Well, after such a great introduction, i cant wait to hear the speaker myself. [laughter] sometimes all these introductions can backfire. Recently, new York Magazine voted me as one of the 100 smartest people in new york city. [laughter] i thought, wow, what an honor. But in all fairness, in all fairness, i have to admit that madonna also made that same list. [laughter] and i understand that next year lady gaga is going to push me off the list entirely. [laughter] now today im going to the talk about the future, the future of the mind. And let me say that talking about the future is dangerous. Let me quote from that great philosopher of the western world, yogi berra [laughter] yogi berra once said, quote prediction is awfully hard to do, especially if its about the future. [laughter] well, im a physicist. We can predict the future of the universe billions of years into the future. So let me quote from that other great philosopher, woody allen. [laughter] he once said, quote eternity is an awful long time, especially toward the end. [laughter] well, you may say to yourself what does a physicist know about the mind . What does a physicist know about daily life . Well, we are the ones who invented the tran sis to have. We transistor. We invented the laser. We helped to assemble the first computer and the internet. We wrote the worldwide weapon. And along the way we invented television. We invented radio. Radar, microwaves, xray machines, and dont forget we created the Space Program and the gps satellite, and we physicists love to make predictions. When we helped to assemble the internet, one physicist predicted that the internet would become a forum of high culture, high art and high society. [laughter] well, today we know that 5 of the internet is pornography. [laughter] but thats because teenage boys log onto the internet. Just wait until the grandmas and grandpas log onto the internet. Then 50 of the internet will be pornography. [laughter] and, again, you may say to yourself, well, how does physics differ from chemistry or the other sciences . Well, let me tell you a little story. During world war ii, once the nazis captured a bunch of american scientists, and they called them spies, spies. And so they were about to be executed by firing squad. There was a geologist, a physicist and a chemist about to be shot by the firing squad by the nazis. Well, they lined them up, and then just as they were about to push the trigger, all of a sudden the geologist says, earthquake, earthquake well, chaos broke out, and then in the chaos the geologist snuck away. Well, now it was just the physicist and the chemist. They were lined up in the firing squad and then suddenly the physicist said lightning, lightning. Well, in the chaos the physicist sneaks away. Now its just the chemist. So they line up the their rifles, and all of a sudden the chemist says, fire, fire [laughter] sometimes it just doesnt pay. [laughter] so anyway, today im going the talk about the future of the mind. Ever since i was a child ive been fascinated by two things. First, ive been fascinated by outer space, by the origin of the universe. In fact, thats what i do for a living. Thats my day job. However, ive also been fascinated by inner space. What lurks on your shoulders is the most complex object in the known universe. If we were to create a computer that can simulate the brain, the computer would be the size of a city block. Thats how big the computer would be. Energy would require a Nuclear Power plant to fire it up and a river to cool it down. But your brain operates on 20 watts of power. So when someone calls you a dim bulb [laughter] thats a compliment. [laughter] and you dont need a Nuclear Power plant to energize your brain, a hamburger is fine. [laughter] so how is it possible . Well, my latest book, the future of the mind, im proud to say is now number one on the New York Times bestseller list. [applause] so im not the only one fascinated by the mind, because the book is now the number one hard cover book in the united states. But my previous book was also a bestseller, physics of the future, in fact, they tell me this is the first time in World History that the word physics entered the New York Times bestseller list. And i did it twice. [laughter] in physics of the impossible, i even go 500 years into the future when we have starships, teleportation, maybe even time travel. And i answer the question what happens if you go into a time machine . Go back in time to meet your teenaged mother before youre born and she falls in love with you. [laughter] well, if your teenage mother falls in love with you before youre born, youre in deep dodo if that happens. [laughter] so let us talk about the two greatest mysteries in the universe; the origin of the universe and whats sitting on your shoulders. Inner space and outer space. And last year the politicians got wind of the excitement. Weve learned more in the last five to ten years about the mind than in all of Human History combined. President barack obama last year got wind of this, and in his state of the Union Address announced the Brain Initiative. Just like the human genome project, changed the course of medicine giving us a disk with all our genes on it, obama announced the Brain Initiative with the europeans. 1 billion thats billion with a b, not an m will be devoted to creating a map, a map of the brain. Just think of it, we will have the genome and the connectome, all the neural connections of the mind on a discanning. The shortterm discanning. The shortterm goal is to cure Mental Illness. Mental illness has been with us since biblical times. Even the bible mentions Mental Illness. But if we have the connectome and the genome on two disks, then in some sense if you die, you live forever. You live forever in some sense because your personality, your memories, your wants and desires are coded inside a disk. So when i was a kid, i was fascinated by telepa think, reading minds. Telekinesis, moving objects with the mind, recording memories, uploading memories, photographing a dream. Believe it or not, we can do all of the above. And you will see that in todays slide show. But when i was a kid, i used to try to read peoples minds. I tried real hard to move objects with the mind. I finally came to the conclusion that maybe there are two telepaths that walk the surface of the earth true telepaths that walk the surface of the earth, but i wasnt one of them. [laughter] and then in science fiction, of course, its full of telepath. These are things that we can now do in the laboratory. Things that we could only dream of we now do in the laboratory. And even recording memories and uploading them. Hollywood is always ahead of us. This is the movie the matrix. Even reality, reality itself is a memory uploaded into the mind. So let me ask you a question. Late at night just before you go to sleep, late at night have you ever had that weird sensation that maybe, maybe life is an illusion . Maybe its just a memory uploaded into your mind like the matrix, and you are the only one thats real. And in some sense someone is testing you to see whether youre smart enough to figure out that youre the only real one. Ever had that weird feeling . Raise your hand if you ever had that feeling. Well, youre crazy. [laughter] you think youre the only one in the universe . Give me a break. You see, im the only one in the universe. [laughter] im sitting in my bed right now. [laughter] this is just a memory uploaded into my mind. Im just sitting in my bed all by myself. Well, hollywood, of course, is always ahead of us, and when it comes to uploading memories, no one can do it better than the former governor of california. [laughter] the former governor of california had the memory of being married to sharon stone uploaded into his mind, and look what happened to him. [laughter] this is total recall. And in total recall, Arnold Schwarzenegger is the good guy. For 99 of the movie, hes the good guy. You identify with him. Hes the hero. And in the last minutes of the film, you find out hes actually the bad guy with good guy memories uploaded. Its the only movie i know where hes both the hero and the villain simultaneously. And then we have iron man comics and the movies, exoskeletons. We can now do this in the laboratory. In fact, the pentagon realized that there are thousands of Wounded Warriors from iraq and afghanistan. They are now connecting the brain directly to a mechanical arm and exoskelton, bypassing the spinal cord totally. We can now do this in the laboratory. And then why not live our life throughen an avatar through an avatar, a surrogate . Surrogates have perfect bodies. Theyre superhuman in strength, theyre perfect, theyre gorgeous. Why not live our life through a surrogate or an avatar . This could be the future of the Space Program. Outer space is dangerous. Ever see the movie with sandra bullock, gravity . Whoa. Space is dangerous. So why not send a robot into outer space guided by you, and you are in your hot tub in your living room . From your hot tub, you mentally control a robot astronaut in outer space. Nasa is looking into this possibility. And then i used to dream about telekinesis, moving objects with the mind. This is the movie carrie where a telekinetic is bullied all her life and finally she cant take it anymore. So at the senior prom, she destroys the entire high school. Whats the lesson here . The lesson here is never take a telekinetic to the senior prom. [laughter] and then superman, the iconic figure of the comic books. Hollywood is right there again. Every kid knows that supermans father died when krypton blew up. But the latest movie has a twist with. You see, in the latest movie supermans father is reduced to a Computer Program. His connectome, his mind, his pathways of the brain are encoded in a Computer Program. And he comes back to life as Russell Crowe. [laughter] Russell Crowe is a hologram, a hologram that has all the performs, personality quickers memories, personality quirks, all the expressions of supermans father. Is this possible . This could be the end product of president Barack Obamas Brain Initiative. We will have a disk called brain 2. 0. Brain 2. 0 that lives on even after we die. And then the question is, can the mind exist without the body . 200, 300 years ago people thought that the spirit, the soul was different from flesh and blood. Then we have modern science which tells us, no, no, no. You see, the brain is wet ware, like hardware. The brain is computer wet ware and the mind is software. The mind is Software Running our wet ware. But, you see, if we can put the mind on a disk called the connectome, this billion dollar project of president Barack Obamas, then in some sense the mind can be separate from the body just as the ancients once thought. But lets talk about science. That was hollywood. Now lets talk about science. Because of physics, we can now peer right into the thinking process of the mind. With mri scans we can actually see thoughts ricocheting across the mind like a pingpong ball. We can actually see Mental Illness in action. This is a brain stem. On the left is the brain when you tell the truth. The red areas represent blood flow. Its really easy to measure with an mri scan. When you tell the truth, nothing happens. But when you tell a lie, ah, yes, when you tell a lie. First, you have to know the truth. Then you have to create the lie. Then you have to calculate the consistency of the lie with all the other lies youve been telling all these years. [laughter] thats a lot of brain power. Your brain lights up like a christmas tree. And now if you take a look at the brain, look at it from the point of view of evolution. Our brain is like a museum. Look at the back. The back part of the brain is the most ancient part of the brain. Its called the reptilian brain. When you are in a car accident and you get whiplash back here, sometimes you lose your sense of balance. Because whats back here is the most ancient part of the brain. The reptilian brain. Then in the middle is the monkey brain, the brain of emotions. The brain of social hierarchy, hunting in a pack, forming coalitions, understanding the intentions of other people. Thats the center of the brain. Then the front of the brain is the thinking brain; that is, the brain of humans. Now that we have brain scans, we can test old wives tales to see whether these old wives tales about the mind are true or not. For example, many people, many parents when they look at their teenage children are thoroughly convinced that teenagers are brain damaged. [laughter] yes, teenagers are brain damaged. You can actually see that with brain scans its amazing. The prefrontal lobe is not fully formed in teenagers. So the next time you argue with your teenagers, you know hes brain damaged. [laughter] another old wives tale is that when a man talks to a pretty girl, he starts to act stupid. Well, its true. You look at a brain scan of a man talking to a pretty girl, and blood drains from the prefrontal cortex. [laughter] men act retarded, stupid [laughter] its absolutely true. You can see that with brain scans. So old wives tales can now be tested against science. And then if you were to cut the brain horizontally, you have two hemispheres. On the left and the right hemispheres, and different parts of the mind are connected to different parts of the body. If you electrify this part of the brain it doesnt hurt at all, the brain has no pain sensors. The brain cannot feel pain. If you hit this part of the brain with electrodes, then your opposite hand moves. You hit this with electricity, then part of your hand moves. Now, it turns out that in epileptics we have to cut, cut the connection between the left and the right hemispheres. And then something bizarre, something mysterious begins to happen. When you cut the connection between the left and the right hemispheres, gradually two personalities begin to emerge, two different minds in the same brain begin to e memory. Emerge. We see this. All of a sudden you want to do one thing with your hand, and then your other hand goes like this, okay . In one documented case, onehalf of the brain was an atheist. The other half of the brain was a believer. Now, in the future im sure that were going to find a brain such that one half is republican [laughter] and the other half is democrat. And you imagine going to the polling booth and you have to hit the switch, and all of a sudden theres this struggle [laughter] theres a struggle between the left and the right over pulling down the switch . Yes. This could actually happen because we now have brain scans, not just superstitions about the mind. Now, in the old days back in the 1950s you had to put on this awkward helmet. You looked like a refugee from star trek. All these electrodes. Now we dont do that anymore because we have computers. Computers allow us to decipher all this mishmash of radio that comes out of the mind. In fact, in the future these brain scans will be sexy. The upper left, children can now play video games mentally. They put on a headband. The headband picks up radio from their mind, and they control an avatar inside a video game. On the right is what is happening in japan. In japan you put a headband on your head at a party, and it has two ears on it. When you talk to someone whos interesting, the ears go like this. When you talk to a dud, a real loser, then your ears go like that. [laughter] and so with this, with this headset you will know ahead of time if youre going to go home alone at night. [laughter] and i think im going to give these to my students in college. I will see all my students. If their ears go like then i will say f, f, f. Oh, theres an a here. Theres another a. [laughter] so you can do this now. This has gotten the attention of Apple Computers and microsoft. Theyre looking into this. On the lower left, maybe one day you will simply control your laptop by thinking. The headset will pick up radio from the brain, computers will decipher the signal and move the cursor. You can already type, we can already type by the power of the mind because computers can now decipher what you are thinking about. And one day it could be sexy. All of a sudden fashion models, people that are at the forefront of high fashion will start to wear these things as well. Itll be far bl to control computers fashionable to control computers this way. In fact, one day when you walk into a room, you may mentally turn on the lights, mentally set the thermostat, mentally turn on the tv, mentally call for the car and mentally drive the car just by thinking about it. This is my colleague, stephen hawking, the great cosmologist. Hes now lost control of his fingers. He can only blink. Thats all he can do. But, you know, were physicists. What we did was we put a chip in his right glass. Next time you see stephen on television, look at his right frame. There is a chip in his glass. That chip picks up radio from his brain, converts it to signals that operate a laptop computer. So this is how stephen now communicates with the world. But not just a laptop, why not an exso skelton . Exoskelton . This is whats being done at brown university, Duke University. They put a chip right on top of the brain. It doesnt hurt, because the brain doesnt have any pain sensors. Then this chip is connected to a laptop which then controls a wheelchair. This gentleman here had a stroke. He is a vegetable. He cannot scratch his nose, he cannot talk, he cannot do anything but blink. Blink is the only thing he can do. At brown they put a chip in his brain connected to a computer. He can now surf the web, he can read email, write email, play video games, do crossword puzzles, operate his wheelchair, operate household appliances, anything you can do on a computer, he can also do, and he is totally paralyzed. And weve now connected, also at brown university, this paralyzed woman to a mechanical arm. She also is totally paralyzed. She can only blink. And when they connected her to a mechanical arm, she could pick up cocacola for the first time in years and scratch her nose. And they asked her what do you how do you feel . And she blinked, and she blinked and she spelled out the words i want robot legs next. [laughter] well, thats coming too. Because the pentagon got wind of this, and they realize, oh, my god, think of all the Wounded Warriors from iraq and afghanistan with no arms, no legs. What is our country doing for our veterans . Well, what were doing is creating mechanical arms. Mechanical arms that are so sensitive you can pick up an egg without breaking it. You can fist bump, you can highfive, you can handshake. That is how delicate these arms are built as johns at Johns Hopkins university. And not only that, but complete exoskeletons are next. We are going to bypass the spinal cord for these people. Think of the people who are injured because of car accidents, strokes, football accidents on the football field. Hundreds of them, thousands of people who are partially or fully paralyzed. Were going to make sure they walk again by bypassing the spinal cord. Now, at Duke University theres one scientist from brazil. He is creating this exoskeleton for somebody who is totally paralyzed so that he can start the world cup sock or games in brazil soccer games in brazil. So the next time you watch the International Soccer cup games in brazil, they will be initiated by somebody who is a vegetable, totally paralyzed with an exoskeleton. And in japan theyre looking at surrogates, avatars like the movie avatars. In the movie avatar, you are in a pod, and you control mentally another being. This is now japan where we have a robot connected to a man with electrodes, and he controls the robot. This could be the future of police work, firemen, emergency work. People put their lives on the line for dangerous jobs. Why not have a robot do it . And it could also be the future of education. Surrogates will one day be in the classroom. This is a surrogate. It shows the picture of somebody who is sick in bed. The teacher looks at the surrogate and sees the face of the pupil who is sick in bed, and the pupil in turn sees an image of the teacher or while the student is sick. Remember when we were young, we used to play hookie . Those were the good old days, right . [laughter] theyre gone. Isnt the future wonderful . [laughter] well never be able to play hookie again. [laughter] because the teacher always knows every single day theres the surrogate right there in that chair. And the brain is connected to the eyes, so why not use the eyes as a direct way to input information in the brain . This is the future of the internet. The future of the internet is to be in your contact lens. You blink, and you go online. And who are the first people to buy internet contact lenses . College students taking final examinations. [laughter] my students go blink, and they will see all the answers to my exam right there in front of them. And whos the second person to buy internet contact lenses . President barack obama so he doesnt have to have these damn teleprompters giving his speech whenever he gives a speech. [laughter] whos the third person to get internet contact lenses . Vice President Joe Biden so he never says anything goofy again. [laughter] and valentines day. Think of all the romeos who are tongue tied, they cant say roses are red, violates are blue. Think of violets are blue. Think of all the romeos that cant get a poem off the ground for their loved one. In the future, all the tonguetied rome owes will have beautiful words emanating from their mouths right out of a poetry book because it is right outside of a poetry book. [laughter] nasa is interested in this because astronauts in outer space, they have to see the blueprint. Theyre in outer space, for gods sake, and theres no blueprint. Theyll see the blueprint right there in your, right there in your eyes. These glasses, these contact lenses, by the way, will also recognize peoples faces. So when you bump into somebody, youll always know who they are. How many times have you been at a conference like this, and you bump into somebody, and you say i know this person, i know this jim, john, jake, who is this person . In the future your contact lens will say its jim, stupid. [laughter] you want to see his complete biography next to his name . You see him every time theres a meeting here at rainy day books, and lets say youre looking for a job. Youre at a cocktail party, and you know theres some very important people at that cocktail party, but you dont know who they are. In the future you will know exactly who to suck up to at any cocktail party. [laughter] husband and wives will connect their contact lenses together. How many times has the husband or the wife gone shopping and bought the wrong thing . Go back and return that apple, the apple is rotten. In the future youll see what your husband is seeing, and youll say, no, no, no, dont buy that apple. No, no, no, no, buy this instead. And so surrogates will repair damaged reactors like in fukushima, put out fires, explore outer space, and you will be in a hot tub mentally controlling all these gadgets. So computerized prosthetics could enhance the human body. And next is uploading memories. This was once considered science fiction, but now we do it. Last year at Wake Forest University in North Carolina and also in los angeles they took a mouse, trained the mouse to drink water from a bottle, and then they recorded the memory in the hippocampus. The hippocampus is that red thing in the middle of the brain. They recorded that memory. Later the mouse forgot, but then they reinserted the tape recorder back into the hippocampus and, bingo, the mouse remembered. This is the first time in World History, just last year, that we recorded a memory and played it back, uploaded that memory into a mouse. Next, primates. Very soon now were going to record memories of a monkey perhaps eating a banana, record it and then shoot it back in, and the monkey will remember everything that it forgot. Next, alzheimers patients. We are going to create a brain pacemaker for alzheimers patients. Thats the shortterm goal. Were going to create a button. You push the button, and the memory of who you are, who your children are, where you live, where you left your keys will be inserted back into your mind. And who knows . Even beyond that maybe youll push a button, and youll insert the memory of a vacation that you never had. [laughter] or if youre a college student, think of all the courses you flunked in college. Maybe well be able to upload some of that information. And workers who get laid off because of technology, maybe theyll upgrade their skills not by going to a community college, but by simply uploading the memory. So the hippocampus is the gateway to memory. Now, when the hippocampus is damaged like in a stroke, then you cannot form longterm memories. Theres a sad case of a guy whose hippocampus was damaged in surgery. When you greet him, he would say hello, hello, how are you, how are you . And then he would forget. He would forget that he met you and start all over again, hello, hello, how are you, and he would do this for decades. For decades he would repeat the same memory over and over again. Late in life he saw himself in a mirror, and he was shocked to see an old man in the mirror. And he said that cant be me, im a young man, im young. And then he would forget the memory of seeing himself as an old man, and hed go back to saying, hello, hello, how are you . This is so bizarre that two hollywood movies were created about him. One is 50 first dates with Drew Barrymore and the other is groundhog day with bill murray. And the they could thought is can you photograph something with a thought . Whats more ephemeral, fleeting than a thought . Well, at berkeley where i got my ph. D. Years ago we can actually do it. You put somebody in a brain scan. The brain scan converts the image in your mind into 30,000 dots. Now, thats an mri machine today. Very awkward. You cant brain scan yourself every day. But on the right is the worlds smallest mri machine. Its only this big. It uses supercommuters to compensate for a weak magnetic field. And according to the laws of physics, how small can you make a huge mri machine . The answer is according to the laws of physics we can make measuring ri machines mri machines this big. Your cell phone will have more computer power than a University Hospital today. Your medicine cabinet will have more medical knowledge than a University Hospital today. So heres how we do it. We take the brain, put it in an mri scan, and the computer spits out 30,000 dots. Each dot represents electrical activity of the brain. Then a Software Program analyzes these 30,000 dots and prints out a picture. These are some of the first pictures of a thought. On the left is steve martin. Next to it is the image of steve martin as seen through your brain. Its not perfect, because its only 30,000 dots. A picture may have a million pixels. But, hey, the fact that we can do this at all is amazing. This is a picture of an elephant. A person in an airplane. And then the computer image generated by a computer. Then what you do is you put this person in an mri machine, and you have him go to sleep. And when he sleeps, he dreams x. The Computer Program just keeps on going. Some of the first crude pictures of a dream came out last year. In the future you may wake up, push a button and see the dream that you had the previous night. And then in germany they did something amazing. According to old wives tale, some of us have lucid dreaming abilities. We are conscious when we dream. We can actually change the course of a dream. We know we are dreaming while we are dreaming. This is called lucid dreaming. Now, how many people in this audience have ever experienced any dream, even once, where you knew you were dreaming . Look at that. Well, it turns out that this old wives tale is true. In germany last year, they brain scanned a lucid dream e dreamer, and he controlled the direction of his dream, and we followed it with an mri scan. It is absolutely true. So maybe one day Leonardo Dicaprios move i i have inception is not so farfetched after all. And then the big one, Mental Illness. This is why president barack obama and the European Union want to dump a billion dollars to find out how the brain is miswired. It turns out, for example, that many of our leading figures actors, actresses, composers, musicians have suffered from bipolar disorder. On the upper left, for example, is margo kidder. She became famous as lois lane. However, several years ago they found her homeless, stark naked, hiding behind garbage cans. And it was revealed that she suffers from bipolar disorder as many actresses and famous actors suffer. We can now brain scan these people, and we now cannot cure them, but we understand how Mental Illness forms to a degree. Schizophrenics, for example, hear voices. If you want to see a schizophrenic, just go downtown. See the homeless, and youll see people talking to themselves. That is classic schizophrenia. Anden when you brain scan these people, you find something very interesting. The left part of your brain generates voices. You talk to yourself. We all talk to ourself all the time. But the front part of your brain, the conscious brain, is aware of it. In these people when they have voices racing through their mind, the left part of their brain lights up, but the front part of the brain is unaware of it. In other words, they are talking to themselves without their permission. Or their knowledge. Now, if you one day heard a voice inside your brain that was outside of your conscious control, youd think youre going crazy, right . Well, thats what we have here. We can actually see that now in these people. And we can now even go into history. Joan of arc was perhaps one of the most legendary figures in all of ancient history, a teenager who changes the course of a war, changes the course of european history because she said she talked to god. Were not sure, but it turns out that if you have epileptic lesions in your brain, some of them about 1020 become hyperreligious. You see ghosts, demons everywhere. And we think that perhaps the prophets, the prophets of old got hit in the head, and they began to see ghosts, demons everywhere. And we think joan of arc suffered from this. And you can actually induce this artificially. You could put on a helmet, a helmet that shoots radio duplicating this effect, and you feel like youre in the presence of god. This is called the god helmet where you put on a helmet, and you feel that youre in the presence of god. So scientists, being scientists, decided to put a nun and an atheist inside the god helmet to see whether it could change their beliefs. For the atheist they chose Richard Dawkins [laughter] sir Richard Dawkins, the atheist biologist, he put on the helmet, and then a nun put on the helmet. And they asked, did this change your religious belief . And Richard Dawkins says, no, hes still an atheist. And they asked the nun, does this change your belief . The fact you can induce religious feeling . And she said, no. You see, god created us with a telephone, a telephone in our brain so that we can communicate with god. So the scientists were unable to change anyones religious beliefs. Some days you cant win. [laughter] and then the question is, what about super genius . What about people who are off scale, have fantastic photographic memory, artistic and mathematical abilities . It turns out that there was a boy who had a bullet go through the left temporal lobe. There was a man who dove into a swimming pool, hit the left side of his head on the bottom of the pool, and afterwards both of them became super mathematical geniuses. This has now been documented. Acquired savant behavior. Now tonight after todays talk, do not pick up a hammer [laughter] and do not hit yourself on the left temporal lobe thinking youre going to become a genius afterwards. However, some of these people have photographic memories that we have analyzed. This gentleman here, for example, takes a helicopter ride over manhattan and draws the entire vista of the manhattan harbor, the new york harbor from memory. He did it for hong kong, london and new york city. When you go to jfk airport and you land in the American Airlines terminal, look up, and you will see, you will see this huge mural. Every detail perfect, drawn from memory by this man who had one helicopter ride over manhattan. How do you do this . If they can do it, we can do it. Were not different from these people, so how is it . Well, were not sure, but one theory is that when you have a memory, we used to think that the memory decays with time. It gets old. It wears out and disappears. We dont think that anymore. We now believe that forgetting is a very complicated biochemical process. In these people their brain records, but the forgetting mechanism is broken. They have forgotten how to forget. Therefore, they remember everything. You can ask them what were you doing in 954 1954 at 4 00 in the afternoon on may 2nd . And they will tell you what they were doing at that time. Amazing. And then we have the other question of aspergers syndrome. True genius from isaac newton. Isaac newton, hands down, is the greatest scientist who ever lived. Einstein said that. And he was a very strange perp. He person. He couldnt have small talk, he couldnt chitchat with you. Hed be horrible at a dinner conversation. You would not want to invite isaac newton for dinner. And if you wanted to see somebody with aspergers syndrome, just watch the Big Bang Theory on cbs television. The dr. Who did the autopsy kidnapped the brain. He took the brain home and kept it in a cooler for 30 years. It was in his living room. One day he drove across country to put einsteins brain in a mayonnaise jar. Went through problems over decades because this man said, this is a piece of history, and he cannot cremate him. He took it home, but home, but he did not no what to do with it. Now it is in princeton university, and i have a chapter analyzing the braid the greatest brain of modern time. What about Sigmund Freud . Believe it or not, we can now analyze freudian psychology from a modern. Of view. Many people think he was a crackpot, crazy, superego. How do you you measure those things . Now we can. You can actually see that there is a Pleasure Center. There is a libido, a part of the brain that governs pleasure, just like freud said. In fact, if you take a mouse and took electrodes to the Pleasure Center to a telegraph key, the mouse we will hit the telegraph key twice per second until it starts to do starves to death. What death. What did dogs, cats, and even up to a dolphin. When a dolphin plucked when a dolphin swam forward it would hit an electrode stimulating the Pleasure Center. It would hit the electrode twice a second and tell the dolphin realized, i am i am dying, i will die. Then the dolphin stopped, went, went out, grab some food, and came back. Not stupid, after all. Then the question is, what is consciousness . So many people have written about this thing called consciousness, 20,000 papers never in the history of science have so many written so much to produce so little. [laughter] i have a new theory of consciousness. I consciousness. I do not have time to get into it, but i believe animals have consciousness. Even dogs and cats, i think, our conscience. In fact, how many people in this room have a cat at home . Raise your hand. The cat comes up to you and purrs. You say, oh, zero, kind put the. How affectionate. Wrong. The cat would be thinking, this human is mine. I owned this human. I will put my hormone on this humans leg so other cats cannot come on my territory. I i trained this human. He feeds me twice a day. Good human. [laughter] that is what is going on. And why are cats loners . Because they are descended from the wildcat. A solitary hunter. They do not hunt in packs at all. They are they are used to being alone, just like greta garbo. How many people in this room have a dog . Raise your hand. When you come home, the dog jumps at you and slobbers all over you. Why . The dog thinks that you are a dog. Except you are top dog, the alpha dog, they are the underdog. Dogs are pack animals who hunt in groups. The pecking order. Who eats first . The alpha male. That is why dogs are mans best friend. Why do dogs like to be with people . They are pack animals who like to hunt in groups. Groups. I said that the lowest state of consciousness is a thermostat. One unit of feedback. That is that is what i call one unit of consciousness. Even thermostats i believe our conscience. A flower has maybe ten units water, sunlight, gravity, moisture, carbon dioxide. A a flower may have ten units of consciousness. As i said before, in the back of your brain is the reptilian brain that understands space, knows where it is located, but not much more. Space understands location. Location. Then level to consciousness, monkey consciousness, located at the center of your brain, the brain, the brain of the motion, the brain of social hierarchy, the brain of pecking orders. Orders. And then level three, what makes us different . We see the future. Animals animals do not. Animals have no conception of tomorrow. They do not plan for tomorrow. When it gets cold they hibernate because it is instinctive. When it gets cold we pack our bags, winterize our homes. We see the future. We daydream, plan, strategize. Animals do not. They have no conception of time, time, that is, no conception of tomorrow. If this theory is correct, i have to explain everything about the mind, including things as ephemeral as humor you may say to yourself, humor is so spiritual, so much out there that you will never be able to explain it in the theory of conscious. I dont think so. Why. Why is a joke funny . You here something and complete the ending. Your brain is a prediction machine constantly predicting the ending. You have no choice. When you when you here a joke your blame completes the ending, and when you here the actual ending it is different. For example, Teddy Roosevelts daughter was one of the gossip mongers of the white house. She is famous for saying, if you have nothing good to say about other people, then please come sit next to me. [laughter] wc fields was asked a question about young people. Are you in favor of clubs for young people . And he said, am i in favor of clubs . Yes, but only if kindness fails. And then the bible says look, the. Is the bible says do onto others as you would have them do unto you, except do it first. Why are these funny . When you here the expression that your mother taught you, if you dont have anything nice to say about somebody then dont say anything at all. Right . You complete the dots. You have no choice. Your brain is a prediction machine. When the when the punchline is then come sit next to me, it is funny. Even humor can be understood in my area of consciousness. We are running out of time. Robots are level one. Robots are like alligators, not much more intelligent. Slowly we create emotional robots. Its still pretty. The most advanced robot is built in japan. You you saw a picture of him earlier. Run, walk, climb upstairs. He can even dance. He dances much better than me. He dances better than me every time. I interviewed the creator of the worlds most advanced robot and asked, how smart is the world most advanced robot . And he said on camera, my creation is as smart as a cockroach, a retarded cockroach, a lobotomized, stupid, stupid, retarded cockroach. We have a long ways to go before they we will be smarter than us. Let me wind up by saying that, that, yes, president barack obama as an initiative to create brain 2. 0 to understand why we have Mental Illness. If we can understand the wiring we we will have a form of immortality. The question is, when you die, do you live forever . To paraphrase bill clinton, it all depends upon how you define the word you. Argue wetware and software . If so, when you die, die, you die. Are you information . If so, information can double every 18 months. This this is the rate at which computers are growing in sophistication. When you get a birthday card in the mail you open it up and its its things. There is a chip in that birthday card. That has more computer power than all the allied forces of 1945. Hitler, churchill, roosevelt would kill to get that chip. What do you do with it . You throw it in the garbage. If hitler had that chip in 1940, we might all be speaking german. 1969, we put two men on the moon. These old, grainy nasa pix of Mission Control . According to this chart they were 64k processors, dinosaurs. Your cell phone today has more computer power than all of nasa in 1969. In. In fact, you wont put me on one of those rocket ships. It is criminal. We were shooting humans into outer space backed up by one cell phone. And the internet as a consequence will become a brain that. In motion, memories. Imagine teenagers on facebook sending the emotions and experience of their first date, senior prom. The movies could have total immersion entertainment, not just a flat screen with sound, but total internal and emotional content. And perhaps in the far future, the next century, a disc with memories and thoughts, perhaps we can send it into outer space. We can send it on a laser beam at the speed of light. And this may be the way to explore the galaxy, send it into outer space at the speed of light on a laser beam to explore the universe let me close on a note, and then i will take questions and then i will sign your books. Remember, after i sign your book you can go to ebay and make money auctioning them off. [laughter] one last note. I had a role model. I idolized albert einstein. My favorite story, when einstein was an old man he was tired of giving the same talk over and over. One day his chauffeur came up to him and said, professor, i am merely a parttime actor. I have her do her speech so many times that i have i have memorized it. Why dont we switch places . I will be the great einstein and you can take a rest. They switched places. This went along famously until one day a mathematician in the back asked a very difficult question. Einstein thought, the game is up. Up. The chauffeur said, that question is so elementary that even my chauffeur here can answer it for you. [applauding] thank you very much. Much. You have been a great audience. I will take questions and then be happy to sign your book. [applauding] thank you. So we have some time for q a. Afterwards, please lineup in an orderly fashion. We will have pictures taken as well. People will line up. We have microphones in the audience. Here is your chance to talk back. Come on up. Yes. Yes, doctor. I was wondering was wondering how farreaching you think the fx of fukushima will be on japan and the Hawaiian Islands and the rest of the pacific. How long we will we experience the agony of three simultaneous meltdowns we have the answer, 40 years. It will take about 40 years to begin the process of dismantling the reactor. The accident is not over. A small earthquake could send the accident starting all over again. Workers cant get in for more than a few minutes at a time. The pentagon made it a priority to create robots that can turn the screw, use a hammer. We dont have those yet. They want to insert cameras into the water to see where the melting is. We dont even have a picture the water, the radioactive water builds up. When you visit fukushima you see all the swimming pools. The agony is unending. It will take 40 years to clean up that accident. Japan made faustian bargain, the legendary figure who sold his soul to the devil. There is a price you have to pay. You sell your soul to the devil. Lets move on to other questions. Next person. I wanted to thank you for coming by. I wanted to ask, you have been an inspiration that you started at such a young age. Of all the people you have met, do you find that getting the standard, everyone starting young, or do you see someone who came in at an older age . Is it advantageous to start interest in science when very young. It helps to be young. I have interviewed about 500 scientists in my time. I have my own radio show, which goes out to about 130 radio shows. When did it start . When did you get interested . They always say the same thing, when i was ten, a telescope, a microscope, a chemistry set, a visit to the planetarium. The 410 Everything Everything is mommy and daddy, mommy and daddy , mommy and daddy. At ten you begin to ask what is beyond mommy and daddy and get this existential shock realizing how huge and glorious and splendors the universe is. Then kids then kids just eat it up. They want to know everything , while the sun shines. Then they hit 15, and it is all over. [laughter] what is the greatest destroyer of scientists known to science . Junior high school. You see, we are all born scientists, wondering where did i come from, why does the sunshine, why do the stars twinkle. We are born that way until junior high school, and then it is crushed out of us. We have to memorize useless facts that dont amount to anything. We are called nerds, it is hard to get a date, hormones kick in. It is it is difficult. In high school you have this pyramid with Beautiful People on top, the jocks and the cheerleaders. But hollywood never tells you that as soon as you graduate from high school that permit turns upside down. [applauding] they never tell you that. Look at bill gates, steve jobs, these are billionaires, leaders of innovation and technology, at the bottom of the pyramid in high school. Thank you. Insert memory into a rat. It may be that someones memory is inserted into another persons brain. Controversy because memories are personal and meant to be for a single person. How how do you think the public will respond . The ethical implications of being able to insert not just true memories, but false memories, courses you never took, dates you never had, vacations you never experience can be uploaded, we think, in the future. Future. What happens if a criminal gets this and uploads the memory of a crime you never committed. Our our legal Justice System depends upon eyewitness accounts. What happens if you can tamper with peoples memory . Then eyewitness account cannot be trusted. I think this has to be regulated. If we get to the. Where we can insert memories they must be labeled that this memory is false, this vacation you never had, but it is fun anyway, so, so i will pay money. We will have to regulated to make sure false memories are clearly labeled false. For people who worry about security, some people think in the future a cia agent will record your memories from a distance. That wont happen. You have to put up probe either directly on top of the brain or a helmet right on top of the brain. Further away the radio signal dabs so that it is less than background, gibberish. You have to be right up to that persons brain. The problem is not privacy because someone will record your memories. You may willingly make a memory but then someone else sells it. That is a whole other area which we will play out in the years. Right now we can only record one memory at a time. Thank you. Yes. Next. [inaudible question] you were talking about how [inaudible question] okay. The question is about asp burgers. First of all, a mild form of autism. A certain fraction of people with autism develop enormous mathematical artistic abilities, not all, but a good fraction begin to excel, bn iq of 80, be mentally retarded. How is that possible . The new thinking is it is damage to the left temporal lobe that creates the savant a bullet, a blow to the head , or damage from autism. We now believe autism is not the only way to have mathematical powers. They have these powers without having to have a low iq. Functional. Isaac newton was functional. Newton was actually a member of parliament. We are now beginning to understand that autism and savant behavior are not inevitably linked. We think you can actually control it, function in society and still have these mathematical powers. One study just last year showed that many Silicon Valley engineers have a higher rate than the average generation, but you probably knew that already. This is something we are still investigating. A long ways to go, but now that we have brain scans we can see their brain is slightly different from the average. Curious as to your thoughts on the theory of quantum consciousness. In my book i have a chapter on quantum consciousness which is, perhaps, the most bizarre form in all of science. According to the quantum theory, in order for something to exist somebody has to look at it, make an observation. Before you observe something , in principle it could exist in all possible states. When you look at it it assumes one state. Therefore the observer determines existence but observation requires consciousness. Conscious people make the observation. The greatest paradox, if i have a cat in a box and i do not open the box the cat could be either dead or alive . Well, well, we added the dead cat to the live cat. Neither dead nor alive until you open the box. Einstein thought, this is is stupid. How can you be neither dead or alive at the same time . What can i say. Einstein was wrong. This is the greatest paradox in all science. How you resolve the fact he could have live and dead cats simultaneously, and if you ever find the solution to this puzzle, tell me first. [laughter] nobel Prize Winners debate this question. There is an alternative. The universe splits in half. In one universe the cat is dead and in the other the cat is alive. That theory seems to be the one preferred by string theory which lends to the last question, is Elvis Presley still alive in another parallel universe . The answer is possibly yes. Perhaps the king is still live. One last question because i have to get to signing your books. One last question. Superhero on his tshirt. Thank you. My question was, if you could put someones thoughts onto a disk could you build them a robot body and put them in their . If you can put the mind onto a disk the question is can that desk then be put into a robot . This is something that cannot be ruled out. One one day far in the future we put all our pathways onto a disk, the robot can be handsome, gorgeous, superhuman with the powers of a cyborg and look just like us. This this is something that cannot be ruled out. This is at least 100 years away. It is something that you cannot rule out, maybe these surrogates, maybe we will live our lives as surrogates people people preferred to live in superhuman bodies. They preferred to be superhuman. Then, of course, he turns off all the superhuman bodies at the end. Thank you so much for being here today. What i want to do now is to sign your books. [applauding] you have been a great audience. Thank you so much. [applauding] youre watching book tv, television for serious readers. You can watch any program you see here online at booktv. Org. Deborah hicks sat down with book tv at Duke University to discuss her book, the road out. The 30 minute interview is part of book tv college series. Book tv is on the campus of Duke University where we are talking with professors and scholars about some of there books. Joining us here is deborah hicks, her book the road out a teachers odyssey in poor america. What do you do here at duke, first of all . I have a couple of things i do, part of a research unit. That is a unit composed of people doing research in the social sciences. Then i am also a social entrepreneur. There i work with appalachian girls in middle school and help them get Educational Opportunity and access. I have a couple of different hats
comparemela.com © 2020. All Rights Reserved.