CogNation

Joe and Rolf discuss recent research finding that recordings from the brain can be used to reconstruct the speech that is being thought about. Getting into the prospects of mind-reading and other futuristic possibilities, they discuss some of the limitations of research in the area and what makes progress so difficult. Source material: Speech Synthesis from Neural Decoding of Spoken Sentences by G. Anumanchipalli et al. (2019) YouTube video of the model

Our guest is Karen Schloss, who studies the way in which color is imbued with meaning through a lifetime of associations with objects (like bananas and fire trucks) and concepts (like love and politics). We discuss her research, including topics such as: What color should recycling bins be? A tool that can help designers use color-concept associations in their work The "blueberry problem" (why is is that blueberries aren't very blue?) How to market a blue banana What color heaven and hell should be Links: Dr. Karen Schloss's lab at the Wisconsin Institute for Discovery Colorgorical: A color-concept tool Our paper for discussion: "Color inference in visual communication: the meaning of colors in recycling"

We examine a paper that finds sleep disruption from using tablet computers (as compared to reading a book in dim light). How much should we be worried about the effects of screens on a good night's sleep? There's good reason to believe that blue light is the main culprit -- recently discovered receptors in the eye that respond to blue light directly connect to brain areas implicated in sleep regulation. We lay out the case.... Papers: "Evening use of light-emitting eReaders...." "Melanopsin: photoreceptors, physiology and potential"

Joe and Rolf talk with Brent Stansfield, who is currently the director of medical education at Wayne State University, about the future of health care and the kinds of value that doctors can provide as artificial intelligence and robotic surgery come of age. We frame the discussion around the article "Medical Education Must Move From the Information Age to the Age of Artificial Intelligence" by Steven Wartman & Donald Combs.Special Guest: Brent Stansfield.

We talk about the history of research on intelligence. Is intelligence a real thing? What does it actually refer to, and can it be measured? Joe and Rolf discuss.

We discuss the article: Augmentation of Brain Function: Facts, Fiction, and Controversy ...a collection that explores recent research and opinion on ways of enhancing brain functioning, from classroom learning to the use of electrical and laser stimulation on the brain.

Is self-control something that we an think of as a resource that can be depleted and replenished? It's been a popular model in psychology for years, but it has come under question recently. We discuss "Why self-control seems like (but may not be) limited", a paper by Inzlicht and colleagues that proposes an alternate model.

Can we create life artificially? What would that even mean? Rolf and Joe talk about the field of Artificial Life, or "A-Life", which has worked toward the goal from a number of academic disciplines for the past thirty or so years. They think about different approaches, such as software, hardware, and biological artificial life, and consider what it might take to convince us that we have created something that would be considered life.

Dr. Stephanie Preston is our guest for this great conversation about the neural and evolutionary underpinnings of heroic behaviors. She proposes that heroism can be found across the phylogenetic spectrum, and acts of human heroism may have significant roots in conserved behavior patterns -- for example, the instinct for mother rats to retrieve and protect their young even at the risk of great personal danger. We discuss what qualifies as heroism, how situations can cue (or inhibit) heroic behavior, and what the evolutionary advantage might be to put one's own genes at risk to save the life of another. We also discuss the field of evolutionary psychology as a whole, and the way in which researchers think about it differently than it is often represented in popular press.Special Guest: Stephanie Preston.

The psychologist Dan Wegner (1948-2013) had a lot of influential work. One of his most popular (and controversial) claims was that conscious will is an illusion. He wanted to sidestep the issue of whether or not "free will" in a metaphysical sense exists, and get to the more psychological issue of why human beings have such a strong feeling that their conscious intention is what causes their actions. Can this be right? What exactly does Wegner mean, and does this mean we should abandon moral responsibility? Rolf and Joe get into the weeds sorting out how psychological insights can inform how we think about philosophical issues.

We talk with Adrian Nestor, a professor and researcher at the University of Toronto, Scarsborough, about his recent research, the state of current brain imaging technology, and some speculations about where the field is headed. Can mental images and thoughts be captured, decoded, and understood by a combination of electroencephalography and machine learning techniques? What is the hype and what is the reality?

Dr. Beatrice Golomb describes her paper, "Diplomats’ Mystery Illness and Pulsed Radiofrequency/ Microwave Radiation" which details the evidence for the theory that the Frey Effect is responsible for the Cuban embassy incident in 2016. She also details the (mis)handling of the New York Times story that popularized this claim as a leading theory of the incident.

Rolf and Joe tackle an interesting perceptual phenomenon called the Frey Effect. In the Frey Effect, first discovered in the 1960s, pulsed microwave beams can cause the perception of a high-pitched sound. This has come up in the news recently as an explanation of possible "attacks" on the American embassy in Cuba. How exactly does this work? Should it be something we should worry about? Discussion is based around UC San Diego professor Dr. Beatrice Golomb's paper documenting the case that the Frey Effect is responsible.

In part A of the episode, Joe and Rolf base discussion around "Rapid calibration of an intracortical brain–computer interface for people with tetraplegia" by Brandman et al., thinking beyond the hype to get a realistic picture of how things work in the field. It's not all like The Matrix (yet).

In this second part on brain-computer interfaces, discussion goes toward the more speculative. Joe and Rolf talk about Elon Musk's Neuralink project, which aims to fully connect brains with computers. Would this be possible? Could any system really read our thoughts in the way portrayed in science fiction? Should we even want this to happen? And most importantly, how does this affect the coming Robopocalypse?

Today on the show Rolf and Joe discuss the use of virtual reality for the treatment of mental health disorders like phobias and PTSD. They explore research from Dr. Skip Rizzo on the state of the art, discuss limitations of VR, and then engage in some wild and possibly irresponsible speculation.

In the inaugural episode of CogNation, Joe and Rolf talk about artificial intelligence that mimics the way people think. Along the way, they also talk about pneumatic tubes, uploading consciousness, and how we'll spend our time when robots do all the work. They touch on how this all inevetiably leads to robots taking over the world. The discussion is based around the article "Building Machines That Learn and Think Like People" by Brenden Lake, et al. This article focuses on recent progress in cognitive science that suggests that human-like thinking machines should leverage causal models of the world and be endowed with intuitive physics and psychology.