io9: brain implant

Your Consciousness Is Ten Seconds Behind the Present

Michael Reilly — Mon, 14 Apr 2008 13:40:00 PDT

The time it takes for sensory input to travel along nerves and get processed by the brains means we're always living in the past. Okay, no problem — we can live with a few lost milliseconds. But ten seconds? A new study shows that once our brains make a decision (like "push this button") it takes that long for our conscious minds to become aware of it.

Neuroscientists at the Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences in Germany conducted the study, and appear concerned that people will feel robbed of their free will. Interesting, but the real question is: Once brain-computer interfaces are developed for the masses, are we going to need the plodding "consciousness" part of our brains at all?

Source: Nature Neuroscience, via Science Blog

Ultrathin, Rubbery Circuits Bring Us One Step Closer to Google Brain Implants

Annalee Newitz — Thu, 27 Mar 2008 17:00:00 PDT

A new kind of computer circuit printed on ultrathin rubber would make the perfect "brain wrapper," says its inventor. Usually computer circuits are etched on rigid, plastic boards, but University of Illinois researcher John Rogers has successfully placed circuits on a rubbery material that can bend and stretch. Many groups have been working on developing this technology, but Rogers is the first to demonstrate that his bendy circuits actually work. Rogers says the circuits could wrap around part or all of the brain, to monitor its electrical activity. Or — in future applications — to interface with your brain, perhaps using antennae to establish a wireless neural link to the internet so you can be Googling with your mind.

Says Rogers:

We'd like to have an electric circuit that could wrap around part of the brain and detect signal patterns to predict the onset of seizure before it happens . . . You can't take a sheet of plastic and wrap a brain, you really need stretchability.

For now, though, Rogers is focusing on just making the circuits work. He makes them by stretching a thin, rubbery material to 15 percent of its normal size, binds the circuits to it, and then snaps it back to its normal size. The circuits continue to work, and can also work if re-stretched or bent. Here's a video of how that looks under a microscope.

Another possible application for the technology is skintight, wearable computers. Sort of like PVC for the BSD set. Image via USA Today.

Stretchy Circuits [New Scientist]

The Pros and Cons of a Google Brain Implant

Annalee Newitz — Fri, 22 Feb 2008 17:30:58 PST

In John Varley's upcoming scifi novel Rolling Thunder, everyone has a brain implant that lets them google information constantly. And many futurists are saying this technology will become a reality long before we colonize Mars. The question isn't whether we'll have google brain implants (or the futuristic search engine equivalent), but how we'll handle them. What exactly would be the plusses and minuses of being able to google information instantaneously in your head, without anybody knowing you're doing it?

A google brain implant could work in lots of ways. With technology we have right now, people could wear a brain-computer interface helmet like the one sold by Emotiv, and use that to control the cursor on a wearable computer with a tiny monitor that's attached to your classes. So the thing wouldn't be implanted in your brain, but it would be responding to electrical signals from your brain. More sophisticated wearables like those described in Vernor Vinge's novel Rainbows End might allow you to google via subtle movements of your body, and then display results in special contact lenses.

A more far-future implant might actually have a direct neural linkup to your brain, allowing you to see google results on your retina. No matter how the instant, subtle, brain-controlled access to google works, the same benefits and problems are likely to exist.

PRO:

Ability to "remember" many details about a person or issue in the middle of a conversation, so that you can marshal facts quickly and check the accuracy of what other people are saying.

CON:

The person you're talking to could much more easily pretend to be somebody they are not by googling information and feigning expertise.

PRO:

You will never get lost because you've got maps at your synapse tips, and you'll always know what's playing at your local theaters. You'll also get the latest news headlines and stock quotes at the twitch of an eyelid.

CON:

You'll spend so much time in your head reading google news and watching YouTube that you'll zone out during conversations and forget to pay attention to what your best friends are telling you (unless they're telling you in the form of a google news alert).

PRO:

Instant access to infinite data storage allows you to quickly store your every interesting thought, and search through them instantly. More innovative ideas result.

CON:

Over reliance on "offloaded" memory means people make less of an effort to remember important things and therefore brain flexibility actually erodes. Ideas become boring repetitions of what you've thought up before, or what other people have thought up and posted on the Web.

PRO:

You can cheat on tests.

CON:

You can cheat on tests.

PRO: Need something desperately and can't get to the computer to order it? Just buy it through Froogle.

CON: Google ads are constantly running in your head, perhaps designed to respond to thought patterns.

PRO: Every time Google ads a cool new service, like Gmail or Picasa, you've got instant access to it in your brain.

CON: Google is famous for its "silent update" system, which occasionally results in pretty buggy services. Imagine what it will be like when Google silently updates your brain.

What Is an io9?

Annalee Newitz — Wed, 02 Jan 2008 06:00:15 PST

io9s were marketed as cheap time machines in the 2070s. They were actually just low-grade input/output devices for the brain that tuned tachyon waves and gave users vivid images of possible futures. The things were so addictive, and drove so many people insane, that io9s were eventually outlawed. Today the word is just slang. io9ers are the early implanters who obsessively upgrade themselves with beta tech. People who tweak out on buggy brainware are sometimes said to have "gone io9." Science fiction writer Ken MacLeod has another term for io9ers. He calls them rapture fuckers.