The latest ceasefire in gaza appears to be holding, giving time to hammer out a more durable deal. The two sides are so far apart. When we talk about syria, we always talk about figures. People here have been bombing, shelling, people dying, picture in their heads they cannot get rid of. An australian boy holding the decapitated head of a syrian soldier. Pretty graphic evidence of the threat they represent. The details of Robin Williamss death are disturbing. A dark end to a man who brought so much light into this word. We begin with whats been a long week for the people of ferguson, missouri and the shouldion death of Michael Brown leading to rioting and looting that caused property damage. The story took a turn when video emerged showing the victim engaged in a strongarmed robbery shortly before he was gunned down. If it was a long week for the residents, it may have been an even longer week for local law enforcement, in the cross hairs over accusations of on overly militaristic response making a bad situation worse. Joining us now is a writer of an opinion blog and author of the book rise of the warrior cop. We dont mean to imply in any way that what happened in Michael Brown was directly connected to the militarization of police. The response has been striking, because what were seeing are swat teams that would be easily mistaken for militaryouts in a war zone. We know the situation there is volatile, but do police need this kind of equipment to react to Something Like what weve seen there . I mean, this kind of force is appropriate when youre spoonedding to a very specific situation, so if there were reports of looting or rioting in a particular area, maybe a swat team is appropriate. The idea behind a swat team is to use overwhelming force and violence to diffuse an already violent situation. What were seeing in ferguson and other cities after a cries like this is a mass suppression and saturation of entire towns apartment neighborhoods, photos weve seen, the people being accosted by police in those photos arent in the pros of committing a crime. Theyre being stopped and searched and hatted down. These arent images we associate with a free society. This looks more like martial law. The aclu released a report in june looking at military grade equipment transferred to police from war fight tore crime fighter. In 1990, the military gave about a Million Dollars worth of equipment through that program, by last year, 450 million. There are swat teams almost everywhere, now, and some members say there are 50,000 swat operations a year, thats almost 140 a day. Some counties have them every day. The concern that is theyre increasingly used to conduct ordinary police work . They are. In fact, that is the case in st. Louis county. Just a couple of years ago, there was a swat raid in st. Louis county to serve an administrative warrant for a white collar crime. Neighbors complained to the local media and the local media asked the st. Louis Police Department why this show of force. The st. Louis Police Responded every single search warrant in st. Louis county is now served with a swat team, regardless of the crime. St. Louis county is the county that has come in to ferguson and is however you want to look at it, imposing order or martial law. The images you are seeing are mostly of st. Louis county troops, ferguson is in st. Louis county. Yeah, i think whats happening is this kind of force that was once reserved for emergency situations when youre talking about hostage takings or active shooters has spread all over the country because a number of these federal policies and has become the default use of force in far too many situations. On the other hand, weve seen terrible situations where police have gone to serve an arrest warrant at a house and end up getting killed. Especially when we do see this kind of situation, the rioting, the serious violence, sometimes citizens more heavily armed than police. What we want is police to respond with an appropriate amount of force. You know, locking down an entire neighborhood or town because of rioting or looting, you know, basically is punishing all the residents of that town for the actions of a few people. You know, its, yes, its true that in some cases police have been killed serving search warrants, but, you know, if the police are looking for a felon, if theyre looking for somebody suspected of serious violent crimes, perhaps that force is appropriate, but the vast majority of swat raids are to search warrants on people suspected of drug crimes. The majority of people who shoot back at Police Believe they are being robbed by other drug dealers, waking people up and setting off flash grenades eelicits a response in people. We want police to use the amount of force they need to protect themselves and the community, but what were seeing in ferguson is that the residents are more scared of the police than they are of the people who are rioting and looting, and thats a problem. Thanks for giving us your perspective. My pleasure. Thanks for having me on. Israeli tanks were silent on the gaza borders thursday. And allowed peace talks in cairo to move forward. In gaza city, palestinians used the break in the fighting to enjoy at least a few days of more normal life. Israeli and palestinians negotiators have until monday to hammer out a deal. Hamas is demanding an end of israelis gaza blockade and new facilities including a functioning court and airport. The state department confirmed reports the u. S. Had held up delivery of some weapons to israel over concern with civilian deaths in gaza. For more, im joined by jerusalem, Company Founder of the think tank, helped negotiate the release of an israeli soldier after five years of imprisonment by hamas and writes a column for the jerusalem post. Very good to ever you with us. The israelis and the palestinians now have five days to come up with a deal to end the war in gaza. Is either side willing to make the concessions that would make a deal possible . Well, its not only a matter of making the concessions. Both sides can make the concessions. We have a situation that both sides completely underestimated each other with regard to their intentions and abilities in fighting a war and now we have a situation where there is no trust and no reason for there to be trust between the sides to come to an agreement that would give each side the achievements that they want. So far, we have a loselose situation, where both sides have paid heavy prices for the decisions theyve made in going to this war, and theyre pretty much stuck now in trying to figure out how oh to get out of it. I would say both sides are ready for this war to officially end. How does israel negotiate with the palestinians, though . Palestinian Authority Representatives of told us they speak for owl palestinians, including hamas, but one group of negotiators has gone back to the west bank for negotiators, another to qatar. How does that work if theyre split going to different places to get different opinions . I received a phone cull from one of the hamas leaders in gaza who told me that palestinian president speaks for them all, that the delegation that was negotiating in cairo was headed by the representative and he headed the delegation and negotiated. The hamas people in cairo had no direct contact with the israelis and the egyptian mediators contacted the hamas people mainly not even directly. If its true that the hamas people have in fact authorized president abass to speak on their behalf, its possible for israel to negotiate directly, Prime Minister netanyahu and president abass, whos in aman this evening could meet tomorrow morning, could neat over the next days and come to an agreement and they will accept that agreement. I know you argue that that is what israel should do. What about reports that hamas is divided, that differences of opinion with hamas leaders in gaza. I think it could be. I think there are lots of internal arguments, power struggles within hamas, differences of opinion, not only between the hamas leadership outside and hamas leadership inside, but even within the hamad leadership inside and military forces. Hamas has always had a difficult Decision Making pros. The war is in a wait and see with the five day ceasefire that the military fighters were emerged and even the enormous amount of damage in gaza, that the people on the streets are telling hamas in gas enough is enough and that message is being driven home and war being directed not from gaza. We had Aaron David Miller on the show the other day arguing that abass has the willingness but not the power to really go forward with a longer term and more serious deal. Thats part of the case. Its complexion in that the situation has changed in the past days because were seeing compromises coming out of cairo that i would have thought were impossible a few days ago and hamas is not talking about a long term deal, but about a five year ceasefire. I was told they would agree to International Inspection to ensure that they are not using Building Materials coming into gaza to rebuild bunkers and tunnels, that they would agree to troops of the Palestinian Authority not only at the rafah crossing with egypt but along the border in that buffer zone israel is demanding, that they would be willing to see the Palestinian Authority troops there. These are significant compromises from hamas. With netanyahu, it has clear that he has demonstrated the will to move forward and would open the possibility of Regional Security and stability pact between israel and its neighbors, egypt, saudi arabia, some of the gulf states. This is what we really should be doing and netanyahu has not yet demonstrated the political will to do that. Maybe he will understand that this war has opened opportunities for israel that were not so clearly identifiable before the war as they are now. Youre pretty moderate guy but youve written that a long term compromise needs to include the end of hamas. We need to allow the palestinians to choose their leadership, go back to elections and determine who they want to lead them. I would hope that it would not be a hamas led leadership, but a leadership that wants peace with israel. I would hope they would elect a moderate leadership leading them a toward successful negotiation witness israel. Lets hope this longer term truce leads to some even longer term compromise. Pleasure to have you with us, thank you. We will be right back. America. Stories that impact the world, affect the nation and touch your life. Im back. Im not going anywhere this time. Only on Al Jazeera America. More than 150,000 people ever died in the syrian civil war, displacing 9 million, almost 3 million of whom fled to other countries. The crises in iraq and gaza have driven this from the headlines. Doctors without borders that continued work since the syria conflict began. Doctors have delivered more than 63,000 emergency room consultations, 10,000 surgeries, 100,000 outpatient visits and 2300 babies in facilities from hospital to say caves and tents. Doctors without borders calls attention to the suffering in syria and in neighboring countries. With a new web video, the reach of war, one day in the conflict. Heres a sample. It is what the patient needs now, not tomorrow, and not in a week. For more, im joined here in new york by tara. Newell from Doctors Without Borders. The reach of war videos are very, very powerful, powerfully depressing showing the suffering, inspiring showing the work that your doctors do in those war torn areas. The message youre trying to get out is there is no way with these numbers and the numbers of horrible. Staggering. No way of understanding the magnitude of whats happening. You know, the data is staggering, and i think thats something that gets reported in the media often, but what gets lost is the human face to the whole conflict. Its so easy going into the fourth year now of this conflict to be desense tides to the whole thing. I think a big part of what we were trying to do and say is theres such a human emment to it that people just perhaps need to understand then what ill equate it to, ive come back from being there for a year trying to explain to my family, these are developed modern people, people like you and me who sent their children to school with a spiderman backpack or soccer practice after school, flat t. V. In their homes and suddenly, the whole bottom has fallen out for them. Suddenly, you have no longer access to health care, when we take for granted we can go and get care, no care is available and your children are dying are preventable things that would have been unheard of before the conflict. Doctors have had to set up clinics in chicken farms and caves under crazy circumstances. The Syrian Government isnt allowing them on their territory. I know you are in parts of syria where the government is not in control, but what about the danger to your doctors . Youve got the savagery of this is group. Access is to limited in this country because of the insecurity. Weve had to be creative with the delivery of our programs for that region and juggle at all times the best interest of those we serve and the security of our staff. Its not just our expatriot staff, but all the doctors and hospitals. What ive seen this year was an absolute disregard for humanitarian principles, which is also very difficult for us. Ive worked in many contexts around the world where at the end of the day at least hospitals and ambulances were respected in the middle of a conflict. We dont see that in syria. You show doctors working and helping people. Lets look at one of your doctors and what he had to say, a trauma surgeon at work in jordan. Theres the shell. We have three new cases coming. Some of these doctors are working around the clock. How many people are there like him, who in your group, who come to it because of their personal experiences . We have so many. We have so many people working for us. Expatriot staff as well as National Staff some of which are refugees themselves. Its extraordinary how many people are willing to put themselves out there and risk their lives to help. To be honest, once you get there, youre compelled to help. These people are so, so so in need and so much suffering from little kids to old people. Its across the board and these refer gee camps are cities with more than 100,000 people. Lets play another clip. In this case, its a psycho therapist. If anybody could tell them you have to stay here for another two months and then you can go back home, people would cope easily, but nobody can tell them when they can leave the camp or if they can go back. Its not just the physical suffering, its the psychological suffering. As you said, their lives completely upturned. What does that do to their psyche . To be honest, i cant imagine myself, because i cant say ive been through it. To be honest, these are people who as i say were normal People Living normal lives when everything fell out. The psychological trauma is enormous and during the time that i was there, the North Carolina of psychological patients we saw and the severity of it became greater and greater as weve gone opinion. They dont see an end in sight. Four years in it, i cant predict how this is going to go. Thats what plays on them, when is this going to end, when will this nightmare end. I think thats got to be impossible to live with. What can people do to help Doctors Without Borders . Lets just watch. A young girl lost both her legs, lost her mother. Its horrifying, the need of the people there. What can people do for Doctors Without Borders . Of course, i think the first thing we want to happen is for people to understand whats happening, to be cam passionate and to see this human side of it. Part of the work that we do is also to witness what we see and share with other people. That in and of itself is important to us. Other than that, of course, being able to support across barredder supply of goods, the United Nations making an effort to get supplies in and the International Community really needs to speak up about this. Its very underwe will ming to be honest, the International Response to this cries. I think we need to get together, speak of it louder in terms of international need to allow access. The most brutal extremists in recent memory. Some of what we will show and discuss is graphic. From its murderous persecution of tens of thousands of members of the yazidis, surrounding by fighters trying to kill them to its persecutions of christians, public beheadeddings a understand mass executions, and two women stoned to death for adultery. The Islamic State group makes horrifying use of children, having frightening success in getting kids to join, as we see in this now viral video from vice news. For more on the brutality of the Islamic State group, including using child soldiers, im joined by nia bloom, the author of small articles, children and terror. Good to have you with us. The brutality of the Islamic State is staggering, from the massacres of the yazidis and kidded nappings of women, a woman being stoned to death for adultery. Are people terrified . I think theyre portraying themselves if you watch the video they put out. They had a message to the muslim community, saying greetings from the islamic caliphate and portraying an islamic utopia. Theyre not showing the stoning, the beheadings, not showing peoples heads skewered on fences and posts, something out of game of thrones, yet theyre still able to attract 10,000 foreign fighters. They are putting out propaganda videos showing brutality, including some of the slaughter. We saw an australian boy holding the severed head of a victim. His father is an i. S. Fighter. He posted it on line saying thats my boy. Australian Prime Minister called it barbaric. Nothing would surprised me from these people, but how do they justify twisting a childs mind in this way. I was shocked. I saw this was posted to the Facebook Page and twitter, you know, his son is only seven years old. Easy got two sons. Actually three sons that hes brought with him. I just cant imagine how this isnt a form of child abuse. What theyre doing is manipulating children, and this is just a form of at least for me, of almost like a cult of brainwashing. Theyre making this kind of brutality normal and every day. Its a way of desensitizing the children to the fact that these are real people. The child doesnt look comfortable in the photo. Its a really shocking photo and he has to use both hands, its a really heavy head. This is really, theyre not showing this in their videos. This is where i think he has done us a favor, by showing the brutality and showing that the reality that theyre portraying isnt the reality of every day existence. This process of manipulating kids begins early. Theyre involving kids early in different places in getting them into this mindset of jihad . Absolutely. Its not just groups that are getting the kids involved in jihad. In part of what ive done by focusing on the recruitment and mobilization of children globally. I spent time in sri lanka. The l. T. T. E. Had a children division. We saw that in northern island, so this is not something exclusive to islam. Many terrorist groups train kids from a young age to indoctrinate them. This is on the vice t. V. Recently when they showed the Islamic State part two. One of the fathers said these children will be i in doctrinatd properly. New terror weapon, little girls, you wrote about a little girl groomed for martyrdom. In fact, she was groomed by her brother, who was a taliban commander and she decided she didnt want to do it. What were seeing is the children are either being coerced or they really dont know what theyre doing. I spent time in pakistan at a facility where they train that suicide bombers, this was the Pakistani Taliban as young as six. These kids dont understand what theyre engaged in. Getting them out is important. Its like getting them out of cuts. For the west, Something Else we have to worry about is the recruitment of women as terrorists, including a big effort to get western women. We saw among other cases, this recent alleged example of a young woman from colorado. Yes, although i think she was mistaken in what kind of role she could have. She trained a explorers, thinking she would be a front line fighter. The majority of women are not going to be suicide bombers now. Theyre not going to fight the enemy, theyre going there to become mothers and propagate the next generation. What weve seen on twitter is up to 26 women. They are looking for suicide bombers, too. Isis isnt looking for women suicide bombers yet. That might be the next stage. Weve seen them in iraq, by isis are looking at women in a very traditional way, the same as the taliban. It took the taliban many years before they started having women suicide bombers. They dont buy into the idea of a woman being equal to a man. Still a scary situation across the world with everything thats going on. Good of you to join us that discuss these very unplease anttoppics. Thanks. Well be back with more of consider this. Presents a Breakthrough Television event. Borderland long held beliefs. Im really pissed off at the mexican government. Give way to compassion. If you feel tired, would you turn around and come back . Our teams find out first hand how treacherous the migrants journey can be. We make them take a trip of death it is heartbreaking when you see the families on top of the rail car borderland continues only on Al Jazeera America turning to the death of Robin Williams, which has led to an outpouring of grief around the world. Today, the coroner confirmed the 63yearold actor died of asphyxiation by hanging. He used a belt that apparently had cuts on his left wrist, as well. A pocket knife was found near his body. Williams publicist said he had battled deep depression, a condition that seems to disproportionately affect comedians. Our next guest met williams 16 years ago and has written about depression and suicide among comedians. He is the host of the jim norton show. Sad for your loss. I know youve known him a long time and wrote very eloquently about your own struggle. You considered suicide as a teenager and you white about how you glam rise that as an exit. You write about how so moan comedians struggle with the demons of self hatred and self destruction. Why do you think that is . Its hard to say. Every comic i know, something is wrong with them. Whether i write something, i try to write it from something personal. For me, it was drugs and alcohol, and sex. For a lot of guys, its gambling or over seating. Comics are quick fix people. We want now, Immediate Reaction and now. We get addicted to things quickly, i think. Once you realize that being funny bails you out of anything and takes you out of sadness and its a way to manage rotten stuff youre feeling, you become addicted to that. Thats why a lot of comics have this stuff that we have. You say in some ways the deeper the pit, the more funny somebody ends up being. Richard pryor tried to set himself on fire. When a guy like pryor cant get through life without trying to kill himself, what hope is there for anybody. When a guy as funny as robin. It seems to me the guys ive always liked, even that werent as famous as robin who died or suffered substance abuse, they were always the funniest ones with guys that could go to the darkest applies. Cook di has evolved to a personal type of humor, but that exposes the comedian to criticism and hurt. The country has changed. The reporting has changed. If a comedian did something in 1940, number heard about it. Now, it becomes public and we talk about it. The more we talk about it, the more people know about you. It just seems people got an insight to these guys are funny, but theres something damaged with a lot of them. There is some stuff maybe people didnt want to know. Four years ago, Robin Williams talked about depression and talked about thinking about suicide on a podcast and how he considered suicide in 2008. When i was drinking, there was only one time for a moment where i thought [bleep]. I went like my conscience, did you obviously just say [bleep]. You have a pretty good life right now. Sad now. Its very rare for a star of his magnitude to commit suicide. I can only think of marilyn monroe, but youve known a bunch of comics who have, certainly big ones Like Lenny Bruce and freddy prince and Richard Pryor tried. If you go back over the act, youre going to find a reference to it. If a comedian is killed in a car accident, youll find he joked about Car Accidents or robin talking about that. Because death is a dark thing and motor comics address dark things. You can see them talk about their own death somewhere, will seem a before i gottive fashion. You write about how he was beloved by comedians and talked about how you first met him at the comedy cellar and he really wanted you guys to like him. We never want to act impressed with somebody bigger than you are. He was a nice guy. It wasnt an act. It wasnt fake. I was a nobody and he just treated everybody the same. He treated everybody respectfully and was gentle to the guy he was going to bump off the lineup and that means a lot to comics. We love to tear somebody apart when they walk out of the room. It means a lot to everybody. Those of us lucky to meet him in one capacity or another, what i read from anybody exposed to him, he was somebody who cared about people and made them feel good. Youre right, in a way, its a very sad end to go what you write. Its quite powerful. You talk about how humans really dont understand how we are perceived by other people. Yeah. And you say that he couldnt that you hope that he didnt, because if he had known, and still killed himself, it would make it even that much more sad. I always use that in a negative thing. When people are being stupid, they dont see themselves like we do. When Something Like this happens, youre like that guy didnt see how much everybody liked him or what a great affect he had on other people. A brilliant actor. We bumble through acting jobs, he was brilliant at it. He could improv better than anybody. He had everything that all of us want, and its like god, do you understand the effect you had on people. When he left the comedy cellar, they would talk about how nice he was and hung out and talked to everybody. He never got to hear those conversations, because he had left, but there was always good stuff. I never heard him bad mouthed when he walked out of the room. Fed understood that, how beloved it was, it would make this even sadder. You almost hope somebody didnt notice. If somebody saw that stuff, how loved he was and still did, thats an even more terrible thing to think about. Good of you to join us and get your perspective and thoughts on Robin Williams. Consider this will be right back. From the watergate hearings to the revelation that he was not a crook, presided in secret over the nations biggest political scandal, to the fall of saigon and americas first defeat in a war. Add in a gas crisis with hour long lines to fill your tank, crumbling cities and an heiress turned terrorist, people felt they lived in a country they didnt know. It provided political soil for an optimist named Ronald Reagan. For more, im joined from chicago by author of the invisible bridge, the fall of nixon and the rise of reagan. I was a teenager living abroad back then. I remember thinking america was killing itself with self inflicted windows. You grew up after that period and when you were a teenager in the age of reagan and the 1980s, did you look back at the 1970s and feel america was fogg apart . It was far too abstract for me. I was fascinated with the 1960s. Every day seemed to bring a new revolution and the 1980s seemed boring. I became obsessed with the 1960s and became a historian. It seemed in many ways that those attitudes had won, but in 1980, reagan gets elected and when you look back at the 1960s, it looks much more like a civil war between the right and left. What you write about in this book is nixon who took power late in the 1960s and describe him as more liberal than what people like to think of him as. Ford we think of as a no one confrontational president. Reagan almost beats him in 1976. He barely loses, ford gets the gop candidacy, but the platform that the gop approves then is extremely conservative, at least compared to platforms in the past and when we first see the modern gop. Thats right. And even that, there was kind of a civil war within the reagan camp that tried to make the platform even more conservative, and this was a time in which when Ronald Reagan decided he was going to run for president within the context of american politics, a very controversial thing to do, because a president had not lost the nomination for his own partys president ial run since well before this, in the middle of the 19th century. When he started running, people thought he had no chance. He was out of it. He was an actor. He also was irrelevant because the vietnam war was over. He got his National Profile attacking anti war protestors. The first time he did well in a gallup poll, the headline has the poll gone bananas. He started winning primary after primary and for the first time that summer, the republicans had a convention in which the outcome was not known before the convention, so really kind of just this Political Party that was ravaged by watergate was almost torn in half. It really was the beginning of reaganism, which i see most profoundly as an american inability to kind of face the traumas that it experienced during the 1970s, wimp it was looking at very closely and in very mature ways with the watergate investigation, with the examination of whether america could be the worlds policemen. Youve seen the conservative movement. You start with barry gold water in the 1964 election that saw him defeated badly, move on to Richard Mixon and what you described as politics of the division that helped put him in the white house. After nixon, after watergate, even after the first couple of years with ford in offers, the conventional wisdom was that conservatism was pretty much finished. Thats right. Every time a conservativism faces a setback, kind of the pundits in american politics declare conservatism dead. My first book ends with pundits saying if the republicans dont kick out the conservatives, there might not be a conservative party. Two months ago, the same kind of pundits or their spiritual children were saying the tea party was dead, the republican establishment was back in power and they were totally shell shocked when eric cantor lost his seat to a tea party insurgent. People deeply want to believe that these kind of enlightened liberal values are on the marsh, but conservatism is so deeply insinuated within american politics i dont see it going away in our lifetime. The tea party has not done terrible ply well in the other primary elections. But one of the reasons the establishment has done well, theyve incorporated so many again, tea party positions. Going back to the book, nearly every republican politician turned against nixon after watergate. Reagan defended him pretty much in my the end and kind of dismissed watergate as not being that big a deal. You do describe him as an optimist in the face of chaos. Theres a striking quote that you said that he was an athlete of the imagination. Thats right. A master at turning complexity and confusion and doubt into simplicity and stout hearted certainty. Thats right. Given what happened in the 1970s and after 1976, where your book ends with the carter years are and everything that happened in the late 1970s, was that not what this country needed . Thats where i disagree. Its definitely what the country wanted, but there were Serious Problems going on in america. What the watergate hearings revealed day after day on t. V. Was a Leadership Class behaving like mafioso. America needed to look at whether it could be the worlds policemen and whether it was a good idea to enter into another Counter Insurgency war, which we did in iraq. We had to face the energy crisis. We were solving difficult problems like adults and those problems are still on the table, because our kind of national id which wanted to see everything as cheerful and optimistic and couldnt handle the adult burden of facing problems was superseded. When you hear samantha power, nominated to be United Nations ambassador, in her confirmation hearing being asked about an article where she talked about mistakes america Foreign Policy has made, she was asked by a republican congressman, marco rubio, what are you referring to . What are these sins america should answer for . She answered america is the great effort country in the word and has nothing to apologize for. A grownup country has to face its problems honestly. We lost that skill. That was a powerful moment with senator rubio and that is one of the many things you address in this book, we can unfortunately only skim the surface. You did a great job. Its really a pleasure to have you with us. Its certainly worth reading, bring that period of the American History to life. Pleasure to have you with us. Thank you so kindly for the opportunity. Well be back with more of consider this. Bazooka. With s. W. A. T. Raids on the rise. When it goes wrong, it goes extremely wrong. Whats the price for militarizing our police they killed evan dead faul lines, Al Jazeera Americas hard hitting. There blocking the door. Ground breaking. We have to get out of here. Truth seeking. Award winning investigative documentary series. Deadly force only on Al Jazeera America america mobile app, available for your apple and android mobile device. Download it now can you imagine seeing sound . Scientists in the Massachusetts Institute of technology have discovered a way to do that. So much for get smarts cone of silence or sound proofing. The researchers figured out how to use video to decipher sound drop the way an object vibrates. The results are startling. You can hear someone speaking through sound proof glass using video of a bag of potato chips. This is what a cell phone recorded from inside, next to the bag of chips. Mary had a little lamb whos fleece was white as snow. This is what we recovered from high speed video, filmed from outside behind sound proof glass. Mary had a little lamb whos fleece was white as snow and everywhere that mary went the lamb was sure to go. An m. I. T. Computer science p. H. D. Student and author joins us. This stuff is amazing, you got pretty good sound by using video even though the room was sound proof, can you complain how this works . Well, so having a sound proof window is going to stop sound from getting through the window, but its not going to stoplight. So, the way that we recover sound is from a video, and the reason why we can do that is because sound is making the object that we see actually physically move. So, that motions really, really subtle, but it turns out that with the right ago go rhythms, you can actually recover it from video and use it to reproduce the sound that was causing those motions. How do you figure out me saying oh as opposed to me saying a . So its hard to explain, sort of at that level of detail, but basically, the real trick is sort of looking at the waves that the object is moving at a really, really small scale, and then trying to filter out the motions that correspond to sound around the object, as opposed to other things. One thing i found incredible is that in the pros of you doing that and figuring out all these differences between different sounds is that what you, the similarity between the actual sound in the example of the potato chip bag and the real sound of the voice taped in a more normal traditional way, again, how does it extinguish between one persons accent and another persons accent . Because it really you could ever told by the wave through your technology if its you speaking or me speaking. Well, so, i mean, the accent of the person speaking is sort of not really going to have an effect on the wave that the object moves or i guess more accurately what i should say is if the accent of the person speaking is different, then that is going to affect the way that the object moves in a way that you should be able to detect, and in particular, you know, sound is just changes in pressure that are traveling through the air, and so when those changes in pressure hit an object, thats going to cause the object to move and its going to move in a way that sort of mimics the motion of the air around. It if we can extract and filter out that motion, then whatever your sound is, we should be able to get some information about it. We should be able to figure out what that sound was. The technology is worrying people a bit. M. I. T. Researchers, can they reefs drop on you with a camera and potato chip bag. There have been dramatic headlines about you guys eaves dropping. What about privacy, are you worried about that . Could this be used by spies . I mean, i wouldnt worry too much about it, especially in every day person, i dont think this is a threat to their privacy. If you look at the experiments that weve done, we do show that this is something that you could use to eavesdrop on somebody, but its not really the easiest way to do that, in motor situations, at least. Its kind of an expensive way to record audio, so maybe, you know, if youre the worlds most wanted criminal or something, then somebody might invest the resources and this might be something that would make sense to use, but for every day people in every day settings, this is a really, you know, its not the easiest way to record audio. I can imagine. Its not an easy way to record audio. What about, you know, those traditional, you know, stories about lightbased listening devices, the ability to listen through windows by reading the window vibrations. Those techniques, they work by you shine a laser at something and then you catch the laser light that bounces off, that bounces back, and it turns out that if you can do this, then the laser will give you a lot of information, but the problem with those techniques is that a lot of times, its not really feasible to bounce that laser off of something and catch the reflective beam. What we do is we provide a way, if thats really what you want, we provide a way to get that kind of information in these situations where bouncing a laser off of something just isnt feasible. Has the c. I. A. Called . Not yet. How about the n. S. A. Not that i know of. I suspect youll be getting cause soon. Congratulations on your research, its fascinating, thanks very much. The conversation continues on our website or facebook or google plus pages. You can find us on twitter and follow me on twitter. Well see you next time. Real reporting that brings you the world. This is a pretty dangerous trip. 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