2. Contents
Abstract
Introduction
What is mind reading?
Why mind reading?
How does it work?
Advantages and uses
Disadvantages and problems
Conclusion
References
3. Abstract researchers to pick up electrical
currents from various parts of
the brain. If we could learn to
A computer can, in a very real
identify brain waves generated
sense, read human minds.
by specific thoughts or
Although the dot's gyrations
commands, we might be able
are directed by a computer, the
to teach the same skill to a
machine was only carrying out
computer. The machine might
the orders of the test subject.
even be able to react to those
The computer mind-reading commands by, say, moving a
technique is far more than a dot across a TV screen
laboratory stunt. Though
. So far the S.R.I, computer has
computers can solve
been taught to recognize seven
extraordinarily complex
different commands—up,
problems with incredible speed,
down, left, right, slow, fast and
the information they digest is
stop.
fed to them by such slow,
cumbersome tools as
typewriter keyboards or
punched tapes.
The key to his scheme: the
electroencephalograph, a
device used by medical
4. Existing human-computer
interfaces are mind-blind —
oblivious to the user’s mental
states and intentions. A
computer may wait indefinitely
for input from a user who is no
longer there, or decide to do
irrelevant tasks while a user is
frantically working towards an
Introduction
imminent deadline. As a result,
People express their mental existing computer technologies
states, including emotions, often frustrate the user, have
thoughts, and desires, all the little persuasive power and
time through facial cannot initiate interactions
expressions, vocal nuances and with the user. Even if they do
gestures. This is true even when take the initiative, like the now
they are interacting with retired Microsoft Paperclip,
machines. Our mental states they are often misguided and
shape the decisions that we irrelevant, and simply frustrate
make, govern how we the user. With the increasing
communicate with others, and complexity of computer
affect our performance. The technologies and the ubiquity
ability to attribute mental of mobile and wearable
states to others from their devices, there is a need for
behavior and to use that machines that are aware of the
knowledge to guide our own user’s mental state and that
actions and predict those of adaptively respond to these
others is known as theory of mental states.
mind or mind-reading.
5. user and to enable applications
to initiate interactions with and
on behalf of the user, without
waiting for explicit input from
that user. There are difficult
challenges:
What is mind reading?
A computational model of
mind-reading
Drawing inspiration from Processing stages in
psychology, computer vision reading system
and machine learning, the
team in the Computer Using a digital video camera,
Laboratory at the University of the mind-reading computer
Cambridge has developed system analyzes a person’s
mind-reading machines — facial expressions in real time
computers that implement a and infers that person’s
computational model of mind- underlying mental state, such
reading to infer mental states as whether he or she is
of people from their facial agreeing or disagreeing,
signals. The goal is to enhance interested or bored, thinking or
human-computer interaction confused.
through empathic responses, to
Prior knowledge of how
improve the productivity of the
particular mental states are
6. expressed in the face is is modeled using Dynamic
combined with analysis of Bayesian Networks.
facial expressions and head
gestures occurring in real time.
The model represents these at
different granularities, starting
with face and head movements
and building those in time and
in space to form a clearer
model of what mental state is
being represented. Software
from Nevenvision identifies 24
feature points on the face and
tracks them in real time.
Movement, shape and colour
are then analyzed to identify
gestures like a smile or
eyebrows being raised.
Combinations of these
occurring over time indicate
mental states. For example, a
combination of a head nod,
with a smile and eyebrows
raised might mean interest.
The relationship between
observable head and facial
displays and the corresponding
hidden mental states over time Why mind reading?
7. minds and react to our moods.
How would that change our use
of technology and our lives?
We are working with a major
car manufacturer to implement
this system in cars to detect
driver mental states such as
drowsiness, distraction and
anger.
Current projects in Cambridge
are considering further inputs
such as body posture and
gestures to improve the
inference. We can then use the
same models to control the
animation of cartoon avatars.
We are also looking at the use
of mind-reading to support on-
Monitoring a car driver line shopping and learning
systems.
The mind-reading computer
The mind-reading computer
system presents information
system may also be used to
about your mental state as
monitor and suggest
easily as a keyboard and mouse
improvements in human-
present text and commands.
human interaction. The
Imagine a future where we are
Affective Computing Group at
surrounded with mobile
the MIT Media Laboratory is
phones, cars and online
developing an emotional-social
services that can read our
8. intelligence prosthesis that How does it work?
explores new technologies to
Futuristic headband
augment and improve people’s
social interactions and
communication skills.
9. The mind reading actually
involves measuring the volume
and oxygen level of the blood
around the subject's brain,
using technology called
functional near-infrared
spectroscopy (fNIRS).
The user wears a sort of
futuristic headband that sends
light in that spectrum into the
tissues of the head where it is
absorbed by active, blood-filled
tissues. The headband then
measures how much light was
not absorbed, letting the
computer gauge the metabolic
demands that the brain is
making.
The results are often compared
to an MRI, but can be gathered
with lightweight, non-invasive
equipment.
10. like frustration."
"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
Wearing the fNIRS sensor,
insight into the users' changing
experimental subjects were
experiences.
asked to count the number of
squares on a rotating onscreen
cube and to perform other
tasks. The subjects were then A computer program which can
asked to rate the difficulty of read silently spoken words by
the tasks, and their ratings
analyzing nerve signals in our
agreed with the work intensity
detected by the fNIRS system mouths and throats, has been
up to 83 percent of the time. developed by NASA.
"We don't know how specific
we can be about identifying
users' different emotional Preliminary results show that
states," cautioned Sergio using button-sized sensors,
Fantini, a biomedical which attach under the chin
engineering professor at Tufts. and on the side of the Adam's
"However, the particular area
apple, it is possible to pick up
of the brain where the blood-
flow change occurs should and recognize nerve signals
provide indications of the and patterns from the tongue
brain's metabolic changes and and vocal cords that
by extension workload, which correspond to specific words.
could be a proxy for emotions
11. "Biological signals arise when to themselves and the software
reading or speaking to oneself correctly picked up the signals
with or without actual lip or 92 per cent of the time.
facial movement," says Chuck
Then researchers put the letters
Jorgensen, a neuroengineer at
of the alphabet into a matrix
NASA's Ames Research Center
with each column and row
in Moffett Field, California, in
labeled with a single-digit
charge of the research. Just the
number. In that way, each
slightest movement in the voice
letter was represented by a
box and tongue is all it needs to
unique pair of number co-
work, he says.
ordinates. These were used to
silently spell "NASA" into a web
search engine using the
program.
Web search
"This proved we could browse
the web without touching a
keyboard”.
For the first test of the sensors,
scientists trained the software
program to recognize six words
- including "go", "left" and
"right" - and 10 numbers.
Participants hooked up to the
sensors silently said the words
12. Advantages and uses
Mind Controlled
Wheelchair
This prototype mind-controlled
wheelchair developed from the
University of Electro-
Communications in Japan lets
you feel like half Professor X
and half Stephen Hawking—
except with the theoretical
physics skills of the former and
the telekinetic skills of the
latter.
A little different from the Brain-
Computer Typing machine, this
thing works by mapping brain
waves when you think about
moving left, right, forward or
back, and then assigns that to
a wheelchair command of
13. actually moving left, right, -- as well as for predicting
forward or back. future dangerousness more
generally. We are closer than
The result of this is that you can
ever to the crime-prediction
move the wheelchair solely
technology of Minority Report.
with the power of your mind.
This device doesn't give you The day when computers will
MIND BULLETS (apologies to be able to recognize the
Tenacious D) but it does allow smallest units in the English
people who can't use other language—the 40-odd basic
wheelchairs get around easier. sounds (or phonemes) out of
which all words or verbalized
The sensors have already been
thoughts can be constructed.
used to do simple web searches
Such skills could be put to many
and may one day help space-
practical uses. The pilot of a
walking astronauts and people
high-speed plane or spacecraft,
who cannot talk. The system
for instance, could simply order
could send commands to rovers
by thought alone some vital
on other planets, help injured
flight information for an all-
astronauts control machines, or
purpose cockpit display. There
aid disabled people.
would be no need to search for
In everyday life, they could the right dials or switches on a
even be used to communicate crowded instrument panel.
on the sly - people could use
them on crowded buses
without being overheard
The finding raises issues about
the application of such tools for
screening suspected terrorists
14. would later are shown. Using
computer algorithms and
functional magnetic resonance
imaging, or fMRI, the scientists
were able to determine with 70
percent accuracy what the
participants' intentions were,
even before they were shown
the numbers. The popular press
tends to over-dramatize
scientific advances in mind
reading. FMRI results have to
account for heart rate,
respiration, motion and a
number of other factors that
might all cause variance in the
signal. Also, individual brains
Disadvantages and differ, so scientists need to
problems study a subject's patterns
Tapping Brains for before they can train a
Future Crimes computer to identify those
patterns or make predictions.
Researchers from the Max
Planck Institute for Human While the details of this
Cognitive and Brain Sciences, particular study are not yet
along with scientists from published, the subjects' limited
London and Tokyo, asked options of either adding or
subjects to secretly decide in subtracting the numbers means
advance whether to add or the computer already had a
subtract two numbers they 50/50 chance of guessing
15. correctly even without fMRI may make you a criminal, a
readings. The researchers mixture of biological factors,
indisputably made exacerbated by environmental
physiological findings that are conditions, may well do so.
significant for future
Looking at scientific advances
experiments, but we're still a
like these, legal scholars are
long way from mind reading.
beginning to question the
Still, the more we learn about foundational principles of our
how the brain operates, the criminal justice system.
more predictable human beings
For example, University of
seem to become. In the Dec.
Florida law professor
19, 2006, issue of The
Christopher Slobogin, who is
Economist, an article
visiting at Stanford this year,
questioned the scientific
has set forth a compelling case
validity of the notion of free
for putting prevention before
will: Individuals with particular
retribution in criminal justice.
congenital genetic
characteristics are predisposed, It's a tempting thought. If there
if not predestined, to violence. is no such thing as free will,
then a system that punishes
Studies have shown that genes
transgressive behavior as a
and organic factors like frontal
matter of moral condemnation
lobe impairments, low
does not make a lot of sense.
serotonin levels and dopamine
It's compelling to contemplate
receptors are highly correlated
a system that manages and
with criminal behavior. Studies
reduces the risk of criminal
of twins show that heredity is a
behavior in the first place.
major factor in criminal
conduct. While no one gene
16. Max Planck Institute, should take the lessons of
neuroscience and bioscience science fiction to heart when
are not at a point where we deciding how to use new
can reliably predict human predictive techniques.
behavior. To me, that's the
The preliminary tests may have
most powerful objection to a
been successful because of the
preventative justice system -- if
short lengths of the words and
we aren't particularly good at
suggests the test be repeated
predicting future behavior, we
on many different people to
risk criminalizing the innocent.
test the sensors work on
We aren't particularly good at everyone.
rehabilitation, either, so even if
The initial success "doesn't
we were sufficiently accurate in
mean it will scale up", he told
identifying future offenders, we
New Scientist. "Small-
wouldn't really know what to
vocabulary, isolated word
do with them.
recognition is a quite different
Nor is society ready to deal problem than conversational
with the ethical and practical speech, not just in scale but in
problems posed by a system kind."
that classifies and categorizes
people based on oxygen flow,
genetics and environmental
factors that are correlated as
much with poverty as with
future criminality.
In time, neuroscience may
produce reliable behavior
predictions. But until then, we
17. Conclusion
Tufts University researchers
have begun a three-year
research project which, if
successful, will allow computers
to respond to the brain activity
18. of the computer's user. Users
wear futuristic-looking
headbands to shine light on
their foreheads, and then
perform a series of increasingly
difficult tasks while the device
reads what parts of the brain
are absorbing the light. That
info is then transferred to the
computer, and from there the
computer can adjust it's
interface and functions to each
individual.
