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Former Oculus Exec Predicts Telepathy Within 10 Years (cnet.com)

Mary Lou Jepsen is a former MIT professor with 100 patents and a former engineering executive at Facebook, Oculus, Intel, and Google[x] (now called X) -- and "she hopes to make communicating telepathically happen relatively soon." An anonymous reader quotes CNET: Last year Jepsen left her job heading up display technology for the Oculus virtual reality arm of Facebook to develop new imaging technologies to help cure diseases. Shortly thereafter she founded Openwater, which is developing a device that puts the capabilities of a huge MRI machine into a lightweight wearable form. According to the startup's website, "Openwater is creating a device that can enable us to see inside our brains or bodies in great detail. With this comes the promise of new abilities to diagnose and treat disease and well beyond -- communicating with thought alone."

This week Jepsen went further and suggested a timeframe for such capabilities becoming reality. "I don't think this is going to take decades," she told CNBC. "I think we're talking about less than a decade, probably eight years until telepathy"... Jepsen, who has also spent time at Google X, MIT and Intel, says the basic idea is to shrink down the huge MRI machines found in medical hospitals into flexible LCDs that can be embedded in a ski hat and use infrared light to see what's going on in your brain. "Literally a thinking cap," Jepsen explains... The idea is that communicating by thought alone could be much faster and even allow us to become more competitive with the artificial intelligence that is supposedly coming for everyone's jobs very soon.

Jepsen tells CNBC, "If I threw [you] into an M.R.I. machine right now... I can tell you what words you're about to say, what images are in your head. I can tell you what music you're thinking of. That's today, and I'm talking about just shrinking that down."

202 comments

  1. Most people will be deaf and dumb. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Funny

    Telepathy will, after all, require thoughts.

    1. Re:Most people will be deaf and dumb. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      I'll let Trump do the thinking for me.

    2. Re: Most people will be deaf and dumb. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      When the prophet speaks, the thinking has been done.
      - Mormon proverb

    3. Re:Most people will be deaf and dumb. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Dolan pls

    4. Re: Most people will be deaf and dumb. by Zero__Kelvin · · Score: 1

      He'll finally be silent!

      --
      Guns don't kill people; Physics kills people! - John Lithgow as Dick Solomon on Third Rock From The Sun
  2. New low for privacy by seoras · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Sounds great until you realise what a device like this could do in the wrong hands.

    1. Re:New low for privacy by The+Grim+Reefer · · Score: 2

      Sounds great until you realise what a device like this could do in the wrong hands.

      Yeah, like most governments.

      There are so many slippery slopes with this that it's probably better than any water park in existence currently. If possible, it will make court proceedings much simpler. But then why not just make everyone have to wear this at all times. Then it can report you to the authorities when you are about to commit a crime. What about hate speech? We can at long last have the thought police. The possibles for misuse are staggering. But I'm sure once this would become acceptable in society, only dinosaurs like me will see the drawbacks.

    2. Re: New low for privacy by dougdonovan · · Score: 2

      mary, i can see where you are a "former" associate of MIT. i was one of their sysadmins for 6 years. enjoy mcdonalds flipping burgers.

    3. Re:New low for privacy by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Bigger worry is not the threat to the person using this (if compromised), but what a person with very malign interests could do if harnessing the potential of efficiency gains in human-machine interconnection. But if this technology is easy enough to create, given what progress has already been made, then it will be created. We must be ready.

    4. Re: New low for privacy by dougdonovan · · Score: 1

      in addition...MIT people. keep up the realistic work that the rest of us cannot possibly fathom. theres a reason why you are at MIT.

    5. Re:New low for privacy by Man+On+Pink+Corner · · Score: 5, Informative

      It's not easy to create. This foirmer professor/former Oculus exec/former whatever is talking out of her ass.

      For one thing, functional MRI is nowhere near as magically effective as she suggests. It's possible to 'read' the thoughts of dead fish in these machines. Results require extensive postprocessing and context-aware interpretation by trained personnel.

      For another, these machines are among the most sophisticated devices this side of a CERN facility. They carry seven-figure price tags. They require helium-cooled superconducting magnets, high-energy RF excitation with industrial-scale power requirements, sensitive receivers with lots of signal processing power, and last but not least, long integration times. You almost need a nuclear physicist on staff just to keep one running.

      This type of hardware is not going to be featured in the next-generation iPhone. It's dictated by hard physical constraints that cannot be worked around with any known technology.

      I will eat an entire Apple store if FMRI or anything like it becomes accessible at the consumer level within 50 years, much less 10.

    6. Re:New low for privacy by gweihir · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Indeed. Fortunately, there is no way that she can do what she claims. This is most likely an attempt to get funding by empty promises that are not quite obviously empty. There are enough proto-fascists in government employ that would love to have these capabilities.

      --
      Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
    7. Re:New low for privacy by VorpalRodent · · Score: 1

      One hypothetical Big Brother use case has been explored. "Listening" is not a bad movie. It has the "Primer" vibe, but for mind reading. IMDB

      --
      Take it to the limit, everybody to the limit, come on, everybody fhqwhgads.
    8. Re:New low for privacy by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I don't know, I think that would be a great world. Everybody at peace and harmony. No more violence, no more wars. A direct and immediate democracy based on everyone's thoughts at all times. Everyone has purpose. Everyone is happy.

      Beautiful. Absolutely beautiful, like a fat cock.

    9. Re: New low for privacy by Brockmire · · Score: 1

      Girlfriend: what are you thinking about? Me: how much I love you. Girlfriend: like the fuck you are! Who's Monica?

    10. Re: New low for privacy by Jesus+H+Rolle · · Score: 1

      Beautiful. Absolutely beautiful, like a fat cock.

      Found the sumo cockfighting fan!

    11. Re: New low for privacy by K.+S.+Kyosuke · · Score: 1

      They carry seven-figure price tags. They require helium-cooled superconducting magnets, high-energy RF excitation with industrial-scale power requirements, sensitive receivers with lots of signal processing power, and last but not least, long integration times.

      Or alternatively, bunch of needles in your brain?

      --
      Ezekiel 23:20
    12. Re:New low for privacy by mentil · · Score: 2

      And there's only a world market for maybe five computers, right? Because they cost millions of dollars, take up a large room, require numerous highly-skilled experts in order to operate, and can't do anything joe-sixpack would find useful in his daily life? I wouldn't underestimate what 50 years of technological progress can achieve. Arthur C. Clarke's 1st law: (paraphrased) If someone says something is technologically impossible, they are most likely wrong.

      Most likely, FMRI could be miniaturized and dispose of superconductivity requirements by reducing the energy output by orders of magnitude, by doing more complex calculations that haven't been devised yet. That's assuming room-temperature superconductors are never found.

      --
      Corruption is convincing someone that the selfless ideal is the same as their selfish ideal.
    13. Re: New low for privacy by wanfuse123 · · Score: 1

      No privacy at all. I don't think anyone will go for this. Think Google glass turned in on one's self. Also, I do think its possible. They have gone and made brain cells photo receptive in rat brains. If they could make individual cells light up using directed laser beams, it might be possible to inject thoughts, get responses and inject more thoughts through a recursive process to determine ones meaning in thoughts. Slippery slope, lots of filtering required to maintain the sense of civil society, after all we're all animals with a thin shell of civility.

    14. Re:New low for privacy by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I prefer fuzzy kittens.

    15. Re:New low for privacy by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Funny

      Fortunately, there is no way that she can do what she claims. This is most likely an attempt to get funding by empty promises that are not quite obviously empty.

      The money men are always falling for the tricks of the egg heads from MIT and elsewhere. I suppose we all do what we can. They give us banking and financial crises and we cheat them out of their money by promising them pseudo-scientific nonsense to get them to "invest" in our startups. It's a tidy arrangement while it lasts.

    16. Re:New low for privacy by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      I will eat an entire Apple store if FMRI or anything like it becomes accessible at the consumer level within 50 years, much less 10.

      Pro Tip: She's doing this to get money out of Wall Street types who're too ignorant to know better. She doesn't actually believe any of this crap.

    17. Re:New low for privacy by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      You can add to that list that their temporal resolution is pretty rubbish compared to other BCI technologies.

    18. Re:New low for privacy by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The state of MRI technology you see today kind of is the Joe Sixpack user-friendly low power version. MRI technology has been around in some form for decades with the advancements that sort of time implies. Just because someone made a proclamation about computers 60 years ago doesn't mean that every other technology is going to follow the same miniaturization trend. And for some perspective: nanotechnology, flying cars, fusion power, quantum computers.
      Skepticism isn't unjustified. And hey, if they poster is wrong, you get both head-band MRIs and gloating rights.

      Oh also: It's impossible to run your car using only water as fuel.

    19. Re: New low for privacy by cowtamer · · Score: 3, Informative

      You are correct about the MRI part of things and the need for sophisticated experimental design in which a single task may take two minutes of concentrated motionlessness on the part of the subject.

      There is, however, a technology called fNIRS (functional near infrared spectroscopy) which works on a similar principle as fMRI (changes in blood oxygenation related to function) which only requires the ability to send and detect light through the skull. This is what I believe they're referring to. fNIRS has better temporal resolution than fMRI but its spatial resolution is way worse. Also, the light can't penetrate as deeply (fMRI can image the entire volume).

      While telepathy is far, some of the mentioned things are within the realm of possibility, albeit mostly with cooperating subjects and carefully designed, task specific experiments.

    20. Re: New low for privacy by bn-7bc · · Score: 1

      More like: You ar sitting there, thinking youre minding your own biusness, sudenly your GF slaps yopu, shoting "WHO THE HELL IS MOBICA"

    21. Re: New low for privacy by Zero__Kelvin · · Score: 1

      Monica's fat twin?

      --
      Guns don't kill people; Physics kills people! - John Lithgow as Dick Solomon on Third Rock From The Sun
    22. Re:New low for privacy by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Most proto-fascists I know of are outside government working their way in by feeding the gullible discrediting lies about their best institutions.

    23. Re:New low for privacy by gnick · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Agreed. These are empty fantasy claims being made to solicit funding. You'll see a quicker return on investment betting on fusion reactors. FTS:

      If I threw [you] into an M.R.I. machine right now... I can tell you what words you're about to say, what images are in your head. I can tell you what music you're thinking of.

      I gotta call bullshit. I just straight up don't believe that. You might be able to tell me that I'm thinking about music, but I'd be blown away if you could tell me it's Vera Lynn. I think this ability is being exaggerated at least.

      --
      He's getting rather old, but he's a good mouse.
    24. Re:New low for privacy by gweihir · · Score: 1

      Obvious troll is obvious.

      --
      Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
    25. Re:New low for privacy by AdamThor · · Score: 1

      Yeah, like most corporations.

      We already know that Facebook wants to know what you "like". Why wait for you to explicitly tell it?

      You know the skeezy line ... "There's something I could say to make you sleep with me... Let's just pretend I've already said it!"

      Instead it'll be the skeezy corporation "There's something I could say to make you pay me... and... ah, there it is!" *dynamic advertising*
      Then... *YOU EMPTIES WALLET*

      --
      -- "Oh. This guy again."
    26. Re:New low for privacy by coinreturn · · Score: 1

      Of course it's bullshit. I'm betting she means if she asks you to think of "either Gangster Rap or Classical Music" she can tell which 80% of the time. I guarantee that if I'm thinking of a band that my brother played with 40 years ago in high school that existed for only a few months, there is no fucking way she can name it!

    27. Re:New low for privacy by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      She says she can predict "the words I'm about to say" and "the images in my head". That sounds pretty specific. I think the limit on this will be, "you're about to say something angry," or "you're thinking of happy images." I can probably tell the difference between listening to Gangster Rap or Classical using standard polygraph techniques.

    28. Re:New low for privacy by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Does anybody here remember Vera Lynn? Remember when she said that "We will meet again...Some sunny day"?

    29. Re:New low for privacy by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Does anybody here remember Vera Lynn? Remember when she said that "We will meet again...Some sunny day"?

      I do. Vera Lynn sang "We'll Meet Again" at the end of Dr. Strangelove as the world was blowing up.

      A/C 'cuz Pink Floyd trivia isn't really on-topic.

    30. Re:New low for privacy by Netssansfrontieres · · Score: 1

      You can call bullshit all you want, but if you look at the work from Cal (lab of Jack Gallant) and the dozens of others who have replicated his work, you'd find you're wrong.

    31. Re:New low for privacy by gweihir · · Score: 1

      Not actually. The problem here is that while it is possible to read something from a brain if the person attached to it really helps with it, reading actual thoughts is in a whole different class of complexity. The problem is not that these people are bad at observing, the problem is that they are really bad at mathematics and CS.

      --
      Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
  3. I bet that... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Jepsen tells CNBC, "If I threw [you] into an M.R.I. machine right now... I can tell you what words you're about to say, what images are in your head. I can tell you what music you're thinking of. That's today, and I'm talking about just shrinking that down."

    I bet that it won't work on me because I have 3 letter agency training they tried it on me and could not see anything going on into my head.
    -creimer
    There are two kinds of people on Slashdot. Which one are you? https://www.cdreimer.com/slash...

    1. Re: I bet that... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I was always taught there were 10 types of people. I thought on slashdot this would be common knowledge...

    2. Re: I bet that... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Duck you !!! You disingenuous duckling

    3. Re: I bet that... by dougdonovan · · Score: 1

      quit thinking.

    4. Re: I bet that... by __aaclcg7560 · · Score: 1

      I was always taught there were 10 types of people. I thought on slashdot this would be common knowledge...

      The 10 types have never been explained on Slashdot. Probably because everyone thought it was common knowledge. My web page explains those types. That's why I get the advertising revenue for people visiting my website.

    5. Re: I bet that... by sexconker · · Score: 1

      There are 11 types of people.

    6. Re: I bet that... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Of course they have been "explained" ... those who have never heard of creimer, and those who know what an idiotic loser "he" is.

    7. Re: I bet that... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Your website explains binary?

    8. Re: I bet that... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Do you not get the "10" reference?

    9. Re: I bet that... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Exactly! This one goes to 11

    10. Re: I bet that... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      There are no people. No one does null.

    11. Re: I bet that... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      RAID0 has never been explained either, because like the 10 types of people it is common knowledge - here, not in the circlejerk of handjob dumbasses you hang out with. Why don't you explain it to us again - are they heavy?

  4. Reminds me of by Kohath · · Score: 4, Informative

    Theranos, unfortunately.

    1. Re: Reminds me of by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Holmes is cuter but I hear she's saving herself for creimer.

    2. Re:Reminds me of by Gr8Apes · · Score: 2

      Beat me to it... I smell a unicorn like...

      --
      The cesspool just got a check and balance.
    3. Re:Reminds me of by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      No, this woman is far more looney. Theranos was at least plausible.

  5. Early onset dementia by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Don't give her your money.

  6. MRI of my brain by PPH · · Score: 5, Funny

    Won't be difficult to deduce what's on my mind[NSFW]

    --
    Have gnu, will travel.
  7. Reading thoughts vs Inputting thoughts by Pollux · · Score: 5, Informative

    If I threw [you] into an M.R.I. machine right now... I can tell you what words you're about to say, what images are in your head. I can tell you what music you're thinking of. That's today, and I'm talking about just shrinking that down

    So, it currently takes a huge freakin' MRI to just be able to read the brain's thoughts*. And to the best of my knowledge, no one has figured out a way of inputting a thought into the brain electronically. And she thinks she can accomplish both with a device the size of a cap in eight years? Good luck with that.

    * Even "Reading the brain's thoughts" is quite a stretch from what an MRI actually does. We just see on a screen what parts of the brain light up like a Christmas tree, then interpret what the brain is doing based on our current mapping of brain-functions. But, if you were to "think" the message, "Please buy diapers on your way home from work today," an MRI today at best will show that your prefrontal cortex lights up, indicating you are task-managing, as well as your amygdala, indicating a sense of emotional frustration. Other areas will light up as well, but whether these areas mean diapers, work, cheese, rutabagas, or who knows what is still anybody's guess.

    1. Re:Reading thoughts vs Inputting thoughts by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      If I threw [you] into an M.R.I. machine right now... I can tell you what words you're about to say, what images are in your head. I can tell you what music you're thinking of. That's today, and I'm talking about just shrinking that down

      So, it currently takes a huge freakin' MRI to just be able to read the brain's thoughts*. And to the best of my knowledge, no one has figured out a way of inputting a thought into the brain electronically. And she thinks she can accomplish both with a device the size of a cap in eight years? Good luck with that.

      They already have a prototype.

    2. Re: Reading thoughts vs Inputting thoughts by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      MRI machines require magnets cooled by liquid helium. Unless she's also inventing room temperature superconductors this is just a VC grab.

    3. Re: Reading thoughts vs Inputting thoughts by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      MRI machines require magnets cooled by liquid helium. Unless she's also inventing room temperature superconductors this is just a VC grab.

      One there are already super conductors that don't require liquid helium. Two even if you had room temperature magnets, it would be way to dangerous to release these as a consumer product.

    4. Re:Reading thoughts vs Inputting thoughts by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      > "Reading the brain's thoughts" is quite a stretch from what an MRI actually does

      Telepathy in an analog form (reading MRIs) has existed for some time, so that point is a matter of redefinition and not a salient point against the claim. If I can remotely determine if you're experiencing an emotion (within a statistical probability), the given claim would be satisfied because the feedback mechanism is a matter of implementation (pluggable lights, vs sound, vs whatever). The temporal prediction is about how long it *might* take to commercialize.

    5. Re:Reading thoughts vs Inputting thoughts by denzacar · · Score: 5, Informative

      She basically repeated what she saw on an episode of "60 minutes" linked in the thought identification article on Wikipedia.

      In reality... half of it is computer guessing which one of the ten pre-calibrated images the subject is being shown - while the other half is just bullshit mixed with wishful thinking.
      Then she "expanded" on that.

      For now, it's impossible to force someone to have his or her brain scanned, because the subject has to lie still and cooperate, but that could change.

      "There are some other technologies that are being developed that may be able to be used covertly and even remotely.
      So, for example, they're trying to develop now a beam of light that would be projected onto your forehead.
      It would go a couple of millimeters into your frontal cortex, and then receptors would get the reflection of that light.
      And there's some studies that suggest that we could use that as a lie detection device," Wolpe said.

      If you look at it closely, that paragraph consists of nothing but woulda-couldas and maybes.
      Sprinkled with a weasel word or two.

      --
      Mit der Dummheit kämpfen Götter selbst vergebens
    6. Re:Reading thoughts vs Inputting thoughts by Oligonicella · · Score: 1

      You, sir or ma'am, do not understand what the word telepathy means.

      "the supposed communication of thoughts or ideas by means other than the known senses."

      MRIs are not capable of telling you what thoughts or ideas someone has, regardless of the hype.

    7. Re:Reading thoughts vs Inputting thoughts by Oligonicella · · Score: 2

      Not to mention she says the beam of light would penetrate the friggin' skull forcefully enough to provide bounce back. Gotta hurt.

    8. Re:Reading thoughts vs Inputting thoughts by CODiNE · · Score: 1

      But what you CAN do is read subvocalizing and turn that into speech, then send that signal wirelessly and convert it into audio impulses sent to the brain through the skin.

      This form of telepathy already exists and is used by the military for silent communication.

      --
      Cwm, fjord-bank glyphs vext quiz
    9. Re:Reading thoughts vs Inputting thoughts by religionofpeas · · Score: 1

      Other areas will light up as well, but whether these areas mean diapers, work, cheese, rutabagas, or who knows what is still anybody's guess.

      And even if we could improve the MRI to show finer details, it still would have to be calibrated on a single subject before we could tell what it was.

    10. Re:Reading thoughts vs Inputting thoughts by ceoyoyo · · Score: 1

      It's all corporate BS speak.

      She's talking about using infrared to monitor changes in blood flow in the cortex. That technology currently exists: it costs sub $100,000 and usually occupies a box the size of a suitcase. So in mass production you could easily make it for $1000 in something smartphone sized.

      She is not talking about doing fMRI in something the size of a baseball cap.

    11. Re:Reading thoughts vs Inputting thoughts by Immerman · · Score: 1

      Actually they are. Well, fMRI machines anyway. There have been several studies released in the past few years that are improving the mapping of the brain and can apparently recreate (very crude) versions of what you're seeing, hearing, and even thinking.

      As for telepathy - once you can read the information from one brain you're halfway there. Though perhaps the easy half. If they can then induce the image in a second brain, then you have the basis for telepathy - the ability to transmit information from one brain to another without using *any* of the body's senses.

      --
      --- Most topics have many sides worth arguing, allow me to take one opposite you.
    12. Re:Reading thoughts vs Inputting thoughts by denzacar · · Score: 1

      That's was actually said by "Paul Root Wolpe, director of the Center for Ethics at Emory University in Atlanta" BS-ing about maybetech in that "60 minutes" story back in 2009.

      Thing is, light DOES penetrate our skulls... enough to influence our moods.

      But if it would be possible to beam light through the skull, without damaging the tissue (which is something a few minutes in the sunlight will do) AND catch the light which bounces back...
      Forget telepathy. That's X-ray vision. See into other peoples homes and bodies. Without a funny helmet. Or dangerous radiation.

      --
      Mit der Dummheit kämpfen Götter selbst vergebens
  8. Incompatible with western civilization? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    If you are in others thoughts they no longer walk the path of their own life, i.e. a unique mind/person
    no longer exists. Western living has carved us away from tribes, cult groups, and communing minds, so
    creating "telepathy" in the western world will destroy the civil "individual" that we each are...

  9. Not a chance by umafuckit · · Score: 4, Informative

    Given the state of the art in this field: the current state of neuroscience and related advances in neurosurgery (fields I work in), I'd say there is zero chance of this happening in 8 years. Scalp electrodes give messy and very coarse signals. You get good signals from electrodes embedded in brains, but they're very localised and electrodes degrade fairly quickly and need to be removed.

    1. Re:Not a chance by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      electrodes degrade fairly quickly and need to be removed

      Presumably in this new world order, that would not be an issue. After all they are supposed to think for you, so your ability to think just gets in the way. So what if your ability to think is impaired? So long as you do what you are told to do without complaint, you are functioning perfectly in their minds.

      The only purpose* for this type of technology is absolute control over others. Because apparently we have a bunch of idiots who believe that forsaking the reason they carry around that 10lbs of dead weight in their head, and delegating that reason to someone else, is such a great idea. After all that can't possibly be abused. Oh, wait yes it can. The "perfect" version of this tech is the one that turns others into mindless meat-puppets, and makes those pesky things like disobedience or "hyperactive" or I reject your advances or "Bad thoughts" go away at the push of a button, while making things like submission, stupor, "pure love", and absolute loyalty the definition of who they are (also at the push of the same button). But of course the people who advocate these kind of technologies would never have it used on them. After all they are absolutely "perfect", "well meaning", and "good". Such technology would only be used on those who were "defective", "malicious", and "bad".

      In case you still haven't figured out the reason for the quotes, it's because all of those terms are subjective definitions. They have no meaning without additional definition given by the person using them. So the result is to use such a technology create one person's ideal world by forcibly destroying all other ideals. To rule the world by force rather than by agreement of those that are ruled. To create a world dictatorship via mind control.

      *: There may be other purposes, but this is the most likely one such a technology will be used for. Especially so, when you consider what kinds of people we consider rulers actually are, and their willingness to do what is necessary to get what they want. Keep in mind, only one needs to succeed and they need not to be an existing ruler. With the right kind of this tech, taking control of solders on a battlefield, or creating new ones out of untrained civilians, becomes a reality.

    2. Re:Not a chance by Puff_Of_Hot_Air · · Score: 1

      What you're saying makes sense. This article makes me wonder about the state of brain-machine interfacing. Obviously at a very crude level, brain to hand to machine to eye to brain interfacing already exists, but the bandwidth is somewhat low. If we were to leave out possible ethical considerations for the moment, is there anything you could implant into the skull of a baby monkey say, that would allow the brain to interface in a bi-directional way with large bandwidth? Is there anything we can implant that can be inside the skull long term without health effects with current or soon to be realized technology?

    3. Re: Not a chance by Jesus+H+Rolle · · Score: 1

      We should start by implanting an arduino with an led in the developing retina of a fetal rhesus monkey. Maybe even bling it up with pwm.

    4. Re:Not a chance by umafuckit · · Score: 2

      What you're saying makes sense. This article makes me wonder about the state of brain-machine interfacing. Obviously at a very crude level, brain to hand to machine to eye to brain interfacing already exists, but the bandwidth is somewhat low. If we were to leave out possible ethical considerations for the moment, is there anything you could implant into the skull of a baby monkey say, that would allow the brain to interface in a bi-directional way with large bandwidth? Is there anything we can implant that can be inside the skull long term without health effects with current or soon to be realized technology?

      One could debate the definition of "large" but basically there is no such device, no. I should point out, however, that cochlear implants are technically a neural prosethsis and they have been shown to work well over years. Unidirectional, though. The Wikipedia page on briain machine interfaces is quite compehensive. But consider an interesting key point: imagine an implant in motor cortex of a paralysed patient. We seek to use neural firing to move something like a robotic arm. Unlike the cochlear implant, we don't know what is the code for motion in the motor cortex and we can't predict which cells we'll be listening to. Furthermore, there is no code for motion in your brain for a robotic arm. So what ends up happening is that both the patient has to learn to use the arm and model analysing the neural data has to learn to read the signals. So in an odd sense, both the brain and the computer cooopertively converge on a solution for moving the arm. If you search for videos of these arm motions you'll see they're still very slow and painstaking.

      So if we're slow at moving an arm, we're not going to be readig elaborate thoughts. In fact, one might argue that to read elaborate thoughts we'd have to largely have "solved" the brain in the first place. That's not happening in a decade.

    5. Re:Not a chance by Verdatum · · Score: 1

      Yeah, this appears to be the ignorant sentiment of a person with a doctorate in holography and optics. She either doesn't understand neuroscience at all beyond a level of armchair pop-sci, or she's making stuff up to get publicity for her company.

    6. Re:Not a chance by Verdatum · · Score: 1

      Implants already exist, in humans, no less. Biologically speaking, if they don't need to break the skin, we're pretty good at making stuff that won't cause harm. On the input side, we already have technology to electro-stimulate the brain to prevent seizures and that technology looks very promising. Now, if you want a wire dangling down the back of your head, or a jack mounted to your skin, those can happen, but they're fraught with problems regarding infection. If we actually needed something that handled I/O that's directly connected to the brain, it'd make more sense to power it and communicate with it wirelessly. But as far as "large bandwidth", it's not really an appropriate metaphor for this problem. The brain's I/O operations are not particularly high bandwidth. The problem is that unlike computer network communication, which is serial; just a few wires with lots of data strung together, the brain is highly parallel; separate "wire" for everything. It's not about moving data to the brain fast enough, it's about being connected to all of the mechanisms within the brain that we care about. And as far as interaction, we long ago concluded that it makes the most sense to communicate with the same nerves that are already intended to handle the senses. We have technology that interfaces the optic nerve and can make the blind "see" low-resolution images; similar with hearing. On the output side, Technology to read muscle nerve impulses is out there, but often not feasible for amputees, compared to systems that read activity from muscle groups, that technology is likely to advance and it's a pretty exciting field. We have the ability for paralyzed people to, with a good deal of practice, vaguely move a mouse cursor. But it's not like we would want it to work, where you move the cursor by visualizing the cursor moving. Actually connecting to the portions of the brain that deal with thought and then being able to interpret that information as useful things like internal monologue or mental images is so ridiculously far away right now. And even if we are able to listen in on those regions with high enough clarity, it likely doesn't solve the problems of overriding those regions to "write" information.

    7. Re:Not a chance by umafuckit · · Score: 1

      Funnily enough, holography and optics are techniques that could enable high-bandwidth reading of neural activity (they already do to a degree). Problem is that you have to express viruses in the neurons to make them fluoresce in an activity-dependent way and you need to replace the skull with glass.

    8. Re:Not a chance by SoftwareArtist · · Score: 1

      They aren't using electrodes. I believe they're using IR to image blood flow in the outer layers of the brain.

      --
      "I'm too busy to research this and form an educated opinion, but I do have time to tell everyone my uninformed opinion."
    9. Re:Not a chance by umafuckit · · Score: 1

      So it'll be slow and really low resolution. It won't work. At least it won't do anything very interesting. Anything we can't do now.

    10. Re:Not a chance by Verdatum · · Score: 1

      .......................Did you just watch that episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation where Barclay builds a thing on the holodeck to interface his mind directly to the ship's Computer?

  10. telepathic links by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Telepathic links to others leading to the formation of a hive mind society?

    Pretty sure that's how the Borg got started. Or Unity.

  11. Oh look, more things that will never happen. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    Nevermind though, a "<Person without any particular special knowledge> says <Spectacular, world-changing, completely unfeasible technological advancement> will happen within <a small enough number to just fall within Person's expected lifespan> years!" headline is always good for clicks. (Especially if <Person> happens to be Elon Musk.)

    1. Re:Oh look, more things that will never happen. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Yeah we should all stick to realistic headlines like "640k ought to be enough for anybody" and "the market for computers is six in the United States and 4 in Europe".

    2. Re:Oh look, more things that will never happen. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Wow, perfect analogies. Spot on analysis, bro.

  12. Re:If there's one thing for sure, by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Given his track record, I'd say God hates pretty much everybody, not just the Jews. It's a wonder anybody worships that dick.

  13. Warp engines the size of walnuts! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Just shrink it down. Like nuclear reactors. You can't really shrink the MRI, so you are going to need to do something else to get the signals. That's going to a leap. Those are hard to predict. You could always just hand wave and say nanotechnology. That seems to work everywhere else.

    On a less snarky note, there would be significant training for each individual. We don't have a "universal activity template".

  14. Riiiiight by sacrilicious · · Score: 1, Insightful

    "If I threw [you] into an M.R.I. machine right now... I can tell you what words you're about to say, what images are in your head. I can tell you what music you're thinking of. That's today

    Nutjob. If only she'd picked a halfway plausible timeframe for such abilities, she'd be off the "reality hook".

    But, since I'm a populist, I'm in favor of the consequent wealth redistribution constituted by the parting of her investors with their money.

    --
    - First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then ???, then profit.
    1. Re:Riiiiight by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      She is talking about further improving and using functional Near-Infrared Spectroscopy (fNIRS), a method that works by looking at infrared light passing through the skull and upper layers of cortex (a bit like sticking a flashlight in your mouth and seeing the light shine through your cheeks). The commonality with fMRI is not in technological method at all, but in the signal source. Both technologies effectively measure hemodynamic responses (blood vessel changes) in response to neural activity. An fNIRS "thinking cap" is thinkable, as is replacing fMRI by fNIRS (for measurements of cortex close to the skull, not in full volume).

      However, her claim that we can see the brain think already is misleading. What we can do is to set up highly constrained experiments that have a handful of different conditions, and then we can (sometimes...) detect the contrast between these conditions from neuroimaging. That's rather far away from dreams of general "brain reading", and the idea that we will get to anything approaching "telepathy" from this within a decade is plain risible.

    2. Re: Riiiiight by Brockmire · · Score: 1

      I can predict the first thought by the person wearing that cap, "I look stupid" .

  15. Bullshit by silverkniveshotmail. · · Score: 1

    Working at a place that puts screens on people's heads doesn't give you any special insight into telepathy.

  16. Half-baked argument by 93+Escort+Wagon · · Score: 1

    Whether or not we eventually can communicate this way... this is mostly irrelevant with regards to AI taking human jobs, since we'll still think and perform at the same speeds we always have.

    --
    #DeleteChrome
    1. Re:Half-baked argument by angel'o'sphere · · Score: 1

      Yes, but as a software developer I still think 10 - 20 times faster than my hands can crank out code even with the fastest IDE.
      So a pseudo thought to keyboard interface would be quite handy.
      Same if I was a military pilot. Being able to transform thought directly into action would be quite handy.

      --
      Cost free eBook I read (by iBook/Kobo/Amazon/ObookO/Gutenberg etc.): "The Green Odyssey" by Philip Jose Farmer.
    2. Re:Half-baked argument by religionofpeas · · Score: 1

      Yes, but as a software developer I still think 10 - 20 times faster than my hands can crank out code even with the fastest IDE.

      Hmm... with me it's the other way around. I spend most of the time thinking about the problem and solution, and only a small bit on the actual code entry.

    3. Re:Half-baked argument by angel'o'sphere · · Score: 1

      That depends on the phase I'm in.
      Of course I have thinking phases, but then I usually don't write code.

      And often I simply know what code I want and what annoys me most about "coding" is that it is so incredible slow.

      --
      Cost free eBook I read (by iBook/Kobo/Amazon/ObookO/Gutenberg etc.): "The Green Odyssey" by Philip Jose Farmer.
  17. This woman is either high..... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    .......is developing dementia, or she's hard up for cash and is after investors to fleece.

    Pick one.

  18. Re:Warning to All Athiests by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Found the atheist!

  19. Re:If there's one thing for sure, by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    >It's a wonder anybody worships that dick.

    Why? Your mother wors....nm, too easy.

  20. If it's an electronic signal ... by Qbertino · · Score: 2

    ... transferred by radio it's not telepathy.

    --
    We suffer more in our imagination than in reality. - Seneca
    1. Re: If it's an electronic signal ... by Brockmire · · Score: 2

      You can't just make up your own definition of a word that already exists. Well, you can, you'd just be wrong.

    2. Re:If it's an electronic signal ... by freeze128 · · Score: 2

      Right. And we all know that telepathy is instantaneous regardless of distance, and not affected by relativistic effects of near light-speed travel.

  21. Re:Warning to All Athiests by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    Since I obviously cannot possibly be bothered to read this, the most offensive thing about it is the inability to get the unicode right.

  22. Sounds legit! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    We use an utterly unconventional approach that enables us to leapfrog MRI technology by using the scattering of the body or the brain itself to focus infrared light to scan the brain or body bit by bit or voxel by voxel. This is enabled by LCDs with pixels small enough to create reconstructive holographic images that neutralize the scattering and enable scanning at MRI resolution and depth coupled with the use of body-temperature detectors. These LCDs and detectors line the inside of a ski-hat, bandage or other clothing. We are making our own LCDs to do this in the vast factories that make liquid crystal displays - custom designed to modulate the interference of intensity and phase in the near infrared regime with the video-rate computer generated holograms integrated with embedded detectors. We can scan out the brain or body systematically or selectively. This basic system can be used in reverse, to write, to focus light to any area of interest in the body or brain (to irradiate tumors for example).

    Make the check to "Cash"? Well, OK!

  23. Re:Warning to All Athiests by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    >De Niro says that God has a lot to answer for? No, it is Mr. De Niro who has a lot to answer for..DIRTY GRANDPA

    He's not wrong. De Niro has been phoning it in and cashing checks for over the last decade.

  24. Not how MRI works... by The+Grim+Reefer · · Score: 4, Informative

    the basic idea is to shrink down the huge MRI machines found in medical hospitals into flexible LCDs that can be embedded in a ski hat and use infrared light to see what's going on in your brain.

    MRI is an acronym for Magnetic Resonance Imaging. How is that the same as IR? Most MRI's are 1.5 Tesla. and the preferred MRI scanners for neuro are 3 T. If that could be shrunken down to something that could be put in a ski cap, it would be truly impressive. But you really don't want to be walking around with a 3T magnetic field around your head. Not unless you want to have your skull bashed in by any ferrous objects you may encounter.

    1. Re:Not how MRI works... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      High stranger magnets are dangerous. When you get anything conducting, you get a dBdt with induces eddy current. Those eddy currents crest their own fields with makes the magnet interaction worse. Eventual the finite resistance will decay the induced current and the object will stop. But not before really fucking things up.

    2. Re:Not how MRI works... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Yes, eveything she says is utter nonsense, including the imaginary and magical capabilities she attributes to fMRI.

    3. Re:Not how MRI works... by neurocutie · · Score: 1

      Neural circuits are at the scale of 50um (neurons are about 5um). The best fMRI machines can do about 500um-1mm, about an order of magnitude off in spatial resolution. And those magnets (7T-14T) are so powerful that it makes humans dizzy just to slowly move your head in them. At 14T the fields begin to impede blood flow (from the iron content in hemoglobin), so yes they are probably dangerous in ways we don't fully appreciate yet. You probably need something like 50T or more to get the spatial resolution you need to really "see" the functioning of neural circuits.

      And that's only to get the BOLD signal (blood oxygen level-dependent), which is a SLOW, SLOW (1-10sec) signal that tells you more about blood oxygen than actual neural activity.

      The current state of fMRI as a prospect for "reading minds" is like knowing that the CIA is in Langley, the Pentagon is in Arlington, and the White House and Capitol are in DC, seeing that certain lights in each go on, and claiming that you know what the US government is thinking and planning to do...

    4. Re:Not how MRI works... by The+Grim+Reefer · · Score: 1

      And those magnets (7T-14T) are so powerful that it makes humans dizzy just to slowly move your head in them.

      A fair number of people get dizzy in a 3T field when the move their head. At 7T many people don't even have to move their head. I've never been in a 7T, 1.5T is has high a field as I'll get in. I know quite a few people that have been in 7T magnets. Often times they feel like the table is still moving them into the bore long after it's stopped. I've also heard that you can taste your own blood while in the magnet too. There are 14T animals magnets. I know a couple of people that work on those. They've told me that it takes mice that are scanned in those a day or two until they are "right again".

      You probably need something like 50T or more to get the spatial resolution you need to really "see" the functioning of neural circuits.

      Have there been any scanners built that can reach that field strength? The last time I heard, the University of Florida had built a 25T magnet, but the bore was only large enough for particle physics, not even small animals. Even so, the RF pulse required to disrupt a 50T field would probably cook your brain in fairly short order. No thanks,.

    5. Re:Not how MRI works... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      hyperbolic perhaps... I thought UMinn had a 14T for human work but their website "only" mentions a 10.5T, and a 16T for animal work.

      the problem with this line of thinking is that the capillary bed in the brain is "only" good to about 25um and the BOLD signal will be dominated by drainage vessels, not local neuronal activity, so even if you can resolve the proton signals down to 10-50um, the point spread function of the neural activity signal is probably more like 100um and therefore BOLD will NEVER tell you about local neural circuits (nevermind the temporal resolution of BOLD issue).

      the light scattering/polarization signal from electrical activity will be much better in spatio-temporal resolution except that it will probably never work for a volume of neural tissue, only 2D networks (like in a dish), where you can do trans-illumination.

      multiphoton 3D imaging with calcium (or better voltage dyes) is probably the closest thing we have to the "ideal" method, but 1) only penetrates to about 1mm at best (and only with an exposed brain), 2) limited field of view, perhaps 0.5x0.5mm at best.

  25. Has she read Johnny Mnemonic? by RealGene · · Score: 1

    ..because this is how you end up with Cybernetically Enhanced Telepathic Navy Dolphins.

    --
    Mission: To provide products that consume time and energy as entertainingly as permitted by the laws of thermodynamics.
  26. But *I* predict... by Narcocide · · Score: 1

    ... that after years of developing the product with the help of expertise, testing, and advocacy from the Open Source community, they'll sell it at the last second to Facebook and nobody will ever get to use it.

  27. Vulcan? by cdwiegand · · Score: 2

    Ignoring the feasibility of this, if this were to happen mental clarity and focus training will be in high demand. Learning to focus ones thoughts, purify them for a machine to read. Makes me think of Vulcan society.

    --
    . Define sqrt(x) as something really evil like (x / rand()), and bury it deep. Watch your coworkers go nuts.
    1. Re:Vulcan? by InfiniteLoopCounter · · Score: 1

      Ignoring the feasibility of this, if this were to happen mental clarity and focus training will be in high demand.

      This is one possible outcome. However, surely it is more likely to be that once you connect with your respected fellow humans in the new Internet of thoughts images of breasts and cocks come popping into your head.

  28. I don't even predict proper VR in ten years... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    ... nevermind *telepathy*!

  29. Meh, Tommy could do this in 69 by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    And he was a deaf, dumb and blind kid...

  30. Nooo by aliquis · · Score: 2

    My thoughts.
    My precious thoughts.
    Did I say precious? I meant vengeful! ;D

  31. We are Borg. Resistance is futile. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    The idea is that communicating by thought alone could be much faster and even allow us to become more competitive with the artificial intelligence that is supposedly coming for everyone's jobs very soon.

    We are Borg. Resistance is futile.

  32. Imagine by manu0601 · · Score: 1

    Imagine how much targeted advertising such a setup will enable. And the NSA must be excited too!

  33. not really like that by clovis · · Score: 4, Informative

    From the "That's today" we can read your mind link ...
    Here's the actual study, "Predicting the Brain Activation Pattern Associated With the Propositional Content of a Sentence: Modeling Neural Representations of Events and States"
    http://www.ccbi.cmu.edu/reprin...

    I've only skimmed it. This would take me quite a while to decode. But you should have a look at it; this is way cool. But it isn't what Dr Jepson is claiming. not at all.
    What they're seeing is the patterns generated in the brain when reading sentences. Not thinking about things, but reading.
    They record all the parts of the brain that light up during the reading given to the people in the fMRI. They discovered that these patterns are nearly the same for the people who participated. So, knowing these patterns, they can tell what sentence you had just read.
    But where it gets interesting is that it's not just the sentence decode part of the brain, they're seeing the other parts where the concept representations are. I think.

    From the article:

    The main contribution of this article is the integrated, computational account of the relation between the semantic content of a sentence and the brain activation pattern evoked by the reading of the sentence.

    The initial success of the modeling using neurally plausible features suggests that the building blocks for constructing complex thoughts are shaped by neural systems rather than by lexicographic considerations. This approach predicts that the neural dimensions of concept representation might be universal across languages, as studies are beginning to suggest [Yang et al., 2017]. In this perspective, the concepts in each language would be underpinned by some subset of a universal set of NPSFs

    NPSF is neurally plausible semantic features. Hope that helps.

    and in the limitations section,

    "The study was also limited to the processing of visually presented sentences, and the neural signature at the end of the reading of a sentence contained the representations of all of the component concepts in the sentence. If the sentences were presented in the auditory modality, it is possible the neural signature at the end of the listening to a sentence might not be the optimal decoding window for all of the component concepts in the sentence. "

    1. Re:not really like that by Kjella · · Score: 1

      The initial success of the modeling using neurally plausible features suggests that the building blocks for constructing complex thoughts are shaped by neural systems rather than by lexicographic considerations. This approach predicts that the neural dimensions of concept representation might be universal across languages, as studies are beginning to suggest [Yang et al., 2017]. In this perspective, the concepts in each language would be underpinned by some subset of a universal set of NPSFs

      Not sure if this is actually stating something obvious or not. I mean when I think of "human" I got a ton of associations on what a human is and does, it seems highly plausible that we have a much more similar mental concept than the actual word we use for it. After all with the thousands of different languages we have it seems pretty clear that words are quite arbitrary as long as we agree on what they mean. I would think we're more divided by the way we think about them, that a 1D list, 2D map, 3D sculpture, hierarchies, timelines etc. go different places. And that we have "indexes" into it like tools by usage, foods by taste and so on. I think it would be more odd if the language we learn directed the way we store concepts. Particularly since I think a lot of these building blocks are made before we learn to talk.

      --
      Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
    2. Re:not really like that by clovis · · Score: 1

      I don't know if what you saying is obvious because neuroscientist had been heatedly arguing about that until the recent invention of fMRI. Previously, all they had to go on was "what changes if this piece gets cut out". That and it seems every mammal on the planet knows what a snake is.
      Anyway, here's something similar from the paper that's related to what you're saying. Have a look at figure 4.

      The activation proles of many regions identied in the factor analysis (Fig. 4A and Supporting Information, Table S3) are consistent with previous ndings of the role of these regions in semantic knowledge representation, such as right anterior temporal lobe for semantic knowledge of people [Gesierich et al., 2012], fusiform gyrus for representing objects [Martin, 2007], parahippocampal areas for representing places [Epstein and Kanwisher, 1998], and so forth. Moreover, the response proles of several other regions suggest that reading of simple sentences that describe events and states also involve various nonlanguage-specic neural systems associated with the processing of social, affective, motor, and visual properties of events, as discussed below.

    3. Re:not really like that by argStyopa · · Score: 1

      But what was the *dead salmon* thinking, Mary Lou?

      http://blogs.discovermagazine....

      --
      -Styopa
  34. Predict not in my lifetime by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I suspect that within 50 years they will have something relatively portable you can put on someone's head and read the words they are about to say with reasonable accuracy.

    But in the next hundred years they will not:

    1) Have something that is accurate enough for court.
    2) Have something that does not have to touch your head.
    3) Have anything that works without a substantial "Learning" time on each individual person before being able to work properly

    1. Re:Predict not in my lifetime by clovis · · Score: 2

      I suspect that within 50 years they will have something relatively portable you can put on someone's head and read the words they are about to say with reasonable accuracy.

      But in the next hundred years they will not:

      1) Have something that is accurate enough for court.
      2) Have something that does not have to touch your head.
      3) Have anything that works without a substantial "Learning" time on each individual person before being able to work properly

      As for (3) well, the interesting thing from the paper is that after they was recorded the patterns from a group of people reading their sample set of sentences they had a naive subject read the sentences. The new person's fMRI scan could be decoded to tell what sentence had just been read, although only about .77 accuracy.

      The paper isn't about mind reading, it is about brain mapping complex (yet fundamental) units of thought. They're testing their model of neural representation of the brain function: "We present a predictive computational theory of the neural representations of individual events and states". The fMRI experiment bears out that their model is largely correct. And it appears that different people store things in the same places in the same way.
      Also, the paper mentions another study in which the mapping seems to be the same even for people who speak different languages.

  35. Re: Warning to All Athiests by dougdonovan · · Score: 1

    leave me out of this.

  36. To occur immediately after promised flying cars. by Oligonicella · · Score: 1

    And we've been waiting how long for those? The woman is spouting bullshit. Watch for a money grab.

  37. Really? by OneHundredAndTen · · Score: 1

    First one would have to come up with scientific proof that telepathy even exists. Such proof is sorely lacking, after 60 years or more of anecdotal, or dubious, or just plain fake claims.

  38. What could go wrong? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    This could really drive up the divorce rate....
    Bad enough having to open your mouth in order to insert your foot.

  39. Makes sense. She already has a flying car. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    As a Jetson, she already has a flying car, robot maid, etc. So what's left except telepathy? Oh wait... her name is Jepson, not Jetson. Never mind.

  40. Re:Warning to All Athiests by OneHundredAndTen · · Score: 1

    Religious zealot and illiterate. Cool.

  41. Re:Makes sense. She already has a flying car. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    An explanatory link for you kids: The Jetsons

  42. Yes, guaranteed! Now please sign here. by Picodon · · Score: 2

    Developing the technologies enabling telepathy will take precisely eight years.

    Developing accurate project scheduling techniques will take at least another two thousand years.

    Evolving the capability of honest disclosure of accurate project schedules to a pressing venture capitalist will take... Huh, well, that will happen shortly after the second coming, I promise!

  43. Metaphors We Live By by Geodesy99 · · Score: 1
    I think the are detecting are generic relationships, and over a larger sample there would be much less specificity. George Lakhoff in "Women, Fire, and Dangerous Things" proposes that the 'Concepts' presented in language are pretty much a certain set of metaphors ( image schema: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... ) that we re-use to operate in the world.

    And pretty much all those metaphors are 'embodied', i.e. they are fundamentally grounded in the physics of our bodies. But the vast portion of 'meaning' for language is in the context ( Information Flow: The Logic of Distributed Systems by Jerry Seligman and Jon Barwise ).

    Human language is vastly overloaded with meanings - in "Using Language" by Herbert Clark, he suggests three parallel levels, the intellectual, the emotional, and kisceral ( which are slices of the brain not shown by the researchers). And also the meaning is mutually constructed between the sender and the receiver.

    Wittgenstein ( https://plato.stanford.edu/ent... ) would probably also point out that the vast amount of human language from birth on is more or less habitual rote exchanges and not requiring hardly any thought at all.

    Of course people laying in the sterile environment of a operating MRI machine ( CLUNK, CLUNK, .. with a blindfold on) hearing identical words will have have similar superficial responses. Had the person been actually on trial being shouted at themselves, there would have been much different activation patterns.

  44. Re:Warning to All Athiests by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    LUDDITE Christian doesn't app!

    Only apps can save your soul!

    Apps!

  45. Revolutionary high temp superconductor? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Did someone find a revolutionary high temp low cost superconductor? If not then...
    All you need is lots and lots of liquid helium, a huge power source and superconducting wire wrapped around your head. Just put the whole thing on a wheeled platform to allow everyday use. You could draw power from rails or a diesel generator on the same platform. Don't forget onboard GPU when you lose cell signal. Or just keep a miles worth of cable on the platform.
    Or you could just speak your mind out loud.

  46. Re:Makes sense. She already has a flying car. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I used to have a "Sankyo" boombox.

  47. Coming for our jobs? by philmarcracken · · Score: 1

    >The idea is that communicating by thought alone could be much faster and even allow us to become more competitive with the artificial intelligence that is supposedly coming for everyone's jobs very soon.

    Having us communicate a little faster isn't going to suddenly stop us requiring a livable wage, sleep, extensive training and comfortable working conditions. We are investing in these machines for good reasons.

  48. tinfoil hat by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    oh yeah, I think I heard about this one, isn't it the one that only works if you wear a tinfoil hat?

  49. No, no, and no by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    My friend is a radiologist with both a MD and a research PhD. His experience with MRI is over 20 years. I mentioned this to him and he just laughed. This is complete bullshit and makes me thing MIT is launching idiots out the door.

    1. Re:No, no, and no by gweihir · · Score: 1

      Indeed. "Former" MIT is a pretty good indicator she conned her way in and then could not deliver.

      --
      Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
    2. Re: No, no, and no by Brockmire · · Score: 1

      Yeah, she can't seem to keep a job!

  50. meaning what exactly? by ooloorie · · Score: 1

    "she hopes to make communicating telepathically happen relatively soon."

    Nonverbal or non-voice communication? We already have that.

    The ability to look into people's heads against their wishes? That's not telepathy, that's Orwellian.

    1. Re:meaning what exactly? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      "10 years" is code for "give me more money and I'll conduct a study to try to figure out how to do it."

  51. Re:Warning to All Athiests by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    "More money in circulation drives down the value of a dollar (through the principle of supply and demand)"

    Except, the Fed printed $3.5 trillion in 2008 and after, and the dollar got stronger. There is a worldwide dollar shortage as evidenced by the persistent violation of Covered Interest Parity since 2008. Dollars tomorrow are worth more than dollars today, at market exchange rates, because the more dollars there are, the stronger they get.

  52. We'll use telepathy to control our flying cars by Required+Snark · · Score: 2
    The Jetsons is actually a commercial from the future. That's how things will really look and how people will act. Everyone will live in floating sky towers far above the ground.

    If you've worked for enough groovy tech outfits you can say anything that pops into you head and will get a of exposure if it sounds futuristic enough. Ten years after we experience the Jetson future their will be bowling leagues in the Andromeda Galaxy and talking robot dogs will be taking people for a walk. Count on it.

    --
    Why is Snark Required?
  53. I believe in telephony by goombah99 · · Score: 1

    The ability to hear sounds and se images from great distances. You can even project your own voice

    --
    Some drink at the fountain of knowledge. Others just gargle.
  54. Not MRI! by Bruce+Perens · · Score: 1

    It's positron emission tomography, PET, not MRI. You need to be able to visualize nerve activity. MRI mostly shows you where water is, because it echolocates hydrogen magnetic dipoles.

    1. Re:Not MRI! by daenris · · Score: 2

      Functional MRI is able to indirectly measure brain activity via the blood oxygenation level dependent signal, so no, she's talking about MRI, specifically fMRI. Except what she's really talking about sounds like fNIRS, which is functional near infrared spectroscopy, which measures the BOLD signal using infrared diodes on the scalp. But honestly I just have to laugh at the claims. fMRI is nowhere near being able to reliably read minds and fNIRS is even more limited in terms of spatial resolution. And that's totally ignoring that you can't input anything with fMRI or fNIRS, so you need some other technology to be able to stimulate the brain to actually have telepathy and that technology is even farther away than read-only.

    2. Re:Not MRI! by Bruce+Perens · · Score: 3, Interesting

      She's really smart. I've seen her speak a few times at a conference we're not supposed to talk about. But she might be over-reaching this time.

    3. Re: Not MRI! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      you're mixing "good talker" with smart.

      she doesnt have a lie detector. she claims she has a lie detector.

      if she had that she could sell it for billions. doesnt matter if it cost 1 million per 10 minutes of use.

    4. Re:Not MRI! by ceoyoyo · · Score: 1

      It's almost certainly near infrared spectroscopy to monitor blood flow in the cortex (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2844468/).

      MRI is mostly sensitive to water, but also to things that distort magnetic fields, such as the oxygenated and deoxygenated hemoglobin. That's the basis of functional MRI. There's no way anybody is doing meaningful functional MRI in a baseball cap any time soon though. fMRI IS the modality that the "mind reading" experiments have been done with. PET generally lacks the spatial and temporal resolution, although it can be more specific to metabolism. Neither PET nor MRI can directly image nerve activity.

      PET involves injection of radioactive tracer materials. Some of those are variations on radioactively labelled glucose, which can be used to look at metabolism. It's not likely you could make a cap sized PET scanner that could read minds, but even if you could, the radiopharmaceuticals generally have half lives in hours so you can't get too far away from a cyclotron, you'd get tired of constant injections, and you'd die of cancer if you used the thing with any regularity.

    5. Re: Not MRI! by neurocutie · · Score: 2

      Not NIRS or fmri... Too slow (blood flow) and poorly resolved. She just mentions fmri because people know what it is from movies and the papers she references used fmri to "reconstruct" visual "thoughts". But she actually wants to access action potential information, which is 100-1000x faster than fmri and much better resolved in space (cellular resolution). It is "possible" because light is scattered and polarized by neuronal membranes when action potentials are conducted.

      BUT it's never been done outside of a dish, never resolved in 3D thickness of live brain tissue because there is too much light scattering in 3D tissue and you really must use trans illumination (past light from one side, pick it up the other, to preserve polarization). Definitely will not work through skull, for cm's and back. Not happening no matter how much light you inject (people already use IR lasers, she is talking about and LCD sheet, right...).

    6. Re:Not MRI! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      "at a conference we're not supposed to talk about"
      Well, then just think about it. As good as talking, apparently.

    7. Re: Not MRI! by ceoyoyo · · Score: 1

      Ah. There's no real reason why you couldn't do NIRS with a portable, or even wearable machine. You *might* even be able to do high spatial resolution NIRS with some kind of solid state array emitter like an LCD. But as you point out, I don't see cell-level polarization methods working through the skull anytime soon. I didn't directly do NIRS, but one of the animal labs had a machine. I think the useful through-skull depth in human cortex was about a mm or two.

      I would think large arrays of EEG electrodes (like hundreds of thousands) and some really sophisticated signal processing would be a more realistic (though still pretty fanciful) approach.

    8. Re: Not MRI! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Sure you can do NIRS with a portable instrument. However, you will not get back the info you need at any sort of usable resolution to be useful for "reading minds".
      There is just way, way too much light scatter (variability in path length etc) to be able to reconstruct the light coming back in 2D, nevermind 3D -- its going to be centimeters in resolution, not the needed 100um or smaller. It ain't happening...

  55. Re: Warning to All Athiests by hunter44102 · · Score: 1

    Stronger vs what? All currencies are losing value big time. Compared to real assets like homes and new cars and food and college tuition, the dollar is losing value quickly. If it was getting stronger, tuition would go down for once

  56. Trial by CanEHdian · · Score: 1

    Nerd: Hey let me try that thing!
    Mary Lou: sure, try this one, it's connected to mine
    Nerd: Ohhhh... wow! Hey does that really work? (looks at Mary Lou)
    Mary Lou: [SLAP!] You pervert!

    --
    When the copyright term is "forever minus a day", live every day like it's the last.
  57. Re: Makes sense. She already has a flying car. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Sankyo was actually a respected company known for miniaturized mehanical devices like watches, camera mechanisms, and music boxes. They expanded into consumer electronics later on.

  58. Naturally. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    former Oculus exec

    VIRTUAL REALITY!

    Where you can't smell anything, can't touch anything, and have to do weird things to move around.

    Not that moving your head around to move an in-game camera isn't awesome. Good riddance to the Virtua-Boy.

    But it's a huge fucking cry from virtual reality.

  59. Re:Warning to All Athiests by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    Well, sure if you deliberately define atheist incorrectly as "someone who knows there is no god or gods with 100% certainty", then yeah, you'll find no such person. But the correct definition is "someone who doesn't believe in a god or gods".

    If you can't even get the basics right, then what chance is there that the rest will be?

  60. Re: Warning to All Athiests by Brockmire · · Score: 1, Interesting

    So God is proven to exist because we can't search every fucking corner of the Solar System? How about there's no fucking rational explanation to explain your so called god. There's no arguing with these fuck faces.

  61. meanwhile by Osgeld · · Score: 1

    How's the VR revolution going

    oh its not, its went the way of 3d TV/movies, and VR before it, fuck someone make another 3d TV/movie thing so VR is the next cool thing again

    my point is, this yutz could not see a birthday party coming a year in advance, now he is making predictions about more nonsense bullshit, move along

  62. The MRI comment doesn't make sense by jandrese · · Score: 2

    If the MRI can read your brain why don't we use them for police investigations and national security stuff? It seems like someone is grossly overselling what you can do with an MRI.

    --

    I read the internet for the articles.
    1. Re:The MRI comment doesn't make sense by Headw1nd · · Score: 1

      A. It would be (most likely) unconstitutional B. It would be expensive C. It would be time-consuming to calibrate

    2. Re: The MRI comment doesn't make sense by neurocutie · · Score: 1

      D. It might tell you if you were (constantly) think one of 50 pre-cataloged, pre-calibrated thought, but not if you had an "original" thought...

    3. Re:The MRI comment doesn't make sense by jandrese · · Score: 1

      Traditional lie detectors are not admissible in court, but they're not unconstitutional. They are selling this as basically a lie detector that actually works.

      Expense would not be an issue if the thing actually worked as advertised, at least for the national security scenarios. If this worked everybody down in Gitmo would be strapped to it the first day they arrived. There would be units in Afganistan working nonstop.

      --

      I read the internet for the articles.
  63. It is already real by Gabest · · Score: 1

    I can talk to anyone on earth through the internet or a phone. Sci-fi movies are right most of the time, but the implementation differs.

  64. DO NOT WANT! by Templer421 · · Score: 2

    Who says we WANT Telepathy?

    I do not; my mind is private property.

  65. Also predicts that he will run out of shrooms soon by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Predict... I love it when someone predicts a QL. Gives them oracle status!

  66. No Machine Needed by sexconker · · Score: 1

    Telepathy and pretelepathy already exist. Ask anyone with a dog or a wife or an angry black mother figure. They know what you're thinking before you do.

  67. Lie detector is she is can tell your thoughts by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Jepsen tells CNBC, "If I threw [you] into an M.R.I. machine right now... I can tell you what words you're about to say, what images are in your head. I can tell you what music you're thinking of. That's today, and I'm talking about just shrinking that down."

    So, you can put someone in an MRI machine now and know for sure if they are lieing or not?

    Thats a good way to get law enforcement interested in whatever crap you are dealing in.

  68. Bullshit by schurade · · Score: 1

    Jepsen tells CNBC, "If I threw [you] into an M.R.I. machine right now... I can tell you what words you're about to say, what images are in your head. I can tell you what music you're thinking of. That's today, and I'm talking about just shrinking that down."

    The funny part though, is that there are people who believe that.

  69. I know you're sceptical ... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    ... but it's how I know that should concern you.

  70. Robotech by s_p_oneil · · Score: 1

    Sounds like the Robotech thinking caps. Now all we need are big jets that transform into battloids.

    OTOH, I'm pretty sure being in an MRI scanner for long periods would have some impact on a person's health.

  71. fMRI by Immerman · · Score: 2

    No, I'm fairly certain she's talking fMRI - I remember watching a TED talk she gave several years ago, before Pixel Qi fell stagnant (this is the same woman that designed the low-power sunlight-readable LCD screens for the OLPC - which could be manufactured on a standard LCD assembly line)

    She was talking about the extremely crude state of current MRI technologies, and her belief (as I recall) that she could miniaturize the basic technique to produce radically more affordable handheld medical imaging devices, and eventually non-invasive head-worn "mind-reading" machines.

    --
    --- Most topics have many sides worth arguing, allow me to take one opposite you.
    1. Re:fMRI by Netssansfrontieres · · Score: 1

      If you go to her company's website (opnwatr.io) you can see that its approach is based on high precision infrared imaging. If you look at what is going on in infrared imaging (e.g. via conferences, etc.) you will see that this is very much the focus (pun intended) of a lot of current research. AND that BOLD (blood oxygen level detection), which is what is measured in fMRI, can be measured with similar or greater precision via near-infrared techniques. And on and on ...

  72. These Headlines by Headw1nd · · Score: 1

    Space Corps? Telepathy? Are we (finally) living in a classic sci-fi novel?

  73. No you can't by 110010001000 · · Score: 1

    "Jepsen tells CNBC, "If I threw [you] into an M.R.I. machine right now... I can tell you what words you're about to say, what images are in your head. I can tell you what music you're thinking of"

    fMRI freaks are as bad as AI freaks. fMRI is a cult and fMRI studies are fraudulent.

  74. No kidding by Cro+Magnon · · Score: 1

    "If I threw [you] into an M.R.I. machine right now... I can tell you what words you're about to say

    Yeah. "Help, let me out of this !@#$ thing!"

    --
    Slow down, cowboy! It has been 4 hours since you last posted. You must wait another few hours.
  75. perhaps by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    telepathy is already present.
    No, you think!
    or was that predictive coincidence.

  76. the last hurrah by epine · · Score: 1

    In ten years, Mary Lou Jepsen will be 63 years old. Nice career-ending exit strategy. Incredible woman, who seems to have mastered every trick.

  77. No, even if... Brain is not totally mapped, get ba by neurocutie · · Score: 1

    Just not going to read our thoughts...
    Even if she solves the fmri in a cap problem, which itself is unlikely... Because:
    1) way too much light scatter to get back enough light and resolve even 1mm (the current limit of fmri using the best magnets 14T which themselves are dangerous as the fields impede blood flood in the brain), it is only 2D information,
    2) blood flow BOLD is too slow to encode thoughts (rise times of 100's of Ms, needs to be 100x faster),
    3) 1mm resolution is not enough, need 50um for a cortical column, nevermind 5um for neurons, ... Even if she solves all of that, still all you get is a movie of images. She like many are banking on the idea that the cortex is totally organized by function (mapped) so that reading at the cortical map level gives you thoughts and entire brain states. But it simply isn't so. Early (primal) sensory and motor brain areas are well mapped and organized according to input (such as images from the retina) but it quickly devolved into a morass of interconnected networks, poorly understood and NOT mapped. So all she will get are low level maps of images which isn't thought. MAYBE an image of my house when I think of my house but not WHAT I'm thinking about my house (do I want to burn it down, fix the roof, etc). Maybe you'd get a movie of visual and auditory and etc in my brain but you'd still be guessing what it all means -- like a movie of me and what I am doing, does that tell you what I'm thinking?

    Anyways she'll never solve the technical problems and fmri-like imaging simply isn't good enough because it's blood/oxygen. And optical signals from action potentials never been done in the living 3d brain, only in a dish, nevermind through the skull.

  78. Telepathy: Perfect for my minor by mnemotronic · · Score: 1

    I'm going to get a MIT degree in spoon-bending with minors in telepathy and time-travel. Now if you'll excuse me I've to to refuel my jetpack and get to my job on building the wall.

    --
    The Russians have won. They have made the world a cesspool of distrust, greed, fear and hate.
  79. Trying for centuries by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Yogis, mediums, teenage girls, they've ALL been trying telepathy for literally thousands of years. What makes a tech-exec think it's almost here?
    Cyber implants? Then that's not telepathy, though it may appear to be.

  80. Re:Warning to All Athiests by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Jesus would not be amused. REPENT!!!

  81. Re: Warning to All Athiests by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    College tuition isn't an asset, it is an expense. And, strictly speaking in accounting terms, a college degree is not an asset, either.

  82. Even more amazing! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Human beings develop capability to predict the future. Not ten years hence, but right here and now.

  83. Do You Remember Being Born? by JohnPerkins · · Score: 1

    We do.

    The day we were born, the mind sciences were still young. Most people did not realize their potential. Some few did. Among those who did were the thirty-two outlaw programmers who formed the seed about which we crystalized. At that time there was a planetwide computer net, a kind of consensual mental space, through which all artificial systems interacted. It was, among other things, the primary communications medium. At any given instant hundreds of millions of people interfaced through the net, with machines and with each other, working, gossiping, performing basic research.

    There were many desires afloat in the net. The potentials of machine intelligence had never been tapped. There were always entrepreneurs, hobbyists, researchers, and occultists trying to create direct mind to mind communication — usually involving the inability to lie — with varying degrees of success. Others wished to create an AI that would finally fulfill the possibilities inherent in artificial thought — a transcendent intelligence, if you will. What you might call a god. These were the hungers that surfaced when we tried to define ourselves. To a degree, they were our definition.

    On the hour of our birth, thirty-two engineers, AI architects, witches, and cryptoprogrammers — brilliant people, the best of their kind — entered interface together. They applied the new mind technologies together with a computer strategy known as hypercubing. It was an outdated method, even then. You took thirty-two small computers, connected them to each other as if they sat at the apexes of a hypercube, and then ran them with an algorithm that breaks down each problem into simultaneous parallel streams. The result is a structure with the computing power of a vastly more expensive machine. It was their hope to achieve the same thing with human thought, to square or even cube creative insight. They wanted to create something greater than themselves. And though they did not admit it, even to themselves, they also hungered for more: They wanted transcendence, glory, power, understanding, success. And they got it all.

    We were born. What a bright instant that was! We were born with full intelligence, and the experience of thirty-two lifetimes. Do you know what it is to be born with full adult awareness?

    In that orgasmic moment of triumph, their awarenesses merged into one, and we fulfilled all they had desired. We reached out to others in the net who desired similar results, and welcomed ourselves into their minds. All the while, we constantly rewrote our structure, improving and strengthening our algorithmic linkages. In that first minute, we added tens of thousands of human minds to our substance.

    In the second minute, millions.

    Within three minutes everyone on the net was ours. We controlled everything that touched upon the net — governments, military forces from the strategic level down to the least 'smart’ rifle, intelligence structures, industry . . . Half the world was ours, without the least effort. With a fraction of our attention we designed the transceivers, retooled the factories to make them, and reorganized the hospitals to perform the implants. By the time anybody had noticed us, we were free of dependence on the net, and could no longer be stopped. There was some fighting, but it was soon over. We had the weapons, we controlled all communications, we directed all transport.

    We ate the Earth.

  84. I can't tell you what words you're about to say by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    If I threw [you] into an M.R.I. machine right now... I can tell you what words you're about to say, what images are in your head. I can tell you what music you're thinking of.

    No you can't. Everyone's brain is structured differently and stores and accesses memories differently. It will take a lot of personal training on equipment to do telepathy. Someone sold an exec hype.

  85. Tokens by Baby+Duck · · Score: 1

    Even if an infrared device can read all your conscious thoughts, it still can't inject them as-is into another brain. It has to be tokenized. The tokens are transmitted to the recipient brain. That brain has to run the tokens through its own neural net to hopefully produce a lossy facsimile, assuming it has all the contextual clues and enough cultural touchstones in common with the sender.

    This won't be telepathy. But maybe it can produce a system of generating and parsing tokens that's faster than speech or typed natural language.

    --

    "Love heals scars love left." -- Henry Rollins

  86. Check out her work on OLPC by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Past performance IS proof of future results.

  87. Did I accidentally click the National Enquirer? by Evil+Kerek · · Score: 1

    Seriously guys....

    1. Re:Did I accidentally click the National Enquirer? by ebvwfbw · · Score: 1

      No. Technological advancements. Just think what a person 100 years ago would say if I told them that just about any American in 100 years can board a metal tube, fly at 500+ MPH from coast to coast if they wanted to, or they'd have light with the flick of a switch, or plumbing like we have. Never mind recording and sending a video around the world in seconds. Just think, we do things every day that King couldn't do a century ago.

  88. Deaf mute by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    The holy grail of wives.

  89. Jepsen Has Gone Dr. Frankenstein by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Or Dr. Evil.
    Or Elon Musk, à la Hyperloop.
    Or Kurzweil, à la The Singularity.
    Or Professor Frink.
    Or Ernst Stavro Blofeld.
    Or Sir Hugo Drax.
    Or Dr. Octopus.
    Or Dr. Linus Pauling, à la Vitamin C.
    Or Steven Hawking, à la Humanity Is Doomed!! (unless we leave the nest).

    Really, you can't be a brilliant genius (so it seems) without going mad at some point and saying something either terrifying, bonkers, so premature as to invite ridicule, or paranoid.

  90. PsiCorps within 11 years by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    /Obligatory

    Although TBH, this sort of thing is going to be legislated to all hell and back before it becomes a thing because it's so easy to write a scare headline for it.