The Impossible Is Getting Closer to a Reality

 Cross posted from Zetetos:

This is an idea that most of us would find more probable between the covers of science fiction than science fact.

From Yahoo.com news and the UC Berkeley News Center: BERKELEY —

Imagine tapping into the mind of a coma patient, or watching one’s own dream on YouTube. With a cutting-edge blend of brain imaging and computer simulation, scientists at the University of California, Berkeley, are bringing these futuristic scenarios within reach. Using functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging (fMRI) and computational models, UC Berkeley researchers have succeeded in decoding and reconstructing people’s dynamic visual experiences – in this case, watching Hollywood movie trailers. As yet, the technology can only reconstruct movie clips people have already viewed. However, the breakthrough paves the way for reproducing the movies inside our heads that no one else sees, such as dreams and memories, according to researchers. “This is a major leap toward reconstructing internal imagery,” said Professor Jack Gallant, a UC Berkeley neuroscientist and coauthor of the study published online today (Sept. 22) in the journal Current Biology. “We are opening a window into the movies in our minds.” Eventually, practical applications of the technology could include a better understanding of what goes on in the minds of people who cannot communicate verbally, such as stroke victims, coma patients and people with neurodegenerative diseases. It may also lay the groundwork for brain-machine interface so that people with cerebral palsy or paralysis, for example, can guide computers with their minds. However, researchers point out that the technology is decades from allowing users to read others’ thoughts and intentions, as portrayed in such sci-fi classics as “Brainstorm,” in which scientists recorded a person’s sensations so that others could experience them.

Mind-reading through brain imaging technology is a common sci-fi theme

Previously, Gallant and fellow researchers recorded brain activity in the visual cortex while a subject viewed black-and-white photographs. They then built a computational model that enabled them to predict with overwhelming accuracy which picture the subject was looking at. In their latest experiment, researchers say they have solved a much more difficult problem by actually decoding brain signals generated by moving pictures. “Our natural visual experience is like watching a movie,” said Shinji Nishimoto, lead author of the study and a post-doctoral researcher in Gallant’s lab. “In order for this technology to have wide applicability, we must understand how the brain processes these dynamic visual experiences.”   Nishimoto and two other research team members served as subjects for the experiment, because the procedure requires volunteers to remain still inside the MRI scanner for hours at a time. They watched two separate sets of Hollywood movie trailers, while fMRI was used to measure blood flow through the visual cortex, the part of the brain that processes visual information. On the computer, the brain was divided into small, three-dimensional cubes known as volumetric pixels, or “voxels.” “We built a model for each voxel that describes how shape and motion information in the movie is mapped into brain activity,” Nishimoto said. The brain activity recorded while subjects viewed the first set of clips was fed into a computer program that learned, second by second, to associate visual patterns in the movie with the corresponding brain activity. Brain activity evoked by the second set of clips was used to test the movie reconstruction algorithm. This was done by feeding 18 million seconds of random YouTube videos into the computer program so that it could predict the brain activity that each film clip would most likely evoke in each subject. Finally, the 100 clips that the computer program decided were most similar to the clip that the subject had probably seen were merged to produce a blurry yet continuous reconstruction of the original movie. Reconstructing movies using brain scans has been challenging because the blood flow signals measured using fMRI change much more slowly than the neural signals that encode dynamic information in movies, researchers said. For this reason, most previous attempts to decode brain activity have focused on static images. “We addressed this problem by developing a two-stage model that separately describes the underlying neural population and blood flow signals,” Nishimoto said. Ultimately, Nishimoto said, scientists need to understand how the brain processes dynamic visual events that we experience in everyday life. “We need to know how the brain works in naturalistic conditions,” he said. “For that, we need to first understand how the brain works while we are watching movies.” Other coauthors of the study are Thomas Naselaris with UC Berkeley’s Helen Wills Neuroscience Institute; An T. Vu with UC Berkeley’s Joint Graduate Group in Bioengineering; and Yuval Benjamini and Professor Bin Yu with the UC Berkeley Department of Statistics. and from Mashable:

Scientists Turn Brain’s Visual Memories into a Mind-Blowing Video

about 12 hours ago by Stan Schroeder

Ever dreamed of recording your dreams and turning them into a video clip? The technology that enables you to do that is near: UC Berkeley scientists figured out a way to turn the way our brains interpret visual stimuli into a video, and the result is amazing.

To be able to do this, the researches used functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging (fMRI) to measure the blood flow through brain's visual cortex. Then, different parts of the brain were divided into volumetric pixels or voxels (the term might be familiar to those who remember early 3D games which were based on voxels instead of polygons which are more commonly used today). Finally, the scientists built a computational model which describes how visual information is mapped into brain activity.

In practice, test subjects viewed some video clips, and their brain activity was recorded by a computer program, which learned how to associate the visual patterns in the movie with the corresponding brain activity.

Then, test subjects viewed a second set of clips. The movie reconstruction algorithm was fed 18 million seconds of random YouTube videos, which were used to teach the program how to predict the brain activity evoked by film clips. Finally, the program chose 100 clips which were most similar to the movie the subject had seen, which were merged to create a reconstruction of the original movie.

The result is a video that shows how our brain sees things, and at moments it's eerily similar to the original imagery.

“This is a major leap toward reconstructing internal imagery. We are opening a window into the movies in our minds.”, said Professor Jack Gallant, a UC Berkeley neuroscientist and coauthor of the study published in the journal Current Biology.

Recording our dreams and "reading" the minds of coma patients requires a lot of work still, as current technology only enables scientists to interpret brain activity while the test subject is watching a movie. Ultimately, it could be used to decode how our brain processes visual events in everyday life or, perhaps, our dreams.

Check out another video, which shows the movie reconstruction algorithm at work, below. More details about the study can be found here. 

President Ronald Reagan, or Ronald Ray-Gun?

“Not he is great who can alter matter,
but he who can alter my state of mind”
Ralph Waldo Emerson
American Poet, Lecturer and Essayist,
1803-1882

“The secret of living a life of excellence is merely a matter of thinking thoughts of excellence.
Really, it's a matter of programming our minds with the kind of information that will set us free."
Charles R. Swindoll
American Writer, Clergyman
b.1934


On Thursday evening I recorded the last Colber(t) Repor(t) of the week, but did not get around to watching it until the weekend. Early in the show, Colbert featured an interaction with a remarkably calm but alert goat, as the lead in to his interview of Jon Ronson by satellite from the UK. Ronson has written a book, which I am looking forward to reading, as I work my way through the stack of material, book, online, periodical and 'other' that I seem always to feed slightly faster into the heap than I can winnow it down.

Ronson's Book, "The Men Who Stare at Goats", is about a little project that operated under the auspices of our government, beginning back in 1983, hence the whimsical word play on our esteemed late President's name. That and related projects were not discontinued until 1995. The book purports also to link these activities to the Bush administration's war on terror, which, not having read the entire book -yet - I can't address. It may very well be continuing in some form under President Obama for all I know. To supplement my preliminary reading, while I try to get my hands and eyes on a copy of this book, I have contacted the author by email, and await a response. Perhaps I should ask all of the readers of Penigma, like clapping for Tinkerbelle in Peter Pan, to 'will' Mr. Ronson to respond favorably to my request for an interview. (It must have worked, I have promptly received a positive response from Mr. Ronson.)

Mr. Ronson has a web site, which understandably is for the purpose of promoting his book and other activities, at http://www.jonronson.com/goats_04.htm%20l, and which provides access to the first chapter, which deals with a certain Major General Stubblebine, describing actual 'black ops' secret military projects with names like "Project Jedi" intended to create soldiers with super powers, able to use psychic ability for a variety of offensive and defensive purposes. Between that and the Reagan era Star Wars initiative, I'm afraid the US Government was tremendously, even appallingly, derivative of the George Lucas entertainment canon of movies and supplemental fictional material. Or given the military nature of all of this new age effort, should that be cannon?

In the Colbert interview, reference was made to something in the book, called 'sparkly eyes', for employing psychic powers against others. I'm afraid the closest I could get to that kind of inspiration while writing this was glittery eye shadow, but it certainly puts me in the correct frame of mind, given where my admittedly spotty research has taken me so far.

After reading an excerpt of Chapter 1 from "The Men Who Stare at Goats", I did a little research on this project, and I will admit shamefully to havng deviated from my usual standard of seeking solid original sources. I just looked it up on Wikipedia (cut me some slack, this is a fluff piece, written for fun; I read the boring, original, serious material the rest of the time). It was strictly a casual interim 'browse' to familiarize myself with the subject matter. Mr. Ronson very much is not making this stuff up. There genuinely does appear to be all this, and much, much more.

A quickie google search on Major-General Stubblebine produced material that was not funny. It appears that Major General Stubblebine is a 'truther', one of those who believes that there is some kind of conspiracy relating to the terrorist events of 9/11. Some of our readers have taken me to task for writing about the birthers and their conspiracy theories without having addressed the lunatic fringe movements on the opposite side of the political spectrum. Well, those readers will get their wish. Although not in depth in this article, I will continue to pursue information on Stubblebine. For now, I offer this video which I found through google - I repeat, I'm not claiming this is up to my usual research standards - for those who would like a glimpse of what I am describing. The video appears to be for some German media, I'm not clear whom, but for those of you whose language skills were getting rusty, which in this case includes me, there is a bonus in the form of German subtitles to amuse you. Here is the Stubblebine interview link : www.youtube.com./watch?v=daNr_TrBw6E I'm sure I'm not the only person who finds it bad enough for our fellow Americans to be treated to this rant by Stubblebine; for it to be seen around the world, in countries which are our allies, is even more embarrassing.

On a more serious note, which requires a bit of a mental shifting of gears to accommodate, I have to express my dismay and shock, so soon after researching the Orly Taitz / Birther information, that we appear to have high ranking military officers in the camps of our conspiracy theorists and lunatics on both extremes of the political spectrum. The 'truthers' apparently have the endorsement of Stubblebine, and the birthers claim the apparent support, through a law suit, of Major General James S. Childress.

This raises the question in my mind, who promoted these men to positions of authority and power, and how scary is it that they had access not only to soldiers, including special forces trained personnel, but dangerous weapons; guns and ammunition, tanks, rpgs. (OK - And goats!) I do not intend by these comments to in any way demean our armed forces, far from it. But reading and viewing the ideas held by these high-ranking individuals, the thought comes unbidden that those armed forces were under the care and command of individuals whose thought processes and conclusions I find disturbing. That these men, at either end of a very polarized political spectrum, had access to anything sharper than a marshmallow or more deadly than a daisy is on some level unnerving.

Readers may definitely look forward to my writing up something further on General Childress and on General Stubblebine. It is not my intent to be flippant or irreverent to legitimate service to our country by either gentleman in the course of questioning their extreme political views, and it is especially NOT my intention to embarrass or demean the rank and file of any of our armed forces. It is however an important concern for all of us that there appear to be individuals at the highest levels of our military who may be extremists, who are willing to use the achievement of that rank to give those extreme, even wacko views credence, and to use their service to recruit others who love their country to those bizarre viewpoints. The thought which popped into my mind unbidden was that it is bad enough to put inmates in charge of an asylum, but far worse to put them in charge of our armies.

Now, off to dig up that glittery eye shadow, and to try mastering the technique of 'sparkly eyes'.... if I can stop laughing long enough to apply it without poking myself in the eye.

More to come.

Victory for Vick

"Who knows what Evil lurks in the hearts of Men?
The Shadow KNOWS."
Francis S. Street & Francis S. Smith
original publishers of "The Shadow"

"Don't let us make imaginary evils,
when you know we have so many real ones to encounter."
Oliver Goldsmith
physician, novelist, poet, playwrite
1730 - 1774

Tuesday's episode of MSNBC's the Ed Show included a segment on the return of Michael Vick to football. PETA, the animal rights extremist group which the Department of Homeland Security has associated with left wing domestic terrorism in their declassified reports www.scribd.com/doc/12251436/DHS-Eco-Terrorism-in-US-2008 is demanding that Vick undergo a brain scan first. The scan is to determine to the satisfaction of PETA that he is sufficiently rehabilitated.

Let me begin by identifying my bias. I not only love dogs, I live and breathe dogs; I breed, raise and train dogs, I engage in a variety of competitions with dogs. My morning began with training a three year old greyhound, not my own, to go potty on command, on leash. This morning we 'proofed' the success of that training with the challenge of requiring the dog to comply with the command while a number of other dogs ran free around her playing, as an intentional distraction. She did wonderfully well with the command, but her real success was that she was bouncing around like a cartoon Kangaroo at the prospect of her training collar being put on before we began. Before she could learn any new commands, this dog had to be rehabilitated to overcome her fears. She used to shake with anxiety when she was expected to do something, because if not exactly abused, someone - I don't know who - had been horribly, unnecessarily harsh with her. Now she can go to a new home to bond with a new owner, as a happy, well adjusted, well mannered dog.

So understand, as you read this, how very much I hate the actions of Michael Vick. I hate, more than even the average dog loving pet owner, that he caused pain and fear, and horrific deaths to those dogs. More than that, I live in Minnesota; as of the recent announcement that Brett Favre will not come out of retirement, the Minnesota Vikings are among the most likely teams in the NFL to hire Vick. One of my friends, the dog-loving wife of a die-hard football fan, refers to the NFL not as the National Football League, but as the National Felons League. She is angry enough to have written a letter of protest to Roger Goodell; I am sure she will not be the only person to do so. This decision by Goodell may be the most controversial one he ever makes.

I respectfully disagree with my friend. However much I deeply deplore what Vick did, he served his sentence. Has he genuinely changed his values and his feelings? I don't know. I am familiar with the science that PETA is relying on to determine Vick's sincerity, but for those of you who are not, it is well described here : www.guardian.co.uk/science/2007/feb/09/neuroscience.ethicsofscience. There are huge ethical controversies surrounding this science; and those ethical dilemmas have not been resolved. At the core of the controversy is simply this, do we judge people on their thoughts, and their feelings, or do we judge them on their actions? People may feel that Vick got off too lightly for what he did, but we have courts that make that decision. What they decide, we need to accept, reluctantly if not enthusiastically. We don't have to like Vick. But we should not allow that dislike to prevent him from lawfully seeking employment in his area of expertise after he has fulfilled the penalty he was given. Most of all, we should not allow anyone, least of all an organization like PETA, to require something as intrusive as a brain scan, as a condition of employment. Vick must, going forward, act appropriately. Sanctions to enforce and ensure that behavior are available, by contract, and the authority of Goodell.

If you are like my dog-loving friend Amy, demonstrate your objections to Vick playing football by not supporting whatever team hires him. Write letters to the team owners, don't give them money by buying tickets, don't watch their games on television. Or, support the rest of the team by attending and watching, booing Vick when he plays.

But do not support PETA's demand for a brain scan of Michael Vick.

Do not support PETA, or the HSUS. Don't give them money, don't give them the power of influence. Research who they really are. As much as I dislike Vick, as a dedicated dog lover, I dislike PETA and the HSUS, even more than I dislike Vick. In a different way, they do more harm as organizations than Vick could ever do as an individual, bad as he was. If you love humans, as well as loving dogs, do not endorse judging people by their intentions as determined by intrusive brain scans. Support judging people by what they do; whatever their thoughts or urges, their is no definitive way to anticipate what ultimate decisions they will make about their feelings and their impulses. In the end, that is all that matters, their choices, their actions; anything else is simply their private demons to battle.