Is 'Mind-Meld' Possible?

[SevenCubed]

"Reading about putting things in animals' brains and changing what they do, people rightly get nervous", envisioning battalions of animal soldiers — or even human soldiers — whose brains are remotely controlled by others. [thestar.com...]

Actually I read this and a nervous thought never crossed my mind because we have already been there for a long time. Only weak minds are easily influenced. For those who are able to continue to objectively think for themselves there is nothing to be concerned about. This is yet another useless waste of taxpayer money because it has no value beyond a desire to control.

That said, strong minds can be whittled down to become weak if we allow ourselves to become overly dependent on technology to manage our daily routines.

<<< ALERT! If you are sensitive to rats and monkeys being used for scientific experiments you probably won't want to read the article >>>

[incrediBILL]

I hardly think it's useless as figuring out how to implant thoughts directly could be the stepping stone to the ultimate man machine interface.

However... putting thoughts in people's heads hasn't been that hard to do historically and it didn't need a lab.

Civilized people are basically sheep, something we've known for a very long time, and the outcome of the situation depends on how twisted the shepherd is. Some people are more domesticated than others and if you assume that even humans, at the top of the evolution ladder but still animals made of meat with predefined directives in DNA making some characteristics nature vs. nurture so some are built followers and others leaders.

If you don't think it's that easy check out the Silver Fox domestication project being done in Russia, Siberia I think, which was started in the 50s and they've already domesticated foxes to behave like dogs and the control group was bred to be as aggressive as possible and now it appears it's built right into the DNA and could be applicable to comparable DNA in humans.

We're obviously more complicated than foxes but being able to predict a violent tendency by DNA is closer than imaginable. Minority Report anyone?

Only weak minds are easily influenced.

Stockholm syndrome would appear to invalidate that concept as strong minds even tended to side with the captors.

FWIW, organized religion has been doing this research for thousands of years and peer pressure alone seems to have quite an impact in this area. The results seem to be YES, you can pretty much get people to think whatever you want them to if done properly.

More recent extreme examples would be Jonestown, Waco. Heaven's Gate, etc. because these people figured out how to get people to lay down and die for their cause, suicide bombers more specifically, and if that's not implanting thoughts I don't know what it is.

Can't ignore the notorious Charles Manson as a prime example of brain washing his followers.

[lucy24]

Only weak minds are easily influenced.

Chorus:
For if it prosper, none dare call it {a strong mind}.

Or:
Strong minds are not easily influenced. What is a strong mind? One that is not easily influenced.

Or:
I am firm, you are stubborn, he is a pig-headed so-and-so.

Or:
One person's moral courage is another person's closed mind.

Et cetera.

[graeme_p]

If I understood the paper correctly, it looks to me as though what was being transferred was sensations, not thoughts.

@incrediBILL, I thought we were not supposed to discuss religion on Foo? Or are attacks on religion exempted?

I would have thought that the biggest examples of brainwashing (which is not what the thread is about anyway) are governments. Also note that most of the suicide bombers of the last few decades were from a secular terrorist group (very aware of this as they came quite near to getting me a few times).

[incrediBILL]

@incrediBILL, I thought we were not supposed to discuss religion on Foo? Or are attacks on religion exempted?

I didn't discuss religion at all and had I digressed into specifics about one or the other I'd have removed my own post as I had some killer examples I could've used but didn't and just expressed my point in a broad sweeping generality withing with condoning nor condemning the practice, just acknowledging that it exists and works.

I discussed the type of mental control exerted by organized religion as an example which isn't a discussion of the religion whatsoever but the effects that can be achieved using peer pressure in a group environment and there are far fewer examples other than people that blindly follow leaders of despot regimes or what happened in Europe during the early decades of the last century.

If you could actually plug the thought directly into the brain as these researchers believe without using biological trucks that leave the matter up for debate it would certainly speed up the process and probably make more lasting results :)

I find the whole thing fascinating as we're well on our way to figuring out how to become the Borg collective the desktop computers were the stepping stone to cell phones, soon Google Glass, and the next step beyond ear buds and high tech contact lenses will be feeding data directly into the old noodle and you'll be shocked how many people will jump at the chance to become instantly smarter.

As many scientists and science fiction writers alike have theorized, humans themselves will be responsible for the next step in human evolution and based on what I'm seeing with the current level of technology paranoia we're probably going to split into two breeds as many will resist the cybernetic enhancements like some currently resist ATMs , online banking and cell phones.

I can tell you as a programmer I'd love to have access to all computer technical information at a mere thought. No searching, no reference books, no reading and researching, just everything I need to know when I need it at the forefront of my brain in real-time as needed. Of course I wouldn't want to get it way they did it in that article, yuk, but something less intrusive and electronic in nature would be appealing.

I suspect someday soon we'll actually get the proverbial 'thinking helmet' as an actual product, probably called iHat or Google Brain, with major corporations tapping directly into your frontal lobes.

Imagine the tracking cookies they'll leave there.

[Leosghost]

you'll be shocked how many people will jump at the chance to appear become instantly smarter.

There ya go Bill ..fixed it for ya :)

And all will be robot bunnies and connected bambies..

Til the power goes off..and/or the connection is broken..and then the number of us who can count past 25 without using parts of other peoples bodies..will maybe not be sufficient to "splice the wires"* and get it all back working..

We may already be past the point where if an EMP hit world wide, or an incoming cosmic snowball shut down the grids and made the clouds stay for a few decades, that enough could cope without electricity or facebook and search engines or twitter..

*metaphor

[seoskunk]

As always everything is answered in a film

The Manchurian Candidate deals excellently with brainwashing, whilst films like the Matrix or THEY LIVE! suggest a mass brainwashing.

Only the strong minded would refuse to believe they have been brainwashed.