The Internet is rewiring your brain and you don't even know it

via digitaltrends.com

In case you couldn’t tell, the Web and social media are changing us. Even though this might seem obvious, we don’t spend much time thinking about the actual repercussions of our constant connectivity are affecting our day-to-day physical interactions, but scientists say the Internet is definitely leaving its mark on us. The connected generation is quicker on their feet, able to find and analyze information faster than their parents, but there’s also a downside to this evolution.

Take for example a study by UCLA professor Gary Small in 2007. Three regular Internet users and three neophytes were asked to browse websites, in an attempt to point out the cognitive differences between “heavy” and “light” multitaskers...

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8 Mind-blowing Gadgets You Can Control Just With Your Brain

via hongkiat.com

So Google Glass is the future, you say? Think again. Imagine a future where you can move anything with just your mind, with high concentration. If you think that is mind-blowing, get this, that future is already here.

In this post, we want to bring to your awareness 10 existing gadgets that allow your brain to command and complete real-life tasks, including using your iPhone and moving virtual characters in-game! Let’s dive into the article for more revelation on this interesting topic.

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First Ever Cellular-Level Video of a Whole Brain Working

via gizmodo.com

This video is the first time scientists have ever been able to image the whole brain of a vertebrate creature in such a way that you can see individual cells and simultaneously how they're firing and behaving in real time. This is how the brain really, really works—and it's amazing.

The research, published in Nature Methods, explains how scientists from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute Janelia Farm Research Campus were able to use a technique called high-speed light sheet microscopy to image the activity of 80 percent of the neurons in the brain of a zebra fish larva. They were able to capture images once every 1.3 seconds—which, as Nature explains, is a speed approximate to neural activity patterns in the brain.

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Soon You Will Interact With Computers Through Thought Alone

via businessinsider.com

Amplifiers for the human brain, designed to allow people with paralysis to interact with the world, aren’t the most easily understood technology. So g.tec, the company that makes them, has come up with the following creative marketing strategy: Convince us that we’ll soon be interacting with computers through thought alone.

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Will it ever be possible to compute the human brain?

via extremetech.com

In the video below, Tampa Bay Rays third baseman Evan Longoria is seen to make a spectacular grab to save a reporter from certain death — or at least serious injury. Granted, Evan may have had a little help from video editing, but at the professional level at least, comparable performances no doubt occur every time an umpire gives the command to play ball. The computations a man-made machine would need to perform to detect and track an incoming threat, like an errant ball, and simultaneously perform motor adjustments to intercept it are certainly not trivial. Yet, for a human brain, the computations underlying such virtuosity pale in comparison to the massive background processing interleaved to create the awareness to perform the task in the first place — or to chose a different course of action on say, the tenth run of the scenario.

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Two Rats Communicate Brain to Brain

via news.discovery.com

It's not quite telepathy, but it's the closest anyone has ever come to getting a mammal to read another mammal's mind.

A research team led by neurobiologist Miguel Nicolelis of Duke University has wired together the brains of two rats, allowing them transmit information between each other and cooperate.

The results, detailed in the journal Scientific Reports, could help improve the design of neural-controlled prosthetic devices. And perhaps more than that, they also show that one day we could network brains as well as computers, or communicate by translating neural activity in the brain into electronic signals.

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Crazy Brain Implants Give Lab Rats a Sixth Sense and Let Them "Touch" Light

via gizmodo.com

t's not every day that science and crazy brain implants lead to the generation of what is essentially a new sense, but it is that day today. Scientists from Duke University have found a way to make rats "feel" invisible infrared light and someday that same tech could give sight to the blind, or give us humans extras senses for fun.

In the experiment published in Nature, rats were first taught to respond to one of three normal, visible lights by sticking their noses into a little port that corresponded with the illuminated light. Then, the researchers implanted small, infrared-detecting microelectrodes—each roughly a tenth of the diameter of a human hair—into the part of the mice's brains that parses touch. Right after the implantation, the mice reacted to infrared stimulus by rubbing their faces, indicating that they were "feeling" the light, but eventually they learned to respond to it exactly how they'd responded to the visible lights in earlier tests. Something akin to "seeing" it or "feeling" it but not quite either.

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EU spends $1.4 billion on flawed, but exciting, brain-in-a-box project

via extremetech.com

Big physics has been showered in riches since the World War II era, yet today finds itself in a bit of a crisis as traditional funding priorities are increasingly questioned. While projects like the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) have enjoyed funding closer to $10 billion, projects in the life sciences which would offer tangible benefit to more people have struggled for survival. A man we will be hearing a bit more about in the future, Henry Markram, has just sold the European Union a brain in a box for €1 billion ($1.4 billion). When his ticket comes due in 10 years, there is one thing that can be counted on — someone is going to have some explaining to do.

In a major announcement this week, Europe has funded two new projects, promising over $3 billion in total. One study will be focused on new applications for graphene, while the other, now being described as the Human Brain Project (HBP), seeks nothing less than a simulation of the human brain.

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Will humans someday communicate by thought alone?

via theglobeandmail.com

It was one of the great “eureka” moments in the history of neuroscience, caught on film as it was taking place in London, Ont.

The patient, Scott Routley, was severely brain-injured in 1999 after being hit by a police car. Given only two years to live at that time, he had already far exceeded medical augury, but the doctors who had examined him for more than a dozen years could find no signs of awareness in him.

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How Startups Should Prepare For The Day When Technology Merges With Our Brains

via businessinsider.com

By 2045, human beings will become a new species, half human, half machine.

Or so futurist Ray Kurzweil believes. He argues that by looking at the how tech is being developed that one day we will sort of merge with machines and society will reach a state of "technological singularity."

That's because, in part, computer processors double in speed every year while they get increasingly smaller. One day, we'll inject tiny computers into our bodies like medicine or add them to our brains to make us smarter.

In the meantime, tech is always getting faster, cheaper, and spreading to more markets and industries. And this creates a lot of opportunity for startups, until the day when we all turn into cyborgs.

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9 Apps That'll Make You Smarter

via businessinsider.com

Feeling a little bit of the winter slump?

Not as sharp as you'd like to be?

Take refuge in your mobile device – there are a number of apps ready to help you shake the dust out of your head.

Whether you use an iPhone or an Android phone, there's something here for you.

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The Psychology of Music

via visual.ly

There’s more to why we like music than just a catchy beat or an easy karaoke tune.

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This Is How Your Brain Works

via gizmodo.com

Some days, after a good night's rest and a protein rich breakfast, my brain works wonderfully. It's well wrinkled, filled to the brim with answers and snapping synapses. Other days, after an epic night and a regurgitated breakfast, my brain just doesn't want to be bothered. It's smooth and thoughtless. How does that damn brain work? ASAP Science analyzes the brain by detailing the difference between fast thinking and slow thinking. You're going to think in a whole new way after this.

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This Is My Brain on YouTube

via mashable.com

Each month, the world watches 4 billion hours of YouTube video. And many people catch those clips during work breaks, while commuting or sneaking them in at the office.

Before I started working at Mashable, I was probably still a significant contributor to this number. I don't sneak videos in between breaks at work, because I'm too busy sleeping, breathing and eating. (Plus, I think about YouTube videos for a living.) This is normally the part when someone jokes that I get paid to watch cat videos all day, but that is a myth that seriously needs to be debunked.

Let's say I spent 2.5 hours per work day watching YouTube videos. (It's a conservative number, believe it or not.) Over 52 weeks — give or take a couple days, so we'll say 245 — that would mean I spent 613 hours watching YouTube videos this year.

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Your Brain by the Numbers [Infographic]

via howtogeek.com

Your brain is a rather impressive piece of hardware; check out this infographic to see its specs laid out including power consumption, calculation speed, and more.

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Neuroscience of Music - How Music Enhances Learning

via neurosciencenews.com

Neuroscience research into the neuroscience of music shows that musicians’ brains may be primed to distinguish meaningful sensory information from noise. This ability seems to enhance other cognitive abilities such as learning, language, memory and neuroplasticity of various brain areas.

Scientific review of how music training primes nervous system and boosts learning

Those ubiquitous wires connecting listeners to you-name-the-sounds from invisible MP3 players, whether of Bach, Miles Davis or, more likely today, Lady Gaga, only hint at music’s effect on the soul throughout the ages.

Posted via email from Inspiration

Rejuvenate Your Brain While You Work: 10 Ways

via inc.com

In my last column, I wrote about how I lead groups of volunteers to work with the Kenyan Children Foundation in Africa, and how we all return home exhausted but with our brains refreshed and renewed. We take a break from our usual ways of thinking, and open our minds to new ideas and experiences. But you don't have to travel thousands of miles from home to recharge your brain.

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Digital Stress on Your Brain [Infographic]

via inspirationfeed.com

Stop reading this and check how many tabs are currently open, I’ll wait….. Are you multitasking? As technology becomes more and more part of out lives, most people are learning to do several things at once. Unfortunately, all of our “multitasking” may have some serious consequences. Enjoy!

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Are You a Right-Brained or Left-Brained Designer?

via designshack.net

Colors, pictures, creativity; designers are quite obviously a group of people that tend to gravitate towards using the right sides of their brains… right? Or is this simply a stereotype that doesn’t necessarily ring true?

Is design exclusively artistic talent put to productive use or is it possible that the industry is equally full of analytical problem solvers? Let’s take a look at how designers think, whether you’re a right brainer or a left brainer, and how I’ve struggled through being a left brainer in an industry of right brainers.

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Researchers Are Trying to Hack Your Brain

via gizmodo.com

The thought of someone being able to read your mind is frightening. And according to some new research presented at the 21st USENIX Security Symposium, brain hacking might be more realistic than we would assume.

The research has nothing to do with psychics or supernatural stuff, but rather focuses its gaze on inexpensive products that you can buy now—like Emotiv's EPOC headset. Using a headset that lets you control your computer with your brainwaves, a hacker could hypothetically create a sort of "brain spyware" app that would trick you into revealing personal information.

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