Posted 12.12.2011 at 6:47 pm
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MRI Machine
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For the first time, researchers have been able to hack into the process of learning in the brain, using induced brain patterns to create a learned behavior. It’s not quite as advanced as an instant kung-fu download, and it’s not as sleek as cognitive inception, but it’s still an important finding that could lead to new teaching and rehabilitation techniques.
Future therapies could decode the brain activity patterns of an athlete or a musician, and use them as a benchmark for teaching another person a new activity, according to the researchers.
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Technology, Rebecca Boyle, behavioral patterns, brain, brain power, fmri, learning, learning and memory, mri scanner, repetitive tasksLed by BU neuroscientist Takeo Watanabe, researchers used a method called decoded fMRI neurofeedback to stimulate the visual cortex. First they showed participants circles at different orientations. Then they used fMRI to watch the participants’ brain activity. The researchers were then able to train the participants to recreate this visual cortex activity.
The volunteers were again placed in MRI machines and asked to visualize shapes of certain colors. The participants were asked to “somehow regulate activity in the posterior part of the brain” to make a solid green disc as large as they could. They were told they would get a paid bonus proportional to the size of this disc, but they weren’t told anything about what the disc meant. The researchers watched the participants’ brain activity and monitored the activation patterns in their visual cortices.
“Participants can be trained to control the overall mean activation of an entire brain region,” the study authors write, “or the activation in one region relative to that in another region.”
This worked even when test subjects were not aware of what they were learning, the researchers said.
“The most surprising thing in this study is that mere inductions of neural activation patterns corresponding to a specific visual feature led to visual performance improvement on the visual feature, without presenting the feature or subjects' awareness of what was to be learned,” Watanabe said in a statement.
Watanabe and colleagues said this method can be a powerful tool.
“It can ‘incept’ a person to acquire new learning, skills, or memory, or possibly to restore skills or knowledge that has been damaged through accident, disease, or aging, without a person’s awareness of what is learned or memorized,” they write.
The paper appears in the journal Science.
[FellowGeek via Slashdot]
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You got circles?
This is incredible. I wonder what the possibilities are here for all types of treatments including pain management...or brain washing.
So they basically learned circles and were bribed into learning them I know I had to of missed something here I mean they all seem excited and whatever advanced fields that help people that got hurt and makes them able to rehab faster I am 110% all for it because any one of us could be those people at any point ya know but I guess I failed to see exactly what happened here.
"i know kung fu..." "show me"
interesting, could be used to for people who have had brain trauma and amnesia.
a little closer to an intersect
of course were way behind in the technology, we use gigantic mris to input data
while chuck just uses super cool slim glasses that flash images and BAM!!!! "guys... i know kung fu"
Will the people getting this done to them lose anything... they are talking about imprinting new patterns. Nothing worse in my view then everyone with the same persona.
andrew STFU
anyways, so does this mean that you can literally be ready to learn just by being around people who know?
to mars or bust!
I suspect the military will make good use of this as making a more controlled soldier.
The government will have more controlled subjects under them.
Corporations will have obedient employees.
Some devious bad religious groups will like this device too.
As the customer walks into the programming clinic and pays to have ‘kung fu’ programmed into their brain, a little something “EXTRA PROGRAMMING” will be added to the programming too.
Bra-ha-ha haaaaa, ringing of hands, bra-ha hahaaaa!
.............................
Science sees no further than what it can sense.
Religion sees beyond the senses.
no kung-fu 4 me?
-Knock knock
-Who's there?
-The Doctor.
-Doctor Who?
-Yes
This is gonna have a great use in future.it may lso be used in lie detection and other security purposes
also visit anditgoez.blogspot.com
and find us on fb at tech2grow
You guys are thinking too small.
How much can I learn? What is the informational limit?
Forget putting my mind onto a computer. I want to put the internet in my mind! (i guess i could do without the trolling)
" that has been damaged through accident, disease, or aging"
yeah right... we all know that the kung fu is the final goal ^^
---
bored? lets go mine the stars... ^^
The year is 2032 and I walk into a "brain upgrade" store. "Sir would you like to 1. Upgrade your memory to use 100% of your brain? Comes with optional multitask feature. 2. learn 100 languages? 3. Download five master degrees and 5 BA degrees? 4. Become a professional athlete? 5. Become gay? 6. The new feature: Copy your brain and memories into a digital format?"
I look up and down the floating digital menu in-front of me. I check my contact lenses computer phone to see what i have in the bank. I choose the "new copy my brain into digital format" option, to make an illegal clone of myself in Europe......
To be continued on my facebook sci-fi vs science technology group:
www.facebook.com/groups/276567225687831 )
____________________________________
Vlane Carter - Author of the Science Fiction BIAlien series.
www.BIAlien.com
"Spock's Brain" on the horizon:
MCCOY: We just want to talk to somebody about Spock's brain. That's all.
KARA: Brain and brain! What is brain? . . .
Aaaah Sick >_< :P Before I know it Ill be out of the job. But as Its always well put. If you REALLY want it done quick. And want it done right with the least apprehensive effects. You should just let me do it! oooooooorrr If you need help realizing screw this dream. Dont forget I am the king, An I do completely realize these skills!!
There is another way I know that "download knowledge directly to your brain" but not Matrix style and not using MRI machine...it's similar to "Remote Viewing" but better...I think it's been in the world ever since man in history has "hearing voices" in his head...who thought what he hears was "angel" or "God"...and it's about the prophet who had known the "books" but don't know how to read...I'm still in research about it...I need help to proove it that it is real...
So they 'teach' stuff using visual aids. Big deal. When they finally learn how to transfer data while completely bypassing the 5 senses, then that's finally worth noting. The next would be the ability to gauge the fidelity of the data transferred as well as it's retention rate with the recipient.