Fantastic and Terrible News: Google search for the mind now exists.

a reply to: chr0naut

Sadly, it is inevitable.

I don’t think it’s inevitable. I doubt that it is even feasible.

Three pages of discussion and hardly anyone has expressed reasonable scepticism about the capabilities of this proposed device. Well, count me — as ever — among the unbelievers.

To work perfectly, this gadget would have to replicate the entire informational content of the brain of its client or host. Anything less is bound to throw the programme off, even if we accept the underlying assumption that we arrive at the questions we ask through some form of internal Bayesian processing.

I don’t believe that is possible.

And if the objective of the research is only to make it work fairly well, then that’s just Google Search in a different box.

I think projects of this kind merely display the pathological side of consumerism as an outlook: gadgets that replace religious myths of the afterlife and divine power. Like the myth of Transhumanism, another screen to hide from us the awful sight of our own mortality.

a reply to: Astyanax

It's interesting that humans have turned one of the most undeniable, straightforward things in the entire world --- death backwards due to fear.

For example, life itself (when the pain starts) is incredibly painful for the majority. Nobody can reasonably deny this. But humans make up all this twaddle about Life.

Now death (when the pain stops) has been turned on it's head by ignorance, mental disease and defect, to be something that it is not as well.

Now as to this specific post .. will transhumanism accomplish some of the life and death defying things? Possibly. But in doing so, the human race will be eradicated. It is this being attached to an organic thing, feeling fear and pleasure (and a little beauty) which makes 'humans' human. Erase even one of the primary components, and you'll have some different sort of automaton.

Humans seem innately death seeking.. in an attempt to be something different than they actually are..and transhumanism is just another form of that instinct.

Kev

originally posted by: Astyanax
a reply to: chr0naut

Sadly, it is inevitable.

I don’t think it’s inevitable. I doubt that it is even feasible.

Three pages of discussion and hardly anyone has expressed reasonable scepticism about the capabilities of this proposed device. Well, count me — as ever — among the unbelievers.

To work perfectly, this gadget would have to replicate the entire informational content of the brain of its client or host. Anything less is bound to throw the programme off, even if we accept the underlying assumption that we arrive at the questions we ask through some form of internal Bayesian processing.

I don’t believe that is possible.

And if the objective of the research is only to make it work fairly well, then that’s just Google Search in a different box.

I think projects of this kind merely display the pathological side of consumerism as an outlook: gadgets that replace religious myths of the afterlife and divine power. Like the myth of Transhumanism, another screen to hide from us the awful sight of our own mortality.

Take the idea of all these smartphone accessories like fitness bands. Feed their data streams, audio and video into an updated Google search/Siri engine that is 'always on'. Pipe the output into some sort of augmented reality wearable and you have the basic idea.

Haven't you ever seen someone say "Hey Siri" then ask a random question into their 'phone? People do that because most of the time they get a response that is useful to them.

All of the technological components required currently exist and are in use, by millions of people.

Of course early results will be third rate but we'd learn and it would learn until it produced acceptable results.

a reply to: chr0naut

If this was simply something to be assembled from already-existing components, it would not be big news at all.

No, it’s more than that — or rather, it would be more if it was anything at all.

a reply to: Astyanax


nothing is impossible


I'll just leave this here Mindreading software

and this too more info

I have bad memory problems, it's a symptom of my brain disease

Something like this could actually really help me. But, it would depend on whether or not it's open source, and which algorithm and encryption methods are used.

I would not use this if I was unable to examine all of its processes, as well as look at the encryption algorithm and have a crack at finding any insecurities.

Unfortunately, technology is moving away from being open to users and towards a system where its function is very easy to use, at the (unnecessary) expense of drastically limiting what you can actually do with it.

Despite computers etc becoming a part of our daily lives, so many people reliant on the tech have no idea how any of it actually works, and this is how companies get away with raping people's privacy. There's a reason so many technologically aware people don't want Win10 for example.

A number of the things we’re discussing here are relatively new to the mainstream of discussion topics. Although the technologies being discussed here have been under development/research for over 20 years, it’s only been in the last few that they’ve become popular on the discussion boards. That, of course, is because some of these applications are only now becoming commercially feasable.

The results of research into AI, robotics, neuroscience, genetics, information storage/processing, brainwave translation, extended life/ageing reversal, nanotechnology, and on, and on, and on... have finally reached the stage where certain practical implementations are beginning to surface. Many companies are already utilizing AI capabilities in their software for marketing, customer relationship management and helpdesk/tech support functions. Intelligent prosthetics under thought control are starting to hit the market, as well as a number of other wearable medical monitoring devices. DARPA has been approved funding to produce an implantable chip to detect, interpret and act upon mental conditions determined via neural signalling/electrical states. It’s advertised intent is to alleviate stressful situations brought on by mental disturbances such as chronic depression, schizophrenia, mania, paranoia, etc. Obviously, if the DARPA chip will detect and act upon these mental states, then it can be modified to act upon others, as well, and do much, much more.

So, it’s not like this stuff is unrealistic, and not to be taken seriously. It’s very real and will become much more sophisticated very quickly. It will advance more quickly than the cell phone has. The AI revolution is just now getting underway from a practical standpoint, though it’s been quietly under development for well over 30 years. It’s now beginning to hit it’s stride, though, and promises to be a game changer in the near future (10-20 years). Many of the basic AI components of an intelligent system are now coming together, and it will not be long before a practical, functioning model will be assembled. IBM’s Watson is no slouch, and Google’s Deep Learning technology is quite impressive, as well. You can expect advances to pickup pace quite rapidly from here on out.

Volchitsa, you said, “Despite computers etc becoming a part of our daily lives, so many people reliant on the tech have no idea how any of it actually works, and this is how companies get away with raping people's privacy.”

That’s a valid point, and important to recognize, Volchitsa. Technology is a double-edged sword. I can clearly envision a time in the not too distant future (maybe 100 years or sooner) when mankind will no longer have the ability to control the technological monster it has created, and to a great extent, with the exception of a handful of wireheads and quantum theorists, won’t even remotely understand it. The potential for sinister exploitation of bleeding-edge technologies will be impossible to resist for many greedy, self-serving opportunists. At any rate, one thing you can probably take to the bank is that technological growth will not be slowing down anytime soon, waiting for our wisdom to catch up with it and responsibly control it. IMO if mankind makes it for even another century or 2 without annihilating ourselves it will be out of sheer dumb luck. It just seems to me the writing is on the wall. I really hope I’m wrong. After Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Einstein said, "If I had known they were going to do this, I would have become a shoemaker."

Gotta go... Have fun!

Singularity here we come!!!