Brains of 3 People Have Been Successfully Connected, Enabling Them to Share Thoughts

Science Alert ^ | 1/1/2019 | David Nield

[RightGeek]

Neuroscientists have successfully hooked up a three-way brain connection to allow three people to share their thoughts – and in this case, play a Tetris-style game.

The team thinks this wild experiment could be scaled up to connect whole networks of people, and yes, it's as weird as it sounds.

It works through a combination of electroencephalograms (EEGs), for recording the electrical impulses that indicate brain activity, and transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS), where neurons are stimulated using magnetic fields.

The researchers behind the system have dubbed it BrainNet, and say it could eventually be used to connect many different minds together, even across the web.

...

In the experiment set up by the scientists, two 'senders' were connected to EEG electrodes and asked to play a Tetris-style game involving falling blocks. They had to decide whether each block needed rotating or not.

To do this, they were asked to stare at one of two flashing LEDs at either side of the screen – one flashing at 15 Hz and the other at 17 Hz – which produced different signals in the brain that the EEG could pick up on.

These choices were then relayed to a single 'receiver' through a TMS cap that could generate phantom flashes of light in the receiver's mind, known as phosphenes.

The receiver couldn't see the whole game area, but had to rotate the falling block if a light flash signal was sent.

Across five different groups of three people, the researchers hit an average accuracy level of 81.25 percent, which is decent for a first try.

[mass55th]

Have to be liberals. It took three brains to come up with one complete thought.

[PLMerite]

"What could possibly go wrong?"

Then again:

[kaehurowing]

Resistance is futile.

[TigersEye]

Plug me in! I wasn’t thinking anything important anyway. ;^)

[UCANSEE2]

[tomkat]

Sometimes I think it’s not so bad being old (ish ;-)

[KarlInOhio]

I envision linking together... Alexandra Occasio-Cortez... Maxine Waters .... and Whoopi Goldberg

Please don't. That exceeds the Chandrasekhar limit of stupid, forming a unit so dense that intelligence can never leak out.

[neverevergiveup]

44 posts, and no Vulcan mind-meld mentioned..

[big'ol_freeper]

Schumer, Pelosi and Reid walk into a bar....

[Magnum44]

Do you know what this means?

[jerod]

Oh yeah... Let's go there...

[TigersEye]

Remember the pain it caused Spock when he melded with the Horta?
Now imagine melding your mind with Pelozi’s.

[adorno]

What would be the difference between a single liberal brain and 3 liberal brains connected together?

None!

[inchworm]

McCain’s dead brain with Flake, and Romney.

[tomkat]

Seriously, though relatively articulate, sometimes trying to come up with an accurate description to convey to the doc is quite frustrating.

Ya see doc, it's less than pain but more than soreness . . .

[null and void]

Do you think if you merged the brains of three Democrats, it might give you one normal human mentality?

Intelligence may be additive, but insanity multiplies.

[redfreedom]

The first thing that came to mind is this could eventually be adapted to forced interrogation thus making the 5th Amendment worthless.

[Beach333]

It depends on whether you’re starting with negatives.

[Big Red Badger]

Nyuk,Nyuk,Nyuk!

[null and void]