Slashdot Mirror
Intercontinental Mind-Meld Unites Two Rats
ananyo writes "The brains of two rats on different continents have been made to act in tandem. When the first, in Brazil, uses its whiskers to choose between two stimuli, an implant records its brain activity and signals to a similar device in the brain of a rat in the United States. The U.S. rat then usually makes the same choice on the same task. Miguel Nicolelis, a neuroscientist at Duke University in Durham, North Carolina, says that this system allows one rat to use the senses of another, incorporating information from its far-away partner into its own representation of the world. 'It's not telepathy. It's not the Borg,' he says. 'But we created a new central nervous system made of two brains.' Nicolelis says that the work, published today, is the first step towards constructing an organic computer that uses networks of linked animal brains to solve tasks. But other scientists who work on neural implants are skeptical."
". But other scientists who work on neural implants are skeptical.""
as they should be,. It's a big deal, as such it will require good data and be repeatable.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
Oh c'mon Pinky, you already know, you DMA'd it from me 250nS ago.
I don't care if it's 90,000 hectares. That lake was not my doing.
If the goal is to use this technology to mend broken connections in diseased or damaged brains, wouldn't it make more sense to test a similarly damaged rat brain rather than attempt to repeat the same results with four mice? Note: The question is related to the original article more so than the submission on /.
Common Sense (+1)
... refuse to issue the standard obligatory decades old Simpson's joke that typically accompanies a story like this one.
North America and South America are different continents...
Common Sense (+1)
I notice they do not include a picture of the wireheaded rats (only an artists impression). Probably wise. While I for one believe that the advancement of science to be the greatest height to which a rat could aspire, I have a feeling that others (and possibly the rats) do not feel the same way.
I am not interested in articles about life extension advancements.
Hemisphere? Yes. Continent? No.
Surely you've heard of North America and South America, right? Yes, they're connected by land, but so are Europe, Asia and Africa... they're still separate continents.
Usually people in power is the one that go wrong. Rats have little brain power, so humans could be the logical choice for mind melding, they are cheaper to maintain and are more abundant than other big brained animals. Want a job giving your brain for the next generation of computing 8 hours a day? And once humans get into the equation, we will effectively be the Borg.
Actually, sounds almost exactly like what I'd think was the beginnings of the Borg.
Imagine a Wolf cluster of these.
This idea has some interesting real-world applications
1. Sex
???
???
4. Profit
And I thought Brazil and the United States belonged to the same continent...
Yea, that can happen when you sleep through geography.
An enigma, wrapped in a riddle, shrouded in bacon and cheese
Wow. We're making Cranium Rats? Anyone that has played Planescape Torment knows thats a bad idea.
One of the most unusual concepts of an alien life form I've seen are the Tines in Vinge's novel A Fire upon the Deep , dog or giant rat-like animals that are not individually conscious, but when together in packs form a single sentient organism. In the case of Vinge's novel, neural communication between the individual members of the pack was carried out via ultrasound, not electricity like here, but I wouldn't have imagined that scientists would pursue the same idea at some point.
Interesting that the hyperintelligent pan-dimensional beings that we call mice would direct us to use their traditional enemies, rats, as preliminary test subjects for the future wiring of all of humanity into one hyper-super-duper-parallel-mind-games-puper-computer to come up with the question much sooner than we would otherwise.
It's easier to be a result of the past, but more fun to be a cause of the future! http://www.spacefinancegroup.com/
Was the artist's impression completely necessary? What I take from that, the rats engaged in some Hollywood, overly cgi vulcan mind meld all the while inside of Tron.
Clearly we need an RFC for the Brain-To-Brain-Interface Protocol.
Hopefully it'll be built on top of SSL. I don't want someone hacking into my rats.
Koans and fables for the software engineer
Ah, but this is not a question of geography, but rather one of politics...
God bless the United Earth of America!
You do not have a moral or legal right to do absolutely anything you want.
See the science fiction novel, _Lady El_ by Jim Starlin and Dana Graziunas.
Sphinx of black quartz, judge my vow.
Maybe NOW we can finally understand what the female brain is Really thinking....
Someone let this out a month and a day too early.
now we need to go OSS in diesel cars
Next time I'm traversing the Warrens, looking for the Decanter of Endless Water, I'll remember that this is how that bullshit started.
Researcher: press that lever, you rat!
Rat: I realize that command does have its fascination, even under circumstances such as these, but I neither enjoy it nor am I frightened of it. It simply exists, and I will do whatever logically needs to be done.
It's actually really complicated, some people actually learn in school that North and South America are a single continent. And Wikipedia doesn't mention this, but in Central America, some people consider Central America to be a separate continent as well.
"First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
Why you should be skeptical:
1. Slapping implants that record...something, and then slapping implants that...play back something that stimulate neurons in the exact same way as they were firing when recorded is a hell of an accomplisment.
This alone is sci-fi level stuff.
2. It's doubtful such activity, on the level of a neuron applies to a blanket region as if projecting on a screen. You wouldn't be "projecting" the correct micro-piece on the correct destination neuron.
3. Even with sufficiently fine neuronal alignment, it's doubtful neural networks at the individual neuron level are identically positioned in rats any more than skin cells are.
4. Even if neural network topology on the individual neuron level are identical between rats, again they wouldn't line up any more than eyes do for humans needing glasses.
(-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
I hate to break it to the researchers, but getting a pack of rats to operate under the same collective consciousness has been done before
See my journal for slashdot ID's by year. Mine created in 2005. http://slashdot.org/journal/289875/slashdot-ids-by-year
...since cats do, in fact, have pointy ears. I would have thought that that would be a major help here.
Also, as a cat lover, I vehemently object to giving mice any special training or equipment that might topple the fragile balance of power between mice and cats. I'm going to file a protest to the United Species Security Council!
Ezekiel 23:20
Oh great, we've just taken the first step into creating Cranium Rats. Bring enough of those together and there'll be talk about overthrowing the bonds human opression.
So, whose politics shaped the tectonic plates?
me: this is scary: http://science.slashdot.org/story/13/02/28/1615207/intercontinental-mind-meld-unites-two-rats Sent at 1:14 PM on Thursday
Poet: scarey
i think it is brilliant
me: its good research, but the implications are scary
Poet: thinking of healing applications for people with brain injury
or spinal cord injury
oh yeah
me: being able to map/read sections of the brain for brain injury and to control prosthetices is great
Poet: let the army use it create sleeper assasins all over the workd
yet the army could
me: but could you imagine the popup adverts coming through your nural implant telling you to go buy Tide detergent.. you dont know why you bought it, you just
did Poet: shit
that is scary
me: actually you do know why you bought it.. you wanted it.. but why did you want it, and why did it feel so good to buy it.. like a hit of opium?
jeez I am cynical
Silence is a state of mime.
Continents are land-masses, not political divisions.
Gotta love slashdot and its tradition of snarky, but ignorant, posts.
Tie a bunch of animal brains together around the world? Have it make decisions? Nope, no way...
I for one welcome our ninja-trained helicopter-piloting rat underlords.
Singularity: a belief in the "God" idea with the "demiurge" relation inverted.
Give us your cheese of be assimilated!
(If at first you don't succeed, do it different next time!)
Okay, so how about this for a better headline: "Two-headed mutant killer cyber-rats plotting world domination: they share a mind, but may-or-may-not-be-on-different-continents-but-are-at-least-4000-miles-apart. Nothing to contest in that statement now. All happy?
Are you looking at the same link I am? There's a video at the bottom of the article showing them in all their wired up glory. http://www.nature.com/news/intercontinental-mind-meld-unites-two-rats-1.12522
Some people die at 25 and aren't buried until 75. -Benjamin Franklin
Citation needed.
The boundaries that make up continents are to a degree arbitrary and depend upon the person making the statement. There's no real justification for Europe being a continent; Europe and a large part of Asia are on one tectonic plate, while the easternmost part of Asia is on the same plate as North America. And the Indian subcontinent is on yet another plate.
So, it's ultimately local custom that determines the number of continents. I've seen Europeans refer to the Americas as one continent. For example, the Olympic rings were at one time intended to represent five continents.
(The quote's copied from Wikipedia, so in five minutes it's entirely possible that De Coubertin would have said the flag represents the population of elephants tripling within six months.)
Even as a question of geography, it's still two separate continents. North and South America are each on their own continental plate.
"Are you thinking what I'm thinking, Pinky?"
"Actually, yes, Brain; for once, I am. *narf* *poit*"
And I thought Brazil and the United States belonged to the same continent...
Yea, that can happen when you sleep through geography.
Or take Geography at a U.S. school.
. .
...could go wrong?
This is how the Borg begins.
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
So scientists are wiring together rodent brains to create a supercomputer? Maybe my neighbor isn't schizophrenic after all.
I work in this field, and the work here is not nearly as revolutionary as made out.
We have known for about a decade that a brain can learn to integrate arbitrary patterns of electrical stimuli. This work was done by many groups including the group that performed the current study, so they are clearly aware of that work. Since the placement of recording electrodes and the stimulating electrodes in these experiments are essentially random at a cellular level, there is no reason to treat the recorded signal differently from any signal derived from task related timing.
Using two animals and the internet is really just a sensationalist re-hash of what has already been well described. Sure it is an engineering achievement, but the claim that there is a 'single nervous system' is wildly overstated. The fact that this study is making such waves is really frustrating to may of us who are working on similar topics because it seems to be rewarding sensationalism rather than progress.
My whiskers with your whiskers...my cheese with your cheese...
PAIIIIIIIIIIN!!!!!!!
Imagine a Beowulf Cluster of these!
excitingthingstodo.blogspot.com
It's Bitmouse!
A USB mouse.
Doesn't this make anyone else a little uneasy? It doesn't sound terribly ethical to me...
Depends where you go to school. In Mexico 6 continents. They ignore Antartica sometimes they will say 5 Then I moved to finland, and they count 6. From there we went to czech republic also 6 continents. Then highschool 10th grade in USA they counted 7 continents. I also noticed that refering to a USAian as american is mostly an anglophone thing. While traveling through Europe I could say I am an Amererican, and they knew I was not referring to USA. And it probably was because I do not have a north american english accent or I could speak the local language. And canadians they're are americans they just hate getting confused with their southern neighbour. Even if you say they're From North America they still end up being americans from the north. I took some english classes, studied 1 year in USA and here is how I interpret the name United States of America with my limited english. the key is in the word "OF" a proposition I believe. It says the These united states belong to america. It does not say They are America. Is like saying "the united union of kentucky", "the sons of Carl", "the many cars of Mike" For the name to actually mean the name of the country is America it would have to say it something like this. United American States. Now this would imply they are american and not just belong to. Funny thing is 99% of USAians don't know where the name come from. When you ask they usually end up saying it means freedom or something like that.
...could go wrong?
This is how the Borg begins.
You say that like it's a bad thing.
Fifty years of Yippie! 1968-2018
The US and Brazil are in the same Continent: America
To be permanently wired to a porn-star.
People don't seem to care. Rat poison is a terrible way to go. Glue traps are horribly cruel. The rat/mouse will starve to death. I once saw a mouse the was struggling so hard to get free from a glue trap that he broke his legs in the process. Other mouse traps snap a mouse's neck by baiting them with food. Some people get cats to kill mice and rats in their houses. Nothing like being hunted by a larger animal that can't be beat. People are willing to scream "ITS A RAT! KILL IT! KILL IT!" Only because its a rat...
Or the http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hyperion_(Simmons_novel) series
So are their minds more or less connected than their continents?
Unfortunately, a meta-mind created by a gestalt of many interconncted humans subconciously sharing data with each other would be just as susceptable to mental illnesses as the individual human minds it is comprised of. Humans attached having "seditious" thoughts that they would never dream of acting on themselves, would still influence the behavior of the gestalt mind in much the same way a handful of 'diseased' neurons in a single human can profoundly influence behavior. (Or how things like depression work.)
Given the conflicted nature the being would have, it would almost certainly suffer a number of neurotic conditions without having very carefully selected humans plugged in.
That phrase is so completely removed from reality that I'm in fact surprized that anybody (you) cared about it.
When a boy tells his girlfriend that he'll give her the Moon, people don't stop to think about property rights either.
Rethinking email
Now for the all important questions: If one rat hears Metallica while linked to the other rat, what entities will the RIAA sue? Can a DRM take down notice shut down the experiment? And how does the six-strike policy work in such a situation?
Plus, they are no longer conjoined; they are divided by the Panama Canal.
Downmodding is the refuge of the weak. Don't downmod, make a better argument!
"Everyone's in favor of saving Hitler's brain. But when you put it in the body of a great white shark--Ooooh! Suddenly you've gone too far!" --Professor Farnsworth
e-Vel!
Anything like this? (IBDB).
Sounds like a bumper sticker to me.
Please do not read this sig. Thank you.
When rat one moved his left foot, the right brain of rat two was shocked, and ... moved his left foot.
God bless the United Earth of America!
Shhh... We haven't told those people at the UN building yet.
It's called TV commercials.
I am talking out of my ass here:
But I imagine that impaired brain function leading to external manifestation of mental illness probably stems from the core functionality of 1 person's brain being damaged. I imagine that a network of minds would be comprised of independent nodes with separate internal functions. I would imagine mental issued from impaired brain function to remain localized.
If for example internal functions were also distributed, the solutions to that person's problem could also be distributed. If someone is raging because their brain function to calm down is broken, someone else's mental function could send that signal on their behalf. I don't imagine a few broken computers bringing down the internet. While viruses do propagate through the internet, anti-virus measures are also effectively propagating through the internet(though not autonomously).
It's exactly as well defined (by the great circle joining Greenwich to the International Date Line). It's just that nobody wants to use it that way.
Science is all about firing a drunk pig out of a cannon just to see what happens.
The Northern and Southern Hemisphere are defined by the physical characteristics of the planet (namely its rotation). There's nothing physically special about the Greenwich meridian or the International Date Line, they are just set by convention.
Or said differently, there's a Northern and a Southern Hemisphere because there's a North Pole and a South Pole. There's no West Pole, nor an East Pole.
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
North and south are also defined by convention. Because we decided that that one was north, that became the rule for every other object in the universe.
(Actually we have two norths. Depending on which convention you use.)
Science is all about firing a drunk pig out of a cannon just to see what happens.
The convention is which one we call "North" and which one we call "South", but those are mere names anyways. The hemispheres as such are uniquely defined by the rotation of the earth. That is, there are two poles, and two hemispheres which reach from the corresponding pole to the equator. And thanks to the weak interaction (more exactly, its parity violation) you can even distinguish from the rotation which hemisphere is which using nothing but fundamental physical laws.
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
Signal cascade anomalies are a recurring malady in many people, and is an underlying feature of many forms of epilepsy.
[Obligatory wikipedia reference]
It is important to stress that a directly interconnected hivemind would suffer timing issues if signals were sanitized by the technological component before being relayed, causing many of the cognitative deficits found in people with mylelination defects to become manifest in the gestalt conciousness. It would also run foul of the halting problem.
This means that propogating signals originating in a single connected mind could cause havok with the whole hivemind, in much the same way a localized signal in the visual cortex of an epileptic can paralyze the entire cortical function of the afflicted person in just a few seconds.
Neural networks are among other things, open feedback loops. Sensory information gets relayed around the neural net, and "memories" are just sensory information on endless loop being preserved in a dedicated region. Anything that influences these feedback cycles will have avalanching effects on the function of that network. This is why things like depression become hard to correct, since the network gets stuck in cycles that promote the depressed state. Antidepressants are meant to help mitigate these effects by manually supplying stimuli to the depressed nervous system.
The issue here, is that the "higher" gestalt mind will be operating on the signal data generated by the connected minds interacting and sharing signal information. It would be susceptible to epilleptic like siezures from hypersynchronous signal sources, and from cascading depression between connected peers, and also just from the idle thoughts and memories of the connected people. (Which by the nature of the shared collective, would also influence all other peers as well, so somebody with a neurological defect could cause lasting neurological harm to the rest of the cluster, just by being connected.)
What I as getting at, is that a subtle seditious thought that isn't really serious, like "we should launch all the politicians into the sun", would bounce around the neural net and if it gets echoed enough times, it will become a recurring thought to the hive mind, and attract its attention as an idea worth pursuing.
Doesn't mean the hivemind would act on it, but it would likely contemplate all the possible ways to do that action, and contemplate the consequences. It might actually consider the prospect, if said politicians are also connected, and doing things that the other connected minds don't like.
Simply having the thought is what exposes the hivemind to the concept, and the nature of a distributed neural network means everyone attached will respond in some fashion to that thought, even if just subconsciously.
Don't underestimate the influence a single brain in the swarm can have over the collective. Remember, a piece of cortex the size of a grain of rice can cause system wide deadlock in an epilleptic siezure. The same sorts of things would be possible in a distributed neural network.
I've seen Americans claim that the sun rotates around the earth.
Everything is relative, and I am at the center of it all.
Although, I would have said "The sun 'revolves' around the earth." But that is just me.
"For I desired mercy, and not sacrifice" -- God
While traveling through Europe I could say I am an Amererican, and they knew I was not referring to USA.
I bet.
"For I desired mercy, and not sacrifice" -- God
"Into the mud, scum queen!"
Ok I can only vouch for Germany, France, the UK, Spain and Italy, but if you said "I am American" 95% of the time it is assumed you are US-American. (Not USAian! Nobody uses that term.) This is because a Brazilian will say he is from Brazil and a Canadian will say he is from Canada and a Mexican will say he is from Mexico. Only the US-Americans will say he is from America. The again there are pedants like you that will understand what he means and argue with him about semantics.
But the thing is that when you are asked from where you are from, they want a country not a continent. It is about as useful to answer it with you are from earth. Ask any European where he comes from and you will get, a country not a continent. (Don't get me started with the EU.)
Oh and before I get angry replies from Australians; semantics... I con't care what continent you come from, I care about the country you come from, to bad they have the same name.