Backup your soul!

A brain–computer interface (BCI), sometimes called a brain–machine interface, is a direct communication pathway - transferring information - between a brain and an external device. BCIs are often aimed at assisting, augmenting or repairing human cognitive or sensory-motor functions. But today, some scientists are playing with the idea of actually using this technology to keep our memories and experiences even motoric skills in an external hard drive..

Today, the existing technology enable us to connect electrodes directly into the brain (of any mammal) and record the activity of a specific area. Then, from the electrical pulses than has been recorded the experimenters are able to analyze and conclude about the inner brain processes that are taking place in that specific area

These kind of devices became more and more common in the last years and being used for various implications. The first system known as the BrainGate Neural Interface System, consists of an array of electrodes (around a 100) that record neural activity from the motor cortex of the brain. Signals from the implant are decoded and processed by a computer, allowing them to be translated into movement commands.

• Converting information into speech - Eric Ramsey, 26, has locked-in syndrome, in which people are unable to move a muscle but are fully conscious. Ramsey, who suffered a brain-stem stroke at the age of 16, has an electrode implanted into a brain area that plans the movements of the vocal cords and tongue that underlie speech. The neuroscienctists team that are taking care of him has developed models that predict how neurons in this region fire during speech. They used these predictions to translate the firing patterns of several dozen brain cells in Ramsey’s brain into the acoustical building blocks of speech.

• Control the movement of a prosthetic limb - Matthew Nagle, 25-year-old man paralysed from the neck down has a computer-linked implant placed in his brain that enables him to operate devices just by thinking about it. Matthew has learnt how to use a computer open email and control a TV using the power of thought can also move objects with a robotic arm. Watch him on this amazing video:

By using the exact same principle scientists are now using electrodes in order to create the reverse effect: Stimulating the brain by electrical pulses and execute specific operations. This has been extensively studied on animals in the last decades and recently successfuly tested on humans! Here are some of the very famous Examples:

• Cochlear implants - is an electronic device that is surgically implanted into a deaf person chochlea and provide him a sense of sound. As of April 2009, approximately 188,000 people worldwide(!) had received cochlear implants. The device usually includes a microphone which picks up sound from the environment, a speech processor which selectively filters sound to prioritize audible speech and sends the electrical sound signals through a thin cable to the transmitter, the transmitter transmits the processed sound signals to the internal device which includes an array of up to 22 electrodes wound through the cochlea which send the impulses directly to the auditory nerve.

• Artificial eyes - sometimes called Bionic eye is an experimental visual device intended to restore functional vision. There are many kind of devices that has been tested in the last years and are rapidly improved. Excellent video:
  

• Deep Brain Stimulation -Parkinson desease is one of the most common neurological disorders that has severe effect on the patients everyday life. By inserting electrodes to a certain area in the patients brain and continuesly stimulating it, the patients are able to control their movement capabilities and extremely reduce the tremor and paralysis. The method - Deep brain stimulation - has dramatically changed the lives of many patients with uncontrollable tremors. Patients often can resume normal activities, such as feeding and dressing themselves, and can have active and fulfilling lives. The need for anti-tremor medications is often reduced or eliminated. Animation that shows how it works and an example of patient before and after treatment:

A glance to the future

What about Inserting more complex information directly to our brain? What if we could stimulate the brain and teaching it/us a totaly new things..? just imagine the possobilities of having tons of information directly to your grey matter in no time!! : you could... "Read" tons of books and watch all movies ever made in 1o Mhz.. , you could play piano, violin or drums in less than a n hour.. or acquire all the martial arts skils and be able to do all the Keanu Reeves paalulim tricks in real life! Its all about information isnt it?

One of the most fascinating question I have recently heard was: could we one day be able to "download" specific data/information/knowledge from our brain into a flash drive? and if we could, why not downloading all our memories to a hard drive and by that simulate our brain activity and keep our entire soul eternal?

Futurists says that 2050 immortality will be within our grasp:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2005/may/22/theobserver.technology

Source

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brain%E2%80%93computer_interfaceRay Kurzweil on how technology will transform us:
http://www.ted.com/talks/ray_kurzweil_on_how_technology_will_transform_us.html http://www.physorg.com/news180620740.html http://edition.cnn.com/2005/TECH/05/23/brain.download/ http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2005/may/22/theobserver.technology
http://blogs.discovery.com/good_idea/2009/06/downloading-data-directly-into-your-brain.html
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/6368089.stmhttp://blog.taragana.com/science/2009/12/16/paralysed-man-successfully-controls-speech-synthesiser-with-thought-951/
http://www.jumpintotomorrow.com/?p=2821
http://edition.cnn.com/2007/HEALTH/conditions/12/14/locked.in/index.html

Its all in your brain - Some similarities between computerized IS and the human brain

Information System is quite a broad area of study that mainly refers to computer-based technology. When using the term, people are usually refers to the process of acquiring data, storing it and performing various data analysis.

However, even from a first sight, it seems that there are similar lines between computerized information systems and another very complex "information system" - the Human Brain.

Most of the brain researches todays tend too look at the human brain as nothing but a very sophisticated and extremely complicated computer… the computerized ability of the brain is so that until now the largest and fastest computers in the world can not imitate even the 1 years old child brain capability.. The secret is that the brain doesnt contain only one processor but billions of them that works in parallel. The human brain contains about 10 billion nerve cells (10^11). On average, each neuron is connected to other neurons through about 10,000 synapses. In that way the brain's network of neurons forms a massively parallel information storing and processing system. This contrasts with conventional computers, in which a single processor executes a single series of instructions. In the brain each neurons is actually perform as an independent computer hence be able to sore amount of data and able to effectivelty analyze the environment.

In here, I will try to stress out some of the similarities and differences of the charachteristics of and termonilogy that is being used in computerized information systems with that being used in Neuropsycology and Psychophysics. I chose to specifically focus on Memory.


Lets start with the similarities:

In General, computerized information systems includes the following capabilities:

1)Computation - Perform high-speed, high-volume, numerical computation.

So is the human brain.. In terms of the functions, both are used for mathematical calculations, carrying out complex algorithms and to storing of crucial information.

2)Communication - Provide fast, accurate, and inexpensive communication within and between organizations.

The brain submodules provide parallelic computation beetween each module. The human brain contain module/specific area for categorized information and specific analysis processes. For exampla, there are specific areas for producing movements, sensing touch, producing speech or visualizing objects. Since the information about the world is stoered in our memory the memory it has to be stores in a very efficient easy to retrieve way. There are evidence for the brain to codifed and store the ïnformation"in semantic folders.

3)Automation - Automate both semiautomatic business processes and manual tasks.
Riding a bike, driving a car, eating breathing walking.. Most of our daily motoric procedures are unconscious. That means that the required sequences or programs are somehow already coded in the brain.

4) Storage - Store huge amounts of information in an easy-to-access, yet small space.
Storage of information in the brain is done by strenghening synaptic connections, activation of specific areas for short time (Short term memory), or morphological changes in the neurons structures (long term memories). There are evidence that the information is codified in a kind of "semantic folders" that are situated in the same brain structure/area. Famous example is of a category specific deficits following a brain seizure.

5) Access - Allow quick and inexpensive access to vast amount of information, worldwide.
The brain needs only sandwiches and cup of coffee and it works!

6) Knowledge - Facilitate the interpretation of vast amounts of data Enable collaboration anywhere, any time.

7)Competitiveness - Increase the effectiveness and efficiency of people working in groups in one place or in several locations, anywhere.

(Based on lecture 2 PPT)


Some more similarities:

8) Combining components
Both work by combining the processes of several components and parts to perform their tasks.
I.e. A computer consists of many many parts, including a motherboard(which itself would is made up of many parts), the disk drives, the processor, graphic cards and many more ... all of which has its own roles in the computer's processes.
Like a computer, the brain is formed out of parts. Besides having the left and right hemispheres, there are also parts of the brain that take care of emotions, mathematical calculations, body CO-ordinations and many other tasks needed for our daily activities.


9) Eletrical signals
Both work by transmitting "logic signals" to each of their parts. Signals are both electrical
i.e. A computer works by using binary ("on"/"off" logical signals known as "bits", put together as "bytes" to represent data.) To communicate internally between components, represent information and store data. In a way, neurons in the brain are either "on" or "off" by either firing an action potential or not firing an action potential.

The face that the brain operates by using a "simple"electrical current has a in electrical stimulation techniques (see one of my next blogs).

10) Upgrading and Evolution
Both can change with time. (the brain evolves, while the computer upgrades with technological advances)
i.e. When any computer gets outdated, there are always options To upgrade, parts To replace faster newer models To choose from. The brain of modern man is found To be significantly larger than those of 1.7 million years ago.
Newsweek article "The first Wanderers" (22/5/2000 issue): May, 2000 a team of scientists uncovered two 1.7 million year old dmanisi skulls of Homo ergasters, notably smaller with only with 780cc of capacity compared with the 1500cc of modern man's skull capacity; proof of the human brain's evolution)


So.. what are the differences?


Compensation ability -
The first and probably the most importatnt difference in my opinion is the Brain plasticity. The brain, unlike any computer or network, have a miraculous ability to compensate and change his modules activiry after damage. This unique charachteristics - Brains plasticity - is not fully understood and a subject to extensive research.
for example:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TSu9HGnlMV0


In contrast, most programs and engineered systems are brittle: if you remove some arbitrary parts, very likely the whole will cease to function.