who had their left DPC stimulated lied more often, while the ones with the right DPC stimulated were more likely to tell the truth, researchers said.
So it sounds like they were given the option of lying about something with no consequences, and they lied more often with one part of the brain stimulated. It doesn't say that it was "impossible" to lie, or even that it made it difficult to lie when strongly motivated to do so. Maybe it didn't directly cause them to be more likely to lie, but made them feel more whimsical or creative and likely to want to lie in a consequence-free environment.
Then there's the much-overlooked difference between "not-lying" and "telling the truth". I can tell you something false because I'm mistaken, because I'm telling you a fictional story, or because I'm over-simplifying. None of those actions are deceptive in nature, but none of them are "telling the truth".
"No mention of how strong a magnet."
You win a prize for asking the correct question.
It is a TMS. so we are talking about a MRI level magnetic fields.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transcranial_magnetic_stimulation
here is a slightly better article:
http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg21128284.400-powerful-magnets-hamper-our-ability-to-lie.html
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
Funny story.
Friend of mine was driving back home from grad school for a short vacation. Got pulled over by some state troopers on the way home. Apparently he was driving a road that is frequented by drug runners from mexico and his little compact car was stuffed to the point of overflowing with random possessions. Trooper asks to search his car. He says no.
Trooper then calls in a K-9 unit after mumbling something to himself, which walks around the car for many minutes without once alarming (barking). Obviously annoyed at this damned citizen who won't let him do what he wants, the trooper then moves my friend behind his police car and goes back to the car with the K-9 trooper. My friend sees them kick the car to get the dog to bark, and the troopers come over and inform him that the dog barking gives them right to search the car. They then spend the next half hour throwing his possessions all over the side of the highway. They found nothing and went on their way.
Moral of the story is - it doesn't matter. The more authority we surrender, the more our 'rights' become meaningless in the face of an overwhelming corporate/government bureaucracy that protects its own rights over yours.
How does it feel to be a liar with pants constantly on fire?
Magnetic fields do no work.