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Comment by rocmcd | Hacker News Reader

Call me a cynic, but I don’t have a lot of optimism for brain-computer interfaces. I can barely control my own thoughts, let alone understand how they are made or where they originate. We would need to make an exponential leap in our understanding of the brain and our consciousness within it to make this in any way a viable input method.

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IMO, the bigger problem, which nobody talks about, is that if we have brain-computer interfaces, it will be trivial to use them to control our emotions. Once that happens, it seems to me we'll basically stop being human. People are going to want to feel whatever emotion is convenient in that moment.

Don't enjoy your terrible dead-end job? Now you do. Don't enjoy your abusive relationship? Now you do. Don't feel comfortable with societal issues at large? Now you do. Empathy gets in the way of doing your job? No problem.

I don't know, I think that is a big jump and definitely not trivial.

"Reading" neural activity is much different than "writing", and modifying the circuits/neural activity precisely enough to modify emotions.

These devices are typically cortical surface level electrode meshes, placed over the motor region of the cortex, while emotions are thought to come from various deep brain structures. Not saying it won't happen, but we are much, much, further from the latter than the former.

I don't know about that. You're right that emotions seem to come from deeper structures, but these structures are also more primitive. We're able to modify emotions with something as simple as amphetamines, so controlling them with a few well-placed electrodes is maybe not so difficult. Seems to me that as brain interface technology starts progressing, we're going to hit an S-curve of technological progress that will make it advance very rapidly in one or two decades.

It's definitely possible, but I guess what I am saying is that research in this area hasn't really been explored in the context of humans.

In the lab, we use targeted genetic manipulations such as optogenetics [1] or chemogenetics (see DREADDS [2]) to achieve precise circuit manipulations that can (maybe/kinda) change emotional state (see [3] and [4] for manipulation of fear in mice, sorry may be pay-walled check sci-hub). But these are impractical in humans at the moment because they require specific genetic backgrounds (a CRISPR modified mouse expressing a specific artificial DNA sequence in certain types of neurons from birth), viral injections to add other genetic constructs that interact with the from-birth one, and implanting lights or adding drugs directly to the brain where the cells are. Precise electrical manipulation is not really done, even in animal labs because it is not precise or controllable for these types of things.

Again, I have no doubt that we will get there, maybe in a few decades too. But the techniques are much further from human use than the "reading" technology demonstrated here.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Optogenetics [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Receptor_activated_solely_by_a... [3] https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/28288126/ [4] https://www.nature.com/articles/npp2015276/

Terminal Man is a fun read. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Terminal_Man

On the other side of this, some people require external emotional regulation because their brains fail to do so for them and take medication for it. So having this as a treatment option isn’t necessarily something we should avoid pursuing for cases where medication isn’t an option for whatever reason.

Yes obviously, just like there is a legit case for brain implants for paraplegic or wheelchair-bound people. However, it's easy to see how things could easily go way too far and lead to a world of VR-addiction and dehumanization.

https://cdn-images-1.medium.com/max/1200/1*gQVf0RpFjaYfS7GJJ...

As always, technology is a tool, and a double-edged sword. It's just hard to predict how it will change society sometimes. IMO brain implants are actually way more dangerous than genetic engineering ever could be. People creating designer babies with blonde hair and a higher IQ is nothing compared to the risk of people no longer being able to feel empathy and sadness in response to problematic situations. Maybe we'll even stop feeling love, because it's just too inconvenient.

Oh and uh, yeah: brain implants could also make it possible to implement the notion of thoughtcrime. I hope, for your own sakes, that your political beliefs and opinions are in line with that the majority has deemed correct.

We already have segments of the population who have to deal with various forms of addiction and dehumanization and this has not stopped us in the development of new medications and technologies.

Should we prevent the development of this technology due to its potential for abuse? Should we develop the technology for its potential to benefit ourselves?

Obviously brain implants that can read and write thoughts come with an extraordinary amount of power and it is both wonderful and terrifying to imagine the potential benefits and dangers that it could provide us.

I think we will do what we have done through history and someone somewhere will develop the technology if it is possible eventually regardless of our qualms with its potential to destroy people.

But one thing that separates BCI from everything is the implant itself. Sure, people have addictions but they also have that choice of stop doing that and focus on things that are important to that person (I know that overcoming addiction is way tougher than just writing about having choice as I'm still going through it at the moment, but one can surely get out this). The thing that differentiates this from earlier technological advancements is that now there is some hardware directly wired in your brain whereas previous technology was outside of your body and I don't think that I would able to accept that without having an impending worry about implant having access to my brain directly.

This is the problem with computer->brain interfaces (which we don't have), not brain->computer interfaces (like moving mouse pointers via direct brain->computer connection).

If you have a good brain->computer interface you can just use traditional methods in a tight feedback loop to manipulate the brain. We have more than enough methods to reward or punish people. Simply reward them for good thoughts, punish them for bad ones, and I don't see how their behavior wouldn't change.

> Once that happens, it seems to me we'll basically stop being human. People are going to want to feel whatever emotion is convenient in that moment.

I would say it is the other way. Many animals have emotions. It is sophisticated abstract thinking that makes us humans. If one can get full control of their emotional part of brain, that would make them truly human.

If we could actually get control of our emotional part, it will be used for the military to create superhuman soldiers, devoid of any empathy and augmented with a rage mode switch that turns off fear and fills them with adrenaline.

Personally, I'd use it to deal with my bipolar.

That's the purpose of basic training already, but we don't want soldiers with no empathy. Soldiers are far too valuable to turn them into rage monsters, we need team players who will actually save each other if they're hurt and won't randomly attack civilians.

IMO we're also pretty close to being able to have robotic infantry drones, which are going to make enhanced human infantry kind of moot anyway. Imagine if you could take something like the Boston Dynamics ATLAS robot, stick a gun on it and paradrop it into enemy territory. It might need to be a bit lighter and more agile, but we're not that far off. It doesn't even necessarily need AI, you could remote-control the thing.

Robots need to be faster, lighter, more agile and with longer battery.

You're ready to be hired by whoever will market these devices.

I was pretty excited when I started learning about BCIs in college. Then I realized that it’s not that my hands and eyes are some sort of limited bandwith, but rather that my brain is not really able to increase the throughput. How many of you code at the speed you type?

While I appreciate that they are game changers to people with accessibility problems, they’re essentially not worth the risk to anyone else.

Well look at something that might change your mind: there is this device called Muse headband that actually uses your brain signals to help you meditate. Meditation is a tool of mindfulness, and with some progress it helps exactly that: control and know your own thoughts.

So already at this (primitive) iteration of tech there is a device that connects to your brain and helps you do something, something that you would find very useful no less, if your goal is to learn to operate your brain in the best way possible. Now this is even possible with this (primitive) iteration of this tech. The effectiveness is reported by a lot of people, and it is also calibrated on tibetan monks who meditate for a living. There is also a similar institutional device with more thorough processes called "40 years of zen" (but you have to go to a laboratory).

Now imagine what the next iteration would make possible, and for example how good would a device like this be if it could actually read direct signals from the brain instead of having to read them through the skin?

This is what I was thinking. As a creative output device My brain thinks way ahead while I’m typing the current code. This tech will actually slowdown the process with respect to output . What this will thrive at is, giving input to the brain about data by brain generating just enough query. So ultimately future super human will be the guys who can generate precise query much faster.

The steam engine was in use for generations before thermodynamics theory was discovered. So in many cases, it is possible to engineer a technology without fully understand the underlying principles that govern its behavior.

In many ways, the current explosion in deep learning and its applications to different fields are similar - we don't quite have a fundamental understanding of why things work, and theory is still catching up to how it is being applied.

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