Mind Reading Technology

Imagine being able to control a computer with only your thoughts. It sounds like something from a science fiction novel, but mind-reading technologies aren’t as rare as you might think. Recent developments in technology and understanding of the human brain have seen a number of companies and universities developing mind-reading technology with a variety of applications including: helping people with disabilities and creating a more stimulating experience for gamers to the altogether more sinister goal of “obtaining information from an individual's mind without his will and awareness.” Here are nine examples of mind-reading technology that are in development or being used right now.

MindReader 2.0

This is probably the most sinister of all the mind-reading technologies available and is now being used by the Department of Homeland Security. The Psychotechnology Research Institute developed MindReader 2.0 also called, Semantic Stimuli Response Measurements Technology. On their website they claim that this technology can be used to obtain “information from an individual's mind without his will and awareness” and can also be used to “modify behaviour”. Sounds like they drew a lot of their inspiration from A Clockwork Orange.

From the Wired.com article

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has gone to many strange places in its search for ways to identify terrorists before they attack, but perhaps none stranger than this lab on the outskirts of Russia's capital. The institute has for years served as the center of an obscure field of human behavior study -- dubbed psychoecology -- that traces it roots back to Soviet-era mind control research. What's gotten DHS' attention is the institute's work on a system called Semantic Stimuli Response Measurements Technology, or SSRM Tek, a software-based mind reader that supposedly tests a subject's involuntary response to subliminal messages.

Tufts University

From the article:
Tufts University researchers are developing techniques that could allow computers to respond to users’ thoughts of frustration — too much work — or boredom—too little work. Applying non-invasive and easily portable imaging technology in new ways, they hope to gain real-time insight into the brain’s more subtle emotional cues and help provide a more efficient way to get work done. "New evaluation techniques that monitor user experiences while working with computers are increasingly necessary,” said Robert Jacob, computer science professor and researcher. “One moment a user may be bored, and the next moment, the same user may be overwhelmed. Measuring mental workload, frustration and distraction is typically limited to qualitatively observing computer users or to administering surveys after completion of a task, potentially missing valuable insight into the users’ changing experiences.”


NeuroSky

NeuroSky is a commercial application for gamers. From the NeuroSky website:
Technology from NeuroSky and other startups could make video games more mentally stimulating and realistic. It could even enable players to control video game characters or avatars in virtual worlds with nothing but their thoughts. Adding biofeedback to “Tiger Woods PGA Tour,” for instance, could mean that only those players who muster Zen-like concentration could nail a putt. In the popular first-person shooter “Grand Theft Auto,” players who become nervous or frightened would have worse aim than those who remain relaxed and focused.

NeuroSky’s prototype measures a person’s baseline brain-wave activity, including signals that relate to concentration, relaxation and anxiety. The technology ranks performance in each category on a scale of 1 to 100, and the numbers change as a person thinks about relaxing images, focuses intently, or gets kicked, interrupted or otherwise distracted.

Watch the video demonstration of NeuroSky below:



http://www.counciloftruth.com/content/view/155/65/