Mad scientists from the University of California, Berkeley, recently announced that we are one step closer to dream reading machines and thought controlled computers.
Essentially, the team used an fMRI machine, which tracks blood flow through the brain. They had test subjects look at numerous pictures to build a model, and then were able to compare blood flow patterns with known images to make positive matches.
This has enormous possibilities for the disabled, as well as science fiction and the military/DARPA:
Such applications are decades away, but “you could use algorithms like this to decode other things than vision,” said Gallant. “In theory, you could analyze internal speech. You could have someone talk to themselves, and have it come out in a machine.”
This is really cool, but if I wanted deeper insight into the incoherent internal rumblings of a crazy person, I would just listen to Tim McCarver.
