Play a Game Using Only Your Mind
New Technology is Coming that Will Blow Your Mind!
Emotiv, a company in San Francisco, announced that its mind-control headsets will be available later this year. In addition, a number of mind-control games will hit stores at the same time.
Emotiv isn't the only company developing this technology. EmSense, NeuroSky, and Hitachi are all developing the same sort of thing. The technology apparently detects a player's brainwaves (EEG), muscle movement (EMG), heart rate, and sweating level (ECG and GSR). When it's all put together, it will reveal a picture of what is going on in a player's mind and translate that to the game.
The headsets, depending on the company, have one to sixteen sensors that detect basic brainwave activity. Sensors can tell just how relaxed, afraid, focused, or anxious a player is. It may sound unbelievable now, but remember what Wii just brought to the gaming experience. Gaming technology is growing by leaps and bounds.
The concept actually exists in a primitive form right now. Interactive Productline in Sweden has developed a game called Mindball. Two players sit across from each other, focusing on a small white ball on the screen. Then using only their brainwaves, they try to roll the ball toward their opponent. It reminds me of Pong in the 70's, the forerunner of video and PC games.
As the technology gets better and more developed, the possibilities stagger the mind. Who's to say that this technology will stay only in games? Imagine driving a car with just your mind.
Wearing a mind-control headset, you might be able to manage your home just by thinking. Turn on lights. Turn off television, turn on computer. Lock door. Anything that could be hooked up to electricity could theoretically be controlled by a mind-control headset.
Perhaps this technology will even cross over to the military. Just think "shoot" and your gun fires. The only problem I see with this is that it doesn't allow time for the mind to back up and determine whether the target is friendly, hostile, civilian, or military. But who knows if this is even coming?
I'm getting way ahead of things. The mind-control headsets aren't even on the shelves until later this year, Emotiv says. Let's take it easy and think before going wild with this new technology.
Published by Sandra Essary
Sandra is a featured travel contributor for Associated Content at Yahoo!. She has traveled extensively in the US, Europe, and the Caribbean. She has also camped for over 35 years throughout the US. Besi... View profile
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3 Comments
Post a CommentNote this article is from 2008. Although this device never made it to mass market, Matel is marketing a Starwars themed toy that is very similar to "mind ball" in that the user uses eeg signals (and perhaps gsr) to levitate a ball by controlling the rpm of fan.
I agree that this is both incredible and frightening. Fascinating article!
I didn't know that. That's both incredible, I guess, and frightening. Why they're planning on introducing this technology first to the children, haha, that's kind of ironic. Just goes to show us how marketing operates. There's a program called "Journey to Wild Divine" that is similar and it's been around awhile. You try and control your heart rate, as it measures it through your finger. It's like a game or journey, through different levels. I've only tried it once though, I made this ball go upwards with my heart-rate. Pretty cool stuff. But this approach seems drastic, and I am not looking forward to this if its going to be introduced through Sony or the Military...hmmm