Wednesday February 10, 2010 2:44 AM AEST

Intel wants to stick chips in your brain

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Intel wants to stick chips in your brain

By 2020, we'll all be characters in a William Gibson novel. Awesome.

By 2020 we will all have chips inside our brains and not need a mouse or keyboard to control our computers, according to Intel.

Intel has been telling hacks that it is finding ways ways to read and harness human brain waves so they can be used to operate computers, television sets and cell phones.

Lucky volunteers will be queuing up to have the test chips wired into their brains so that they can control their computers with a thought.

The bloke behind the idea is Dean Pomerleau, who works for Intel on matters of cognitive neuroscience, machine learning, computer vision, robotics, man-machine interfaces, brain processing of semantic information, and various brain-scanning technologies, such as fMRI, MEG, EEG and ECoG. He and his associates at Chipzilla are solving the mechanisms of brain waves.

He thinks that people may be willing to be more committed to brain implants. "Imagine being able to surf the web with the power of your thoughts."

But then there is the worry that the government could access the chip and read your mind.

And there is also the problem that you will not be able to get your computer to work until you have had your second cup of coffee.

There's more here - bring the singularity on.

 

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16 Comments
Thoughts on this article? Add a comment below.
Mademan
Nov 23, 2009 10:33 AM
I loveit when scientists are full of optimism. "What could possibly go wrong?"

Well you're dealing with the human brain, for starters. So, lots.
Josho
Nov 23, 2009 10:51 AM
and I for one welcome our new robotic overlords.
sirtrancealot
Nov 23, 2009 11:12 AM
Johnny Mnemonic eat your heart out :)
Metasynaptic
Nov 23, 2009 11:23 AM
The skull is a rather good signal shield, so for this to work without lag, misinterpreted signals, etc... you are going to need this thing directly installed in your brain.

In my personal opinion, fark that, I'll keep my keys and mouse and put up with lag from my brain to my hand.
cyb3rspy
Nov 23, 2009 11:27 AM
I can just see the news headlines now "Mans Brain got Hacked & now Crashes into Everything"

or

"Hacker Overclock their heads and become Rocket Scientist"

mmm I can't wait to get my chip.
chapps
Nov 23, 2009 11:28 AM
I would not feel comfortable with a brain chip at work. What happens if I get a little horny and before you know it there are 12 windows of porn raging on my desktop.
Mademan
Nov 23, 2009 11:49 AM
That does appear to be the flaw - controlling human thought. Sales of productivity software would plummit.
omega
Nov 23, 2009 12:51 PM
"Dean Pomerleau, who works for Intel on matters of cognitive neuroscience, machine learning, computer vision, robotics, man-machine interfaces, brain processing of semantic information, and various brain-scanning technologies"

Overworked??
SlickGrunt
Nov 23, 2009 1:20 PM
do we get restart switches that auto clears CMOS to default when we BSOD? can we overclock them?

heh sorry, just got a little carried away. it sounds like a pretty dumb idea. Sure if you implement these chips to cure disabilities/impairments/disfunctions, why not? great. but for everyone so they can surf the effing net? they really do want to turn us in to robots.
Metasynaptic
Nov 23, 2009 1:23 PM
I have a really old logitech wireless mouse, that was supposedly panned by critics because it wasn't good enough for gaming. I still rip up in CoD with it. I'll still rip enemies apart when they are all hardwired into the game and i'm sniping them with my 30 year old mouse.
Ghost_Bear
Nov 23, 2009 2:04 PM
HAHAHAHA, yeeeah... "OK, Pal". Shotgun NOT signing up to "test" this new technology on my... my... MY BRAIN?!?! Hahaha

Oh man, I can't wait to see what the fuck goes wrong with this... actually I probably can because it'll probably be REALLY fucking ugly :S

GB
Bundywow
Nov 23, 2009 2:15 PM
Wouldn't you be pissed if you signed up early and god some crappy pre release version and 12 months later everyone's rockin some uber revision that's twice as powerful as yours?
Metasynaptic
Nov 23, 2009 5:08 PM
This sort of technology can be installed one of 3 ways:

1: Outside the skull. EEGs using this now. A bunch of brain wave sensors at various points around your head. Least effective way to read the brain because the skull dampens the signals.

2: Deep brain insertion. Probes are inserted deep into the brain through wires. Very invasive and not well understood. Mostly used for extreme tourettes. Most effectve way to measure brain signals, and also most effective way to permanently damage the brain.

3: Lastly, and what is the most likely route this technology will take, is a mix of the two. A probe is inserted beneath the skull, but not into the brain. This removes the damping properties of the skull but is less invasive than deep brain surgury. Ideally, you could 'upgrade' your skull implant as required.

Check out wikipedia on tourettes syndrome if you are interested.
lg9142
Nov 23, 2009 5:55 PM
I personally welcome our new robot overlords.
scathach
Nov 23, 2009 6:01 PM
Two questions:

1. How is it cooled?
Will we have to wear hats with little propellers on the top or will it be the borg look with water cooling pipes weaving in and out of you head?

2. Who will supply the OS?
If its Microsoft, we'll be BSOD'ing at inconvenient moments, if its linux we'll be able to tinker with our own minds, if its Apple we'll be Steves puppets and if its Chrome we'll have pop-up and banner ads.

lg9142
Nov 23, 2009 6:06 PM
@ scathach- I think it'll be more of an interface than anything else. So the OS will still be whatever is installed on a computer but should it support it, it will be capable of receiving input from the brain.
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