[marden]

http://www.coasttocoastam.com/guests/1059.html

Washington Post Editor, Reporter and Author, Joel Garreau, was Art's Saturday night guest on Coast to Coast AM. He discussed various technological changes taking place in our lives, almost without our knowledge. Fantastic things. My favorite being the telekinetic monkey.

The first telekinetic monkey that DARPA funded is named Belle.

Belle is a cute monkey—an owl monkey, tiny, with huge brown globular
eyes framed in white ovals two-thirds the size of her head. Her fur is
russet and gray. Belle is astonishingly quick. One of her accomplishments
is her prowess at an electronic game. She intently watches a horizontal series
of lights in her lab at Duke University in Durham, North Carolina.
She knows that if a light suddenly shines and she moves her joystick left
or right to correspond to its position, she gets a drop of fruit juice. Treats
may not matter now, though. She’s gotten way into the game.

Belle is not really telepathic, strictly speaking. That would mean that
she could communicate from her mind directly to another mind. DARPA’s
researchers haven’t gotten that far—yet. Although Michael Goldblatt can
clearly see how they might.

Belle is telekinetic. That means that simply by thinking, she can get a
mechanical arm far away—in Massachusetts, in fact—instantly to move
exactly the way her mind commands. Her Duke researchers line up
probes thinner than the finest sewing thread right next to individual neurons
in different regions of Belle’s motor cortex—the part of the brain
that plans movements. These are linked to two computers, one in the
next room and another 600 miles north, at MIT, via the Internet. The
computers each control a robotic arm. Then the researchers disconnect
her joystick and start Belle’s game. Sure enough, not only is she able to
play it splendidly using just her thoughts, but the two robotic arms instantly
mimic the motions that Belle’s arm would make to control the
joystick, “like dancers choreographed by the electrical impulses sparking
in Belle’s mind,” her researchers report. The first time she did it, the two
labs, in North Carolina and New England, erupted into loud celebration.

Needless to say, there’s quite a story behind this. Especially since the
reason you create a telekinetic monkey is ultimately to create a connection
between any intelligence, silicon or human—any mind and any machine
—anywhere. It is meant to lead to the day when a human might, for
example, with her very thoughts control a robot orbiting Jupiter, causing
its sensors to zoom in this way and that.

The next step is to rig a distant machine such that it can pipe what it is
sensing directly into the brain of its human host. The goal is to seamlessly
merge mind and machine, engineering human evolution so as to directly
project and amplify the power of our thoughts throughout the universe.

The Garreau Group

Introduction
The following seven films show Matt Nagle control computer programs and electronic devices using thought power alone. Click on the numbers above and to the left to watch each film.

25-year-old Nagle is a tetraplegic and the first human volunteer to reach this advanced stage of testing. 96 electrodes (covering the same area of a small pill) were implanted into his brain's motor cortex - the region that processes information about movements. By prerecording the neural signals of his 'motor intentions' and then playing that information back to computers calibrated to read that signal it was possible to Matt to exert control over a computer cursor and work prosthetic devices, even though his spinal cord was severed more than three years before the trials.

Previous efforts in humans to control cursors on a computer screen have been limited to two dimensions. But advances in a field still in its infancy have shown that in the very first trial of new technologies significant advances have been made that could one day offer aid and a degree of independence and mobility to people who have suffered spinal cord injuries through disease or accident.

Introduction : Experiments in thought control : Nature

In separate experiments, the first person to receive the implant, Matthew Nagle, was able to move a cursor, open e-mail, play a simple video game called Pong and draw a crude circle on the screen. He could change the channel or volume of a television set, move a robot arm somewhat, and open and close a prosthetic hand.

Although his cursor control was sometimes wobbly, the basic movements were not hard to learn. “I pretty much had that mastered in four days,’’ Mr. Nagle, now 26, said in a telephone interview from the New England Sinai Hospital and Rehabilitation Center in Stoughton, Mass., where he lives. He said the implant did not cause any pain.

A former high school football star in Weymouth, Mass., Mr. Nagle was paralyzed below the shoulders after being stabbed in the neck during a melee at a beach in July 2001. He said he was not involved in starting the brawl and didn’t even know what sparked it. The man who stabbed him is now serving ten years in prison, he said.

<3rd eYe>

It is fascinating.

[marden]

bump

[Tiresias]

What does "bump" mean?

[Dakar²]

It's like he wants us to think he's abe.

[Tiresias]

"Bump" means he wants us to think he is "abe"?

What does "abe" mean?

I can't keep up with all this netspeak.

[moonmonkey]

ICKUWATNS 2

[Dakar²]

I was referring to this thread in general.

[Gossamer]

Is there a rule against bumping your own thread half an hour after you create it?

[Dakar²]

Originally Posted by Gossamer 

Is there a rule against bumping your own thread half an hour after you create it?

24.5 hours...

[Gossamer]

Originally Posted by Dakar² 

24.5 hours...

Oops.

Well is there a rule against bumping threads no one seems to care about?

[Dakar²]

Can't say I know.

[Rumor]

I listened to a part of this show also.

What really struck me as interesting was the research into burning your fat cells for energy at will. I haven't been able to find anything else about it though.

[marden]

Originally Posted by Rumor 

I listened to a part of this show also.

What really struck me as interesting was the research into burning your fat cells for energy at will. I haven't been able to find anything else about it though.

That's when I know that the program I'm watching or listening to is really on the cutting edge...when you Google it and find ZILCH or close to it.

This program was really interesting. The thought control thing.

And the research which may lead to soldiers being able to go for a week or so without eating (cutting down on the weight of the MRE's they need to lug around -- the guest said that Special Forces troops often burn 20,000 calories a day on a strenuous mission) by getting the body to DIRECTLY burn the body's own fat cells at will.

If I recall correctly, the comment by the researchers was, 'the ramifications this technology might have on the weight reduction industry did not go unnoticed by us.'

This guy is on the edge of things.

But think about what the thought control thing means.

IT IS A HUGE, BREATHTAKING DEVELOPMENT WHICH SHOULD HAVE BEEN THE LEADING NEWS STORY ON ALL NEWSPAPERS AND MSM!!!!

But instead they were busy bashing Bush.

[marden]

Originally Posted by Gossamer 

Oops.

Well is there a rule against bumping threads no one seems to care about?

When the media tried to warn us of the danger of OBL before 911 no one seemed to care about that.

You're right, there should be a rule.

[Gossamer]

Originally Posted by marden 

When the media tried to warn us of the danger of OBL before 911 no one seemed to care about that.

[Rumor]

Originally Posted by marden 

That's when I know that the program I'm watching or listening to is really on the cutting edge...when you Google it and find ZILCH or close to it.

This program was really interesting. The thought control thing.

And the research which may lead to soldiers being able to go for a week or so without eating (cutting down on the weight of the MRE's they need to lug around -- the guest said that Special Forces troops often burn 20,000 calories a day on a strenuous mission) by getting the body to DIRECTLY burn the body's own fat cells at will.

If I recall correctly, the comment by the researchers was, 'the ramifications this technology might have on the weight reduction industry did not go unnoticed by us.'

This guy is on the edge of things.

But think about what the thought control thing means.

IT IS A HUGE, BREATHTAKING DEVELOPMENT WHICH SHOULD HAVE BEEN THE LEADING NEWS STORY ON ALL NEWSPAPERS AND MSM!!!!

But instead they were busy bashing Bush.

I have to admit that the idea of thought control scares me a little bit. It would be too easy to use in a bad way.

[marden]

Originally Posted by Rumor 

I have to admit that the idea of thought control scares me a little bit. It would be too easy to use in a bad way.

The only way is to RIDE the tiger, not merely try to hold onto it's tail.

[Y3a]

There IS NO "GOOD" thought control.

[Dakar²]

I can change your mind.
Through thought control!

[olePigeon]

Anyone see Scanners?

[- - e r i k - -]

Hahaha. A story about a "telekinetic" monkey should have made front page news.

Yes, and I read that the moon will be crashing in to the earth in News Of The World.

WHY IS THE MAINSTREAM COVERING UP THE STORIES THAT REALLY MATTER?!?!?!?

[marden]

Originally Posted by - - e r i k - - 

Hahaha. A story about a "telekinetic" monkey should have made front page news.

Yes, and I read that the moon will be crashing in to the earth in News Of The World.

WHY IS THE MAINSTREAM COVERING UP THE STORIES THAT REALLY MATTER?!?!?!?

Do I detect a tinge of jealousy from your post?

I can imagine someone being envious of a monkey who can play a videogame 600+ miles away by just THINKING of the moves they want to make.

You don't think this is earth shaking???

Man can not use thought to manipulate game controls.

This monkey can.

Can't you understand the implications of such a thing???

Belle is telekinetic. That means that simply by thinking, she can get a mechanical arm far away—in Massachusetts, in fact—instantly to move exactly the way her mind commands. Her Duke researchers line up probes thinner than the finest sewing thread right next to individual neurons in different regions of Belle’s motor cortex—the part of the brain that plans movements. These are linked to two computers, one in the next room and another 600 miles north, at MIT, via the Internet. The computers each control a robotic arm. Then the researchers disconnect her joystick and start Belle’s game.

Sure enough, not only is she able to play it splendidly using just her thoughts, but the two robotic arms instantly mimic the motions that Belle’s arm would make to control the joystick, “like dancers choreographed by the electrical impulses sparking in Belle’s mind,” her researchers report. The first time she did it, the two labs, in North Carolina and New England, erupted into loud celebration.

[- - e r i k - -]

Originally Posted by marden 

Do I detect a tinge of jealousy from your post?

I can imagine someone being envious of a monkey who can play a videogame 600+ miles away by just THINKING of the moves they want to make.

You don't think this is earth shaking???

Man can not use thought to manipulate game controls.

This monkey can.

Can't you understand the implications of such a thing???

Yes I can. We'd totally had to rewrite everything we have ever known about physics.

Or maybe we'd just write this off as what it really is: Good old gullibility.

[marden]

Originally Posted by - - e r i k - - 

Yes I can. We'd totally had to rewrite everything we have ever known about physics.

Or maybe we'd just write this off as what it really is: Good old gullibility.

So what happens if you are wrong?

Put this in your sig for a month.

"Art Bell is the GREATEST!"

With no other qualifiers.

Deal?

[- - e r i k - -]

Deal.

What do I get out of this though? Can you please remove yourself from the MacNN forums completely?

No wait, I'll suspect you'll just ignore any evidence to the contrary and in a year (or hopefully in a week) no one will ever remember the outrageous claim of a "telekinetic" monkey and it's blind believers will wisk it away from their memory and go on to believe the next and greatest outrageous claim. And the world will keep on turning …

[Dakar²]

Originally Posted by - - e r i k - - 

Can you please remove yourself from the MacNN forums completely?

Yeah, like a new nick wouldn't surface after two weeks anyway.

[- - e r i k - -]

Originally Posted by Dakar² 

Yeah, like a new nick wouldn't surface after two weeks anyway.

That's why I added the modifier completely after it. Makes it less unambiguous.

[Y3a]

Originally Posted by - - e r i k - - 

less unambiguous.

Um.............. Zat the same as "MORE AMBIGUOUS" ?

[Dakar²]

Originally Posted by - - e r i k - - 

That's why I added the modifier completely after it. Makes it less unambiguous.

I figured you'd say that... and you'd be right. I just couldn't resist.

[Naaaaak]

Originally Posted by Agasthya

Who the hell is Art Bell?

...

[- - e r i k - -]

Originally Posted by Y3a 

Um.............. Zat the same as "MORE AMBIGUOUS" ?

Sorry. My non-native English gets (less) sloppy with tiredness and a couple of beers

[Dakar²]

Originally Posted by - - e r i k - - 

Sorry. My non-native English gets (less) sloppy with tiredness and a couple of beers

Dude, Australians are considered native english speakers. Its you 'merican that needs work.

[- - e r i k - -]

Originally Posted by Dakar² 

Dude, Australians are considered native english speakers. Its you 'merican that needs work.

I am not Australian.

[Dakar²]

I didn't seriously think so.