Chinese researchers create mind-controlled quadcopter drone

Found this story and thought it was interesting or scary, whichever perspective you choose to view from. Chinese researchers have created a drone that is controlled via an EEG headset by using certain thought responses and phrases.

Researchers at Zhejiang University in Hangzhou, China, have posted a YouTube video demonstrating a mind-controlled quadcopter drone. By wearing an EEG (emotiv electroencephalography) headset, Zhejiang’s researchers claim they can pilot a quadcopter by thinking “left hard” to take off or land, “left” to rotate the quadcopter clockwise, “right” to fly forward and “push” to fly up

A user who clenches while wearing the headset will steer the quadcopter downward, while blinking will shoot photos from the on-drone camera. The EEG headset sends commands via Bluetooth to a laptop, which then sends them to the quadcopter by way of a Wi-Fi connection. The quadcopter also streams its view back to the laptop over Wi-Fi, to give its pilots a better view and more precise control

Original source link:
www.wired.com...

What do you all here at ATS think? The future of drone warfare?

The Future will be Mind controlled Quadrotorcopter drones with machine guns and little rockets/missiles.

reply to post by DaRAGE


Yes... of course. Tiny little copters with tiny missiles. Pure genius. I was referring to the possibility of this tech being used on actual attack drones.

Originally posted by Rubicant13
What do you all here at ATS think? The future of drone warfare?

Just moving it up and down is pretty useless.

This technology was basically available 20 years ago except the subject was controlling the mouse pointer altitude on a computer screen. It was trivial to change the output from a computer screen to a drone so there is basically no advance in 20 years shown by this.

To take it to the next stage of complete mind control might require something like cybernetic implants to interface with the brain. Whether the cybernetic implants would work and whether people would actually tolerate that and whether it's a human rights violation are future questions. However, given China's record on human rights, I don't think they'd be concerned about this aspect...they could probably find some "volunteers" to get the implants. Then it might work. If it involves opening the skull to attach the connectors though, it's risky, because the brain is carefully protected and the damage to the skull might not heal unless the "volunteer" is a child.

Intel Wants Brain Implants in Its Customers' Heads by 2020

If the idea of turning consumers into true cyborgs sounds creepy, don't tell Intel researchers. Intel's Pittsburgh lab aims to develop brain implants that can control all sorts of gadgets directly via brain waves by 2020.

The scientists anticipate that consumers will adapt quickly to the idea, and indeed crave the freedom of not requiring a keyboard, mouse, or remote control for surfing the Web or changing channels. They also predict that people will tire of multi-touch devices such as our precious iPhones, Android smart phones and even Microsoft's wacky Surface Table.

Turning brain waves into real-world tech action still requires some heavy decoding of brain activity. The Intel team has already made use of fMRI brain scans to match brain patterns with similar thoughts across many test subjects.

So, Intel is already working on the technology to take mind control of devices to the next level which is what it will take from what I've seen so far.

Brain implants seem too freaky to me. I'll probably never get one if I can help it.

This is a very scary thought, to be used for drone warfare.

It sounds to me like the commands are preset and the user has to know the commands before they utilize the device. Meaning they can't have a random thought and then it happens because it is not built into the program.

If we had come this far along with the technology that random thoughts could also provoke an action from the drone this would be truly scary. This is probably where they are headed in the future. Just think about all the random thoughts going through your head in a day, some of them are not so good I'm sure. Even if they always build the programs with limits, errors happen and or glitches happen. Or someone can find the ability to hack into the program and mess with it. Scary Stuff.

I also did some further reading on this and they are trying to use it as a technology to help disabled folks which is cool.

Originally posted by Arbitrageur
So, Intel is already working on the technology to take mind control of devices to the next level which is what it will take from what I've seen so far.

Brain implants seem too freaky to me. I'll probably never get one if I can help it.

OMG! That is the device that I want. I'd definitely be getting a brain implant. How easy would that make life?!!!

IT'd make workers heaps more productive too, and make people with no implants seem like a less attractive option in a job interview ;-p

I see a Deus Ex: Human Revolution situation occuring!