Electric brain boosting

http://www.ox.ac.uk/media/news_stories/2010/101104.html

by cr4zy • 14 years ago

37 27 14 years ago

ox.ac.uk

darien2• 14 years ago

Just think about how much easier it will be for high income parents to get their kids into Ivys by boosting their SAT math skills using this technology. Unethical?

thinkdevcode2• 14 years ago

Why would it be unethical?

It's not like it'll divide us any more than we already are ( at least here in the states).

This technology would be an awesome startup idea to try and get it down to a reasonable price range for almost all people to utilize.

mindcrime2• 14 years ago

In the previous HN thread on this topic[1], a HN member pointed out that he had built a device for doing this for around $30.00.

[1] http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3525744

burke• 14 years ago

No more unethical than private tutoring, in my opinion.

People understandably like to draw parallels between mental enhancement and physical enhancement in the context of sports. The difference is that sports are a purposefully-created level playing field, where any sort of enhancement creates an unfair advantage, eliminating the point of the game.

In the real world, there's no intentionally level playing field for entertainment's sake. It's up to everyone to get ahead as best they can. Nobody would complain if their mover were using steroids.

onemoreact• 14 years ago

The the difference between the top 0.001% and 0.002% is in most sports the difference between making millions and working at Wendy's. As long as everyone is dealing with the limits of biology there is a huge incentive to avoid injury and promote general heath. But, once you start artificially altering basic pathways you can trade huge long term downsides for a tiny performance gain. And due to the competitiveness nature you basically force everyone to do the same. In other words it's a zero sum rule so why not chose rules that keep people healthy over time.

But, outside of Med school there is simply less competitive pressure so I don't think we are going to see the same sort's of banning unless there is significant long term damage. On second thought people often take a fair amount of drugs to get though Med school as it is.

darien2• 14 years ago

My main concern is the use of technology as a crutch for self improvement. I can appreciate the use of thought enhancing technology coupled with a strong will and determination to accomplish a certain goal - for I think that is a human ideal. But the moment I reconsider is when technology becomes the symbol for self improvement instead of a means to an end. We see this with diabetics who take insulin but never change their eating habits, people who purchase gym memberships but never attend, people who buy books but don't read them, or people who ride a helicopter up to the summit of Mount Everest, etc. Sometimes technology demeans the human experience and the significance of accomplishment... and I think people who struggle regularly feel cheated by advantages that are afforded to people who have privileged access to things of all measure.

slig• 14 years ago

Someone should really do a kickstarter project. I'm sure it'd be funded.

gwern• 14 years ago

And a tad dangerous. Just to point out the obvious from the article, even with no malfunctions and perfect equipment, reversing the direction made the subjects significantly stupider on the task.

bri3d2• 14 years ago

Supposedly, the reversed direction both only inhibited the learning of the task while the reversed current was applied (and didn't make the subjects generically less apt) and "Previous work by the team showed that a similar induced impairment effect was short-lived."

aneth• 14 years ago

Any evolutionary biologist have theories on why our brains would be so underutilized? I wonder if there is a disadvantage to certain kinds of intelligence. Perhaps society works best when there is a variety of levels of intelligence, so there are larger numbers who are easier to lead and satisfied with less grandiose work. Maybe it has more to do with conserving energy or avoiding conflict?

snippyhollow• 14 years ago

Or, at the very beginning of when evolution reached a "high enough" intelligence to make us use tools (to make tools), it ceased to be of significance compared to the rate of civilization evolution we experienced. We domesticated fire 400,000 years ago, I don't think human level intelligence hasn't evolved much since. (Nutrition, education, knowledge sharing increased much though!) So, our current brain architecture is "one" reached solution (not an optimal) in the possible states of evolved intelligences. Also, our brains are not under-utilized. We don't really know how everything works, and for startes our brains are very robust!

Symmetry• 14 years ago

Well, our brains already use up 10 Watts, about 1/10 of our total resting energy budget, so I could certainly see that being a limiting factor.

itmag2• 14 years ago

So cranking up the caloric drain of the brain should burn more body fat, right?

I can already see the TV-Shop infomercials... :p

Panoramix• 14 years ago

Just curious, how do you measure something like that?

itmag2• 14 years ago

The only thing I want to know: how can I get myself one of these?

How hard is it to build one of these things? Is it safe to use them? Cost?

cr4zy• 14 years ago

As mindcrime pointed out, a previous discussion of this is here: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3525744

Highlights:

Video how to: http://www.jove.com/video/2744/electrode-positioning-and-mon...

Buy: http://soterixmedical.com/tdcs.php

Hack: http://brmlab.cz/project/brain_hacking/tdcs

Natsu2• 14 years ago

This is the first time I've ever seen a device advertized as having a "sham feature."

phren0logy• 14 years ago

Clearly, you need to shop for more research-oriented neuromodulation devices.

edit: Did not intent to come off as snarky. Really, you actually should buy more neuromodulation devices that are research-oriented. Because they are cool. Seriously though, this is uncharted water. Be very careful. As a physician, I can't recommend actually sticking this on your head (yet).

jxcole• 14 years ago

I recall a while back there were advertisements for a device that could stimulate your muscles directly, making them stronger without you even having to go to the gym. However, it was discovered not to long after their release that usage over a long term caused the nerves in the area to atrophy. People were completely losing the ability to contract their muscles normally; the muscles would only contract when under the influence of the device. I am not a physician, but I would be very cautious about using a device like this unless it were proven beyond a shadow of a doubt.

EDIT: Now that I think about it, I remember seeing advertisements for these devices in middle school and they suddenly stopped. I asked someone (probably another student) what happened, and they told me about the nervous atrophy thing. So there's a good chance it's made up, sorry for not checking my sources first.

joeyo• 14 years ago

That's very interesting. Do you have any references?

bri3d2• 14 years ago

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electrical_muscle_stimulation seems to indicate that this is both a relatively common practice and generally regarded as not very dangerous.

While Wikipedia is, of course, neither a primary source nor entirely reliable, I've also been unable to find any references to nervous atrophy in the literature or via a cursory Googling, so any links that could be provided would be awesome.

chegra84• 14 years ago

This might be of some interest:

Savant-like numerosity skills revealed in normal people by magnetic pulses

http://www.centreforthemind.com/publications/SavantNumerosit...

Electric brain boosting

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