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we want to see. Around the

1:00

world. To understand who we are.

1:02

From those talks, we bring you

1:04

speakers and ideas that will surprise

1:06

you. You just don't know what you're going

1:08

to find. Challenge you. We truly have to ask

1:10

ourselves, like, why is it noteworthy? And even change

1:13

you. I literally feel like I'm a different

1:15

person. Yes. Do you feel

1:17

that way? Ideas worth spreading.

1:20

From TED and

1:22

NPR, I'm Manush

1:25

and Zamorodi. In

1:27

2017, Nita Farahani and her

1:29

family went through

1:31

a devastating experience. And

1:34

it's something she's OK talking about

1:36

now. Yeah. So we

1:38

suffered the loss of our second

1:41

daughter, Kalista. She

1:43

fell ill with

1:46

RSV. And

1:49

ultimately, after

1:51

a prolonged hospital stay, she

1:54

died from complications of it on Mother's

1:56

Day in 2017. The

2:00

day-to-day became almost unbearable

2:02

for Anita. From

2:05

the first moment that I took

2:07

her into the emergency room and

2:10

the weeks and months in the

2:12

hospital, there were

2:15

just so many vivid images that

2:17

really left me with

2:19

so much trauma. And

2:22

I ended up with PTSD because

2:25

some of the, you know, kind of

2:28

harrowing cries and moments just seared themselves

2:30

on my brain. And so I got

2:33

to the point where I couldn't sleep and I was

2:35

pretty dysfunctional. Anita tried

2:37

traditional therapy, but it

2:39

didn't do much. And then eventually

2:42

a psychologist

2:44

helped me through it and was

2:46

able to help me using exposure

2:48

therapy, which was also

2:50

really dramatic. Basically, I would

2:52

clench up every time I, you know, tried

2:55

to go through the exposure therapy and not allow

2:57

myself to, you know, kind of

2:59

re-experience the memories. But

3:02

that's a really painful process to go through.

3:04

At the time, Anita thought, if only

3:06

there was a way to reprogram her brain

3:09

so she could stop having these

3:11

intrusive thoughts and feelings. And

3:14

now there is. Today,

3:17

there are more

3:19

innovative neurotechnology procedures

3:21

that are available that had they been available to

3:23

me, I would have opted for in a heartbeat.

3:26

Neurotechnology devices that let

3:28

us peer into the

3:30

brain, monitoring, even guiding its

3:33

activity. In Anita's

3:35

case, she believes a treatment called

3:37

decoded neurofeedback might have helped her.

3:40

Basically, you know, you can go into

3:43

a fMRI machine, a functional magnetic resonance

3:45

imaging, where, you know, when

3:47

you recall the memory, it's

3:49

mapped in your brain. Once

3:52

doctors know which path your brain is

3:54

using to recall that memory, they

3:56

can start using it to do something else. Take

3:59

it over. That mapping

4:01

allows for the development of

4:03

something like a game, like

4:06

playing basketball, to implicitly reactivate

4:09

those same pathways, where by

4:11

playing that game, which is a much

4:13

more pleasant experience than remembering

4:15

the trauma, you can

4:17

essentially overwrite those memories with

4:20

more positive associations instead. So

4:22

when that path in her brain was activated, instead

4:25

of feeling total panic, Nita

4:27

would have felt more relaxed. And

4:30

so it's a different and,

4:32

you know, in many ways, less

4:34

traumatic way of working through PTSD,

4:36

or working through

4:39

any kind of traumatic memory or

4:41

experience. So that's just

4:43

one of the different techniques that people

4:45

have been working on to, you know,

4:48

have innovative uses of neurotechnology to enable

4:50

people to work through trauma or to

4:52

work through different neurological

4:55

diseases and disorders. So

4:57

the memory is still there, but the

4:59

visceralness of that thought is

5:02

lessened. That's right. Yeah. So

5:04

it's like any other memory, it's faded

5:07

more now. It's not literally reliving it

5:09

and re-experiencing it. And PTSD, for me

5:11

at least, and I think for a

5:13

lot of people who experience it, you're

5:15

back there. You're feeling it all again.

5:18

All of the overwhelming, you know, fear

5:20

and trauma that you're experiencing in the

5:22

moment, or re-experiencing as the memory kind

5:25

of takes over again, versus

5:27

how we usually remember, which is,

5:29

you know, kind of at

5:31

a distance with reflection. It may hurt

5:33

still, but it doesn't grip

5:36

us and take us over and put

5:38

us back there in that same kind of way. So

5:41

that does sound amazing. And

5:43

if there was technology that could help

5:46

with that more easily than the years

5:48

of therapy that you went through, that

5:50

would be great. But also, it

5:53

makes me think there are some

5:55

things that people would like to forget. And

5:57

are we going to get to the point where, you

5:59

know, like... that movie, Eternal Sunshine of

6:01

the Spotless Mind, there will be technology

6:04

that could maybe help

6:07

us do that. I mean, it could be.

6:10

So, Nita Fairhoney knows a lot

6:12

about neurotechnology and its pros and

6:14

cons because she's a law

6:17

professor at Duke University studying the

6:19

ethics of how we should and

6:21

shouldn't use this technology in the

6:23

future, which she says is

6:25

coming faster than we might think. Neurotechnology

6:28

in headbands, smartwatches,

6:30

earbuds will be able

6:32

to track our health, including,

6:35

eventually, our thoughts and

6:37

emotions. Yeah. So, I mean,

6:39

there are brain sensors that pick up electrical

6:41

activity in the brain. Major

6:43

tech companies are really racing to

6:46

embed these brain sensors to

6:48

be like the heart rate sensors and other

6:50

sensors we have in everyday objects, but tracking

6:52

something very different, which is being

6:54

able to tell of a person is happy

6:56

or sad or if they're paying attention or

6:58

their mind is wandering or if they're bored

7:01

or gauged, tired or falling asleep

7:03

at the wheel, for example. There

7:05

are companies like SmartCap that have been

7:08

selling these EEG headcaps

7:10

that allow a driver

7:13

or a pilot or somebody who's in

7:15

mining, for example, to track their fatigue

7:17

levels and give more accurate data about

7:19

whether they're starting to get to dangerous

7:22

levels of sleep. I

7:24

mean, this sounds cool,

7:26

easier, but where do

7:28

we start to cross

7:30

the line between technology

7:32

understanding our intention based

7:34

on tiny movements or

7:36

brain activity to understanding

7:38

our thoughts and ideas and

7:41

our feelings? Yeah, it's a great

7:43

question. So, you know, there

7:45

was this amazing study that came out in, I

7:47

think, April of

7:49

last year where using more sophisticated

7:51

neurotechnology, which is like these giant,

7:54

you know, MRI machines that a

7:56

person goes into, they, you know,

7:58

had people listen to podcast

8:01

and then trained a generative

8:03

AI classifier using GPT-1 to

8:07

say like this is what the person's listening to, this is what

8:09

their brain activity looks like, this is what they're listening to, this

8:12

is what their brain activity looks like. And

8:14

then had them listen to something and

8:16

have the classifier try to decode what

8:18

that was. And it was with a

8:20

really high degree of accuracy able to

8:23

decode a lot of what the person

8:25

was hearing or what they were imagining

8:28

just based on brain activity. And

8:31

that again is more sophisticated technology than

8:33

EEG and you know

8:35

it's peering more deeply into the brain but other

8:38

researchers are applying that same concept

8:40

to try to decode EEG activity. And

8:43

so the question of where does it

8:45

cross the line, as you're starting to

8:47

wear everyday devices, you know

8:49

earbuds that are tracking your fatigue

8:51

levels or picking up your intention

8:54

to type or to swipe, but

8:56

it's recording that brain activity at

8:58

all times and these

9:01

models are getting more and more sophisticated

9:03

at being able to decode what that

9:05

means. It's not that

9:08

hard to see that we're quickly

9:10

moving into a world where what

9:12

you're thinking and feeling is just

9:14

as transparent and can be just

9:17

as easily decoded using AI and

9:19

neurotechnology. Over

9:21

the past decade there have been

9:23

incredible advances in understanding how

9:25

the brain works. Now

9:28

we are on the cusp of a new

9:30

era of brain monitoring and

9:32

enhancement and the

9:34

exciting potential and pitfalls

9:36

of merging our minds with machines

9:39

and manipulating the brain, well

9:42

they're mind-boggling. And

9:44

so today on the show, brain hacks, neurotechnology

9:47

that could treat devastating

9:49

cognitive diseases, mental illness,

9:51

and brain injuries. But

9:54

as legal scholar Nita Farahani

9:56

warns, also put our

9:58

most private thoughts emotions

10:00

in jeopardy. And that's

10:02

the part that I fear that

10:04

when you know we get

10:07

to this world of brain transparency if we

10:09

don't have the right kind of safeguards in

10:11

place that that which I

10:13

think is so fundamental to what it means

10:15

to be human what it means to flourish

10:17

as a human may suddenly not

10:19

be our own. Here's Nita

10:22

Farahani on the TED stage. This

10:25

new category of technology

10:27

presents unprecedented possibility both

10:30

good and bad. Consider

10:33

how our physical health and well-being

10:35

are increasing while neurological disease and

10:37

suffering continue to rise. 55 million

10:41

people around the world are struggling with

10:44

dementia with more than 60 to 70

10:46

percent of them suffering from Alzheimer's disease.

10:50

Nearly a billion people struggle with

10:52

mental health and drug use disorders.

10:55

Depression affects more than 300 million.

10:59

Consumer neurotech device can finally enable

11:01

us to treat our brain health

11:03

and wellness as seriously as

11:05

we treat the rest of our physical well-being.

11:09

Regular use of brain sensors could

11:11

even enable us to detect the

11:13

earliest stages of the most aggressive

11:15

forms of brain tumors like glioblastoma

11:17

where early detection is crucial to

11:19

saving lives. The same

11:22

could hold true for Parkinson's

11:24

disease to Alzheimer's, traumatic brain

11:26

injury, ADHD, and even depression.

11:29

But all of this will only be possible

11:31

if people can confidently

11:33

share their brain data without fear that

11:36

it will be misused against them. You

11:39

see the brain data that will be

11:41

collected and generated by these devices won't

11:43

be collected in traditional laboratory

11:46

environments or in clinical research

11:48

studies run by physicians and

11:51

scientists. Instead, it'll

11:54

be the sellers of these new devices,

11:56

the very companies who've been commodifying

11:58

our personal data. for years, which

12:02

is why we can't go into this

12:04

new era naive about the risks or

12:06

complacent about the challenges that the collection

12:08

and sharing our brain data will pose.

12:12

Brain sensors provide direct access to the

12:14

part of ourselves that we hold back,

12:16

that we don't express through our words

12:18

and our actions. Brain data,

12:21

in many instances, will be more

12:23

sensitive than the personal data of

12:25

the past, because it reflects our

12:27

feelings, our mental states, our emotions,

12:30

our preferences, our desires, even our

12:32

very thoughts. I

12:34

would never have wanted the data

12:37

that was collected as I worked through

12:39

the trauma of my personal loss to

12:42

have been commodified, shared, and

12:44

analyzed by others. These

12:46

aren't just hypothetical risks. Take

12:49

Entertac, a Hangzhou-based company who has

12:51

collected millions of instances of brain

12:53

activity data as people have engaged

12:56

in a mind-controlled car

12:58

racing, sleeping, working, even

13:00

using neurofeedback with their

13:02

devices. They've already

13:04

entered into partnerships with other companies

13:06

to share and analyze that data.

13:11

I mean, what's your biggest fear here, Nita? What

13:13

is the worst case scenario if we

13:15

don't start to put some legal

13:17

safeguards around this tech? I

13:20

think, honestly, that human flourishing

13:22

is at risk here. Like, fundamentally, what it

13:24

means to be human is at risk. In

13:27

a minute, Nita Farahani explains

13:29

how our ideas of civil liberty

13:32

need to change in this new

13:34

era of neurotechnology

13:37

to protect our most private ideas

13:39

and thoughts. On the

13:41

show today, Brain Hacks. I'm

13:44

Manu Shahzammarodi, and you're listening to the TED

13:46

Radio Hour from NPR. We'll

13:48

be right back. This

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15:39

Hi, it's Terry Gross, the host

15:41

of Fresh Air. We bring you

15:44

in-depth long form interviews with actors,

15:46

directors, musicians, authors, journalists and more.

15:49

Listen to our Peabody Award winning

15:51

Fresh Air podcast from WHYY and

15:53

NPR. Hello

15:56

lovely listener. I just want to let

15:59

you know that our friends... over at NPR's

16:01

Through Line are also doing an

16:03

episode about the brain, but from

16:05

a completely different angle. Their

16:08

show is about the history

16:10

of understanding how smell changes

16:12

the way we think. It's

16:14

a good one. The same part of the brain that's

16:17

giving us the experience of emotion is also

16:19

giving us the experience of sense. And

16:21

so instantly that we are consciously registering

16:24

a sense, we are also to

16:26

some degree experiencing an emotion. Through

16:29

Line's episode on smell coming

16:31

February 8th, wherever you get your

16:33

podcasts. On

16:36

the show today, Brain Hacks

16:38

and the Future of Neurotechnology.

16:41

We were just talking to Duke Law

16:43

Professor Nita Farahani. She's the author of

16:45

the book, The Battle for Your Brain.

16:48

She says we need to rethink what

16:51

our right to privacy even means in

16:53

this new era. So

16:55

for me, you know, what I've

16:57

been talking about is our right to

17:00

cognitive liberty, our right to self-determination over

17:02

our brain and our mental experiences. And

17:04

what I mean by that is, like

17:07

fundamentally, your right

17:09

to develop your own identity, your

17:11

own thoughts, like to have a

17:13

space where you're able to

17:15

reflect, to think, to, you know, think about

17:18

being a child and trying to sort through

17:20

who you are. I have a third

17:23

grader, so an almost nine-year-old, and

17:26

watching her, you know, more and more come into

17:28

her own and trying to figure out who she

17:30

is, all of that happens

17:32

in this safe space, the safe space

17:34

of mental reprieve. You know,

17:36

in one of the most jarring things,

17:38

I think, in researching my

17:41

book I came across was, you

17:43

know, the classrooms in

17:45

China where children were being required

17:47

to wear headsets to track

17:49

their brain activity, to track

17:52

their attention levels throughout the workday. And

17:54

the thought of a child, kind of

17:56

no matter what that headset

17:59

can or to pick up, but

18:01

the chilling effect that that has on

18:04

the ability to think freely, to be

18:06

able to develop your own internal sense

18:08

of self, to dare

18:11

to think differently at an age where

18:14

it's so hard already to go

18:16

against the norm, that's

18:18

the space that I worry about us eroding,

18:21

getting to a place where people are afraid

18:24

to even think. And

18:27

if we are afraid to even think

18:29

freely, the capacity to be able

18:31

to figure out who you are

18:33

and to dare to dream big

18:35

or to dare to help

18:38

us change the path in the course

18:40

of humanity or your own path in

18:42

life is compromised. When

18:45

I hear you say that, it makes

18:47

me particularly worried because I think we're

18:49

talking about technology that will be very

18:51

subtle, right? You know when I tap

18:53

something or I swipe something, but if

18:56

I think something

18:58

or if someone is collecting a

19:00

brainwave, that

19:02

seems very discrete. It's

19:04

very discrete and hidden and invisible. So

19:06

one of the risks I worry about

19:09

is a lot of times

19:11

with an emerging technology, especially a

19:13

whole new class of technology, it

19:16

becomes normalized and hidden in ways

19:18

that we can't see. So

19:21

just to give you an example of that, some

19:24

of the places in which these EEG

19:26

headsets have been introduced already are places

19:30

like you go into an IKEA

19:32

store to look at a series of

19:34

rugs and you're given a headset and

19:37

told like, only if your brain can prove that

19:39

you love the rug, are you going to be

19:41

able to take it home? This actually happened. What?

19:44

Yeah, they had this marketing gimmick in

19:46

Brussels where they had these limited edition

19:48

rugs. They were

19:51

worried that the kind of idea

19:53

of these limited edition rugs was to bring art

19:56

to people at a reasonable price and people

19:58

were buying them and re-selling them. them

20:00

on places like eBay. And so they

20:02

ran this marketing campaign where you had to

20:04

wear an EEG headset while

20:07

looking at the rugs to prove you loved the

20:09

rug. And if you did, you could take one

20:11

home. And if you didn't, you couldn't. Like, we

20:13

can laugh at that in so many different ways.

20:15

Like it was clearly a marketing gimmick, but

20:18

it normalizes it, right? You

20:20

encounter technology in situations, novel

20:23

technology in situations that are

20:26

non-threatening, that are invisible, you

20:29

don't realize what's being collected. And

20:31

suddenly we've breached this

20:33

category of giving away, you

20:35

know, our most intimate selves without even

20:37

realizing that we're doing so. And, you

20:40

know, I don't think people realize what that

20:42

world might look like. It's not just

20:44

that you've given up your mental privacy,

20:46

you've given up the keys to who

20:48

you are to be able to mentally

20:50

shape and change you. That's happening already

20:52

with algorithms, but the ways in which

20:54

this can happen so much more precisely

20:56

and so much more in a customized

20:58

way, I worry about

21:00

a world of more

21:02

almost brainwashing of people

21:05

in ways that really limit our ability to

21:07

think freely. And

21:10

lest people have individual control over

21:12

their brain data, it will be

21:14

used for micro-targeting or worse, like

21:17

the employees worldwide who've already

21:19

been subject to brain surveillance

21:21

in the workplace to track

21:23

their attention and fatigue, to

21:26

governments developing brain biometrics to

21:28

authenticate people at borders to

21:30

interrogate criminal suspects' brains, and

21:34

even weapons that are being crafted

21:36

to disable and disorient the human

21:38

bone. Brain wearables

21:40

have not only read but write

21:43

capabilities, creating risks that our brains

21:45

can be hacked, manipulated, and even

21:47

subject to targeted attacks. We

21:50

must act quickly to safeguard against

21:52

the very real and terrifying risk

21:55

to our innermost selves. Okay,

22:00

I don't want that future. Tell

22:03

me what to do right now. What would you

22:05

say? Well, I'd say the first

22:07

place that I've been advocating that we

22:10

address is like a system of laws.

22:12

And that's not just because I'm a law professor. I

22:14

think it's because we're starting

22:16

in a world in which the

22:18

balance is not in favor of individuals, right?

22:20

We've gotten to this place where like the

22:23

collection of data is the norm. And so

22:25

the balance is in favor of the tech

22:27

companies. And we have to reclaim some of

22:29

that power for individuals. And in the past

22:31

year, a lot has happened.

22:33

So UNESCO has launched a new project

22:35

around trying to

22:39

develop ethical guidelines around neurotechnology.

22:41

The UN has a committee

22:44

that's putting together a report on

22:46

neurotechnologies and its impact on human

22:48

rights. And a lot of

22:51

the AI legislation that's been happening and

22:53

the conversations that have been happening, some

22:55

of those have started to recognize

22:58

the convergence of these fields and

23:00

include some specifics

23:02

around the processing of biometric and

23:04

personal data. But there needs to

23:06

be a lot more convergence between the

23:08

AI conversations and the neurotechnology conversations. And

23:11

so I've been advocating for a global

23:13

right to cognitive liberty, a right to

23:15

self-determination over our brain and mental experiences.

23:18

And that really just, that's a

23:21

framework to update three existing human

23:23

rights, which is our right

23:25

to privacy, to explicitly include a right

23:27

to mental privacy, the right

23:30

to freedom of thought, to more explicitly

23:32

cover a right against

23:34

interference and manipulation and

23:36

punishment for our thoughts, and the

23:38

right to self-determination, which has been recognized as

23:41

a collective and political right to also be

23:43

an individual right. It

23:45

feels like we are hurtling towards

23:47

an era, and this

23:50

sounds so dramatic, but

23:52

where man and machine are merging

23:54

in many ways. I

23:56

agree with you. How do you think about it?

23:59

So it was, You know, I think of it

24:01

as kind of

24:03

co-evolution. The way I

24:05

see that is human thinking

24:08

is relational. And

24:10

so, you know, our

24:12

technology and our dependence and

24:14

interdependence on technology is increasing,

24:18

which means our relational thinking

24:20

with respect to technology is being

24:22

shaped and changed with that technology.

24:25

I want us to be more in the driver's seat of that.

24:29

Actually knowing what's happening with that

24:31

co-evolution and to be able to

24:33

drive that co-evolution rather than the

24:35

technology in the hands of

24:37

a few powerful people deciding

24:40

how our brains are relationally gonna change

24:42

with respect to that technology. And

24:45

I think this is a whole category where

24:48

it has such a huge implication for how

24:50

it could reshape what it means to be

24:52

human that it's so important that we get

24:54

it right. That's Nita

24:57

Farahani. She's a law professor at

24:59

Duke University and the author of

25:01

The Battle for Your Brain, Defending

25:03

the Right to Think Freely in

25:05

the Age of Neurotechnology. You

25:07

can see her full talk at ted.com. So

25:15

to get to a future where

25:17

all this neurotechnology is even possible, a

25:20

lot of technical work is being done in

25:23

labs all over the world. Like

25:25

one that I visited in Brooklyn at

25:28

a company called OpenBCI. So

25:30

wait, what am I gonna put on my head? Yeah, so

25:32

the new Galia headset is crazy beast. I was

25:35

there to try out a brain

25:37

sensing virtual reality headset called

25:39

the Galia. I'm just gonna

25:41

adjust this island back here. The

25:43

helmet-like contraption that is at the

25:45

bleeding edge of neurotechnology and costs

25:47

about $25,000. And one

25:49

in the back also has three active

25:51

EEG electrodes. So what are they collecting

25:53

then? They're collecting brain activity.

25:56

So it's mostly academics, medical

25:58

researchers, and other tech. developers

26:00

who are using the hardware as a

26:02

starting point for their own projects.

26:05

Founder Connor Rissimano walked me through

26:07

what was happening as I looked

26:09

at a screen and

26:12

all the sensors attached to

26:14

my scalp and earlobes began

26:16

processing lots of data and

26:19

building a very rough profile of

26:21

how my mind works. It kind

26:23

of records your EEG, your eye tracking, your

26:26

heart rate, your heart rate variability, all these

26:28

things against the stimuli. The

26:30

result is a display of all my brain

26:33

waves. Delta, theta, alpha, beta, and

26:35

gamma. It's like a rainbow of

26:37

brain activity that I'm looking at. I

26:40

feel like naked because I feel like you

26:42

can look at these brain waves and be

26:44

like, wow, she's a nervous wreck inside, but

26:47

she presents as like a normal human being.

26:49

Connor could not read my mind,

26:52

but he and the computer could

26:54

quickly make sense of the electrical

26:56

pulses my brain sent out to

26:59

move tiny muscles. Let's try

27:01

flexing or like kind of

27:03

winking your left eye. And

27:05

then an incredible thing happened with

27:07

barely a wink of an eye. I

27:10

was able to save a virtual

27:12

cat from evil rats. All

27:15

right, here I go. There's left, try out

27:17

right. There

27:19

it is. Wow. Nice. Try right again. Then you

27:21

want to collect those bones, but you've got to

27:23

avoid those pesky rats. Yeah. All

27:26

this incredibly impressive, complicated,

27:29

starting a UDP stream now,

27:31

and expensive technology to

27:33

play a video game. But

27:36

it's early days and the goal is

27:38

to get to the point where we

27:40

can just think something and have

27:43

it happen on a screen. You know,

27:45

at OpenBCI, we're really focused on the

27:47

path of least resistance to solving the

27:50

problem, which is decoding the mind,

27:52

intention, emotions, what

27:54

makes us who we are, and then how do we augment that?

27:56

How do we improve that? To do

27:58

that, Connor and his team are piecing together how

28:00

the mind works with the

28:03

data that's easiest to collect, like

28:05

the brain waves that show up when I twitch

28:07

my eye. The computer begins

28:09

to understand that an eye twitch

28:11

shows a specific wave pattern, and

28:14

that means move the cat. Eventually,

28:17

with a lot of repetition, I could

28:19

just think about moving the cat,

28:22

and it would know to move it. So

28:25

this is maybe the beginning

28:27

of mind reading technology. If

28:30

we figure it out the right way, it becomes the

28:33

greatest tool that humanity has ever

28:35

created. When you say the greatest tool, tell me,

28:37

give me an example. To somebody listening, like, what do

28:39

you mean the greatest tool? How is that going to

28:42

help me? Okay. So

28:44

if you knew your

28:47

computer was keeping track of

28:49

your emotions, your deepest darkest

28:52

secrets, but also just like, are

28:55

you focused? Do you need a nap? Do you

28:57

need to go for a walk? Are there these

28:59

kind of like basic things that you don't even

29:01

know about yourself, but I do because I

29:04

now understand your subconscious better than you do. We're

29:08

already there in a lot of ways, but

29:10

it's, you know, we have the power,

29:12

the potential with modern neuro technology and

29:15

computers to make it even more powerful,

29:18

the understanding of our subconscious. And

29:20

so when I think about in

29:22

a real world context, like I do want the

29:24

ability to walk down the street and not have

29:26

to bend my neck down to look at my

29:28

emails and not have to be like, man, I

29:30

got to like open up Google maps and copy

29:32

and paste that address

29:35

from my text thing and then

29:37

like make sure that it's Northeast,

29:39

not Northwest, you know, like it

29:41

could be turning

29:43

down the brightness of the

29:45

display in your sunglasses because

29:48

it's noticing that you

29:51

are getting too much light or you're being stimulated

29:53

too much and it knows that. So instead

29:56

of giving you more of what it thinks you

29:58

want, it knows that

30:01

it should be prioritizing what you need and not what

30:03

you want. But that's not

30:05

what Connor thought the purpose of this technology

30:07

was when he first started the company in

30:09

2013. He

30:11

learned a lot just watching how people

30:13

in other fields used his hardware. In

30:16

the beginning, our goal was to build

30:18

an inward-pointing telescope and to share the

30:20

blueprints with the world so that anybody

30:22

with a computer could begin peering into

30:24

their own brain. Connor Rosamano continues

30:26

from the TED stage. At

30:29

first, we were an EEG-only

30:31

company. We sold brain sensors

30:33

to measure brain activity. But,

30:36

over time, we discovered people doing very

30:38

strange things with our technology. Some

30:41

people were connecting the equipment to the stomach to

30:43

measure the neurons in the gut and

30:45

studied gut-brain connection in the microbiome. Others

30:48

were using the tools to build new

30:51

muscle sensors and controllers for prosthetics and

30:53

robotics. What we learned

30:55

from all of this is that the brain, by

30:58

itself, is actually quite boring.

31:03

Turns out, brain data alone lacks

31:05

context. And what we ultimately

31:07

care about is not the brain, but

31:09

the mind. Consciousness, human cognition.

31:12

When we have things like EMG sensors

31:14

to measure muscle activity or ECG sensors

31:16

to measure heart activity, eye

31:18

trackers, and even environmental sensors to measure the

31:21

world around us, all of

31:23

this makes the brain data much more useful. But

31:26

the organs around our body, our sensory receptors,

31:28

are actually much easier to collect

31:30

data from than the brain and also arguably

31:32

much more important for determining the things that

31:34

we actually care about emotions,

31:37

intentions, and the mind overall. Additionally,

31:41

we realized that people weren't just interested

31:43

in reading from the

31:45

brain and the body. They were

31:47

also interested in modulating the mind

31:49

through various types of sensory stimulation.

31:51

Things like light, sound,

31:53

haptics, and electricity.

31:55

It's one thing to record the

31:58

mind. It's another to modulate. The

32:01

idea of a combined system that can

32:03

both read from and write to the

32:05

brain or body is referred to as

32:07

a closed loop system or bi-directional human

32:09

interface. This concept is

32:12

truly profound and it will define

32:14

the next major revolution in computing

32:16

technology. It

32:19

sounds like you think that we are at a

32:21

moment where on and off are

32:24

not going to be the way we live

32:26

anymore. Yeah, there's all these moments

32:28

where there's friction and there doesn't need

32:31

to be. The computer, if we trusted

32:33

it, would just access that information for

32:35

us and it would understand that it put the wrong

32:37

thing in and that we're frustrated and it would change

32:39

it without us changing it for it. And

32:43

we're already there, right? Most

32:45

people feel uncomfortable when their

32:47

phone is not with them. Most

32:50

people feel like there's a piece of them missing when they're

32:52

like, where's my phone? Where's my phone? Oh my gosh, did I

32:55

lose it? Oh, what does that mean? I've

32:57

lost part of my brain. There's

33:00

memories in there that I don't have without my

33:02

phone. And this

33:05

is part of our mind right

33:07

now and it changes us,

33:09

it manipulates us. And I

33:11

think we're right at this kind of inflection

33:14

point where we're figuring out how

33:16

to put real human emotions directly

33:18

into the computing loop. When

33:22

you have products that

33:24

not just are designed for the average

33:26

user but are designed to actually adapt

33:28

to their user, that's something

33:30

truly special. When we know what

33:32

the data of an emotion or a feeling looks like and

33:34

we know how to make that data go up or down,

33:37

then using AI, we can

33:39

build constructive or destructive interference

33:41

patterns to either amplify or

33:43

suppress those emotions or feelings.

33:46

In the very near future, we will have computers

33:48

that we are resonantly and

33:50

subconsciously connected to, enabling

33:53

empathetic computing for the very first time. Okay,

33:57

so tell me what that looks like to you.

34:00

If everything goes according to plan for

34:02

you, what is the potential that you

34:04

see coming from the technology that you're

34:06

building? I think

34:08

the potential is immense. And so

34:10

in my mind, success

34:13

is building a new type of

34:15

personal computer where the owner, the

34:18

user of the computer, has

34:20

total agency over their own data

34:23

and how the computer is augmenting their mind. We're

34:27

working on what I believe is the

34:29

greatest challenge of this century

34:31

and maybe the greatest challenge that humans

34:33

have ever faced, which is understanding intelligence,

34:36

human intelligence. That's

34:40

Connor Russomano, CEO of OpenBCI.

34:43

You can watch his full talk at ted.com.

34:47

On the show today, brain hacks. I'm

34:50

Manoush Zomorodi, and you're listening to the TED

34:52

Radio Hour from NPR. Stay

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37:01

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37:03

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37:05

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37:08

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37:10

just hearing my conversation with him. Well,

37:13

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37:15

I really geek out about the

37:17

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37:19

neurotechnology and how devices coming

37:21

on the market right now,

37:23

like Apple's new AR VR

37:25

headset, well, they are just

37:28

stepping stones to a new

37:30

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37:32

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37:34

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37:57

It's the TED Radio Hour from NPR. I

38:00

mean if is a morality. On the

38:02

show today. Brain hacks, So

38:05

far we have talked about technology,

38:08

Augmenting the brain, But.

38:10

What if there was a

38:13

way to diagnose and even

38:15

treat severe neurological diseases at

38:17

the molecular level? For

38:20

the third, really severe conditions

38:22

for which we have. Very

38:24

poor understanding of the biology. And

38:27

and know therapeutic insights. So those

38:29

are the conditions that we're focusing

38:31

on. This is that The

38:33

Sergio Pasta. He's a professor

38:36

of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences

38:38

at Stanford University. He

38:40

also directs the Stanford

38:42

Brain Organogenesis Program where

38:44

he researchers neuro psychiatric

38:46

disorders, including the most

38:48

debilitating forms of Autism.

38:50

I've been very interested in

38:52

autism. Early on when I

38:55

was actually in school and met

38:57

my first patient with autism and

38:59

was just like struck by. Just

39:03

like how little we could do for patients

39:05

with autism is still today's as the case.

39:07

We consult a very little. We.

39:10

Still don't understand the biology very well.

39:12

With still diagnosed as orders the way

39:14

we were doing and the nineteenth century.

39:17

Psychiatry. And of course, neurology. There

39:20

are too large extend the only branches

39:22

of medicine word the organ of interest.

39:24

The. Brain. Is inaccessible.

39:28

So. Easy of a patient with

39:30

cancer. You. Remove that humor, right? Are

39:32

you take a biopsy? You bring it to the lab.

39:35

And you can directly studied those

39:37

cells in a dish and identify

39:39

what are the molecules in the

39:41

path and are of and come

39:43

up with. treatments? In Psychiatry we

39:45

can just take the human brain

39:48

out. You know what the past

39:50

few decades in old medicine have

39:52

indicated is that to find new

39:54

treatments that are biologically inspired, you

39:56

need access to the tissue. And

39:58

really this this has become. my

40:01

mission. Sergio Pashka

40:03

continues from the TED stage. Today,

40:07

most of what we know about the human

40:09

brain comes from studies in animals, typically

40:11

mice. And while we've

40:13

learned a lot from this animal brain,

40:16

the characteristics that make the human

40:18

brain unique and uniquely susceptible to

40:20

disease remain mysterious.

40:23

Dysfunction in the human brain causes

40:25

brain disorders such as autism and

40:27

schizophrenia and Alzheimer's disease, devastating

40:30

conditions that are poorly understood.

40:33

Nearly one in five individuals

40:35

suffers from a psychiatric disease. What is

40:37

even more striking is that the lowest

40:39

success rate for finding new drugs is

40:41

in psychiatry, out of all the branches

40:43

of medicine, likely because until

40:46

now we couldn't really access

40:49

the human brain. So

40:52

you have found a way of

40:54

studying brain tissue, but take us

40:56

back to how you went from

40:59

being a clinical psychiatrist to one

41:01

who is researching disorders at the

41:03

genetic, even molecular level. Yes,

41:05

absolutely. So as I was finishing my

41:07

clinical training about 15 years

41:10

or so ago, there was

41:12

a remarkable breakthrough made

41:14

by a Japanese scientist, Shinya

41:16

Yamanaka, who reported

41:18

at that time that under some

41:21

condition, you could take a cell

41:23

that is already fully formed and mature and

41:26

push it back in time through

41:28

a genetic trick to

41:30

look pretty much like the stem cells

41:32

from which the entire organism is

41:34

built. So this was

41:37

called cell reprogramming. He received

41:39

a Nobel Prize for this remarkable discovery a few

41:41

years after. And

41:43

it essentially involves taking, for instance, skin

41:45

cells from any individual, take a few

41:48

skin cells or blood cells, putting

41:50

them in a dish and then inserting

41:52

in those cells a few genes, just

41:55

briefly. And the dream

41:58

was, at that time, that

42:00

you would be able actually to make human

42:03

neurons at the bottom of a dish

42:05

from those patients in a non-invasive way

42:07

that would not involve taking any neuron

42:09

from anybody's brain, but

42:11

rather reconstructing or reverse engineering

42:14

this process in the

42:16

laboratory. I'm here to tell you

42:19

that we can finally grow parts of

42:21

the human brain from any individual and

42:24

then build functioning human circuits in

42:26

a laboratory so-called your dish. We

42:29

start by asking a patient to

42:31

provide a small skin sample. We

42:34

then take those skin cells, reprogram

42:37

them by putting a series of genetic

42:39

factors, and push them back

42:41

in time so that those skin cells become

42:44

stem cells. It's like cellular

42:46

alchemy. These

42:48

stem cells have almost magical abilities

42:50

to turn into any other cell type.

42:53

So what do we do? We take the

42:55

stem cells, we dissociate

42:57

them, we then aggregate

42:59

them so that they form spheres or

43:02

tiny balls of cells. We

43:04

then take those, move them into

43:06

a special place where there is a kind

43:08

of chemical soup, and that

43:10

chemical soup will allow them to

43:12

grow and transform and turn into

43:14

a brain organoid. And

43:17

let me be clear. These are not

43:19

brains in a jar. These

43:22

are parts of the nervous system in

43:25

a laboratory dish. Each

43:28

of them contains millions of cells, and

43:31

we can even listen as

43:33

they fire electrical signals. Or

43:38

we can watch them as

43:40

they sparkle with electrical activity. Or

43:43

we can image inside and watch the

43:45

cells as they communicate with each other. Isn't

43:48

it remarkable to think that just a few

43:50

months ago, these cells were skin cells in

43:52

a patient, and now they're neural cells

43:55

at the bottom of a dish that we can study

43:57

at ease. Wow.

44:00

So you can figure out

44:02

how your patients brain cells

44:04

evolved by using stem cells

44:06

to grow neural cells that

44:08

you call brain organoids. I

44:11

mean, it's amazing. Can you

44:13

give me an example of what you have

44:15

learned from this process? I know you specialize

44:18

in a particular form of autism called Timothy's

44:20

syndrome. Yes. So

44:22

for Timothy's syndrome, which is very

44:24

rare, the patients will

44:27

not just have autism and

44:29

epilepsy, but later on

44:32

they'll have a heart problem. They're

44:35

more susceptible to infections, but

44:37

the patients have literally just

44:39

a letter in their genome that

44:42

has been modified. And

44:44

that tiny, tiny mutation in a

44:46

calcium channel has devastating

44:49

effects. And this

44:51

mutation that causes Timothy's

44:53

syndrome was predicted

44:56

to cause that channel to

44:59

stay open slightly longer so

45:01

that more calcium would get inside the cell. But

45:03

of course, nobody has ever seen it. So

45:06

the first experiment that we've done, which

45:09

is still vividly remember even today, the

45:12

night when it actually worked for the first

45:14

time. And I

45:16

was in the microscopy room

45:19

and we finally had neurons

45:21

and could actually see that there was more calcium

45:24

going inside the cell. And

45:26

that was really a very

45:28

exciting moment because it actually showed us that

45:30

you take the cell from patients and

45:32

you can see a defect, so a

45:35

biological consequence of

45:38

a mutation. We now have

45:40

literally hundreds of genes that

45:42

are associated with autism,

45:45

intellectual disability, ADHD, schizophrenia.

45:48

And the reason why that is important is

45:51

because genes are closer

45:53

to the molecular pathways. So

45:56

they offer a great entry point. And

45:59

of course, I am concerned. convinced that in understanding the

46:01

molecules that are important for that, we're going to discover

46:04

very important pathways that are causing disease. So

46:10

forecast for me, you know, if you

46:12

had a fantasy come true, what would

46:14

that look like? Would it mean that

46:16

you would be able

46:18

to stop neurons from having

46:21

dysfunction or problems before they got

46:24

there? Would it mean that you

46:26

would do genetic testing? I want

46:28

to understand the implications of what

46:30

this might mean for future generations

46:32

of people. So

46:35

we've helped close to 250 labs

46:37

around the world to learn this technology.

46:39

We're going to start to understand what

46:41

goes wrong in those cells. And

46:44

I can tell you that for

46:46

team assistant room in particular, we

46:48

got such a good understanding that

46:50

a therapeutic opportunity just arose pretty

46:52

much naturally out of those experiments.

46:55

And so we designed a strategy

46:58

where we essentially destroy that RNA

47:00

that carries the mutation. And

47:02

this would likely involve an injection of

47:05

this therapy. We're still far away from

47:07

that. But in principle, it would

47:09

involve injecting a piece of DNA

47:11

that will

47:14

modulate that. So in theory,

47:16

you could stop the mutation in its

47:18

tracks. But how old would a

47:21

person have to be to get a treatment like this?

47:23

I mean, I guess in utero? Certainly

47:25

for neurodevelopmental disorders, you want to

47:27

intervene as early as you possibly

47:29

can. Because, you know,

47:31

once damage has been done to the

47:34

nervous system is going to be probably

47:36

hard to reverse. And

47:38

so it is foreseeable that

47:40

some of these patients actually will be diagnosed

47:43

within the first few weeks after being born, which

47:46

means that one could intervene very early

47:48

on in the course of

47:50

this disease. Where

47:53

do we start to think about what

47:55

the ethical implications are of when we

47:57

intervene in the development of someone? This

48:00

is a great this is a great issue something

48:02

that actually pre occupies me quite a lot i

48:04

spend a lot of time, no

48:06

thinking about the ethical societal implications of the

48:09

work that we do both in terms of

48:11

delivering some of the therapies and how early

48:13

you would intervene for timis

48:15

syndrome. It's likely to be

48:17

justified to intervene very early with

48:20

the therapy like this especially because this

48:22

children are very sick, very

48:24

debited by this condition but there will

48:26

be other neuropsychiatric conditions that are perhaps

48:28

not as severe. We're

48:30

not as good as predicting and i think they're

48:32

going to think very carefully when

48:34

do we want to intervene and what are the

48:36

risks for intervention. I think that's

48:39

important to keep in mind because i'm sure there

48:41

are some people listening who think you know we've

48:43

just gotten to a point in society where we've

48:45

started to appreciate that people's brains work differently the

48:48

word neurodiversity is used often

48:50

that we start to

48:52

understand. That you know people come

48:54

in all sorts of shapes and sizes and

48:56

ways of seeing the world. Absolutely and

48:58

certainly our goal has never been to

49:01

try to either change or

49:03

cure anybody who doesn't want

49:05

to change in any way.

49:08

Most of our work has

49:10

been focused on addressing this

49:12

devastating conditions of the human

49:14

brain severe intellectual disability where

49:17

any improvement very small improvement there will make

49:19

a huge difference because there are no therapeutic

49:22

approaches. That are even close to

49:24

being curative in those conditions. I

49:28

think it's going to be a very exciting

49:30

time for human neurobiology and for

49:32

psychiatry and my

49:34

hope is that slowly but

49:36

surely psychiatry will be

49:39

moving into a molecular era.

49:42

That's Dr Sergio Pashka he's

49:44

a professor of psychiatry and

49:46

behavioral sciences at Stanford University

49:48

where he directs the Stanford

49:51

brain organogenesis program. You

49:53

can see his full talk at ted.com.

49:58

So we have talked about all kinds. of

50:01

brain hacks. And we want

50:03

to end our show with a very personal

50:05

story. So

50:07

for people with neurological conditions

50:10

like epilepsy, the lack

50:12

of control over their brain can

50:14

be terrifying. It's very, it's

50:17

a crushing limitation for sure. This

50:20

is Kate Faulkner. She's

50:22

a sous chef in Colorado.

50:24

She's also the sister of

50:26

Ted Radiowar producer Rachel Faulkner-White.

50:29

And when Kate was a teenager, she

50:32

started having tiny seizures

50:34

called absence seizures. Where I

50:36

would shake a little bit and

50:38

drop whatever I was holding, but I wouldn't black

50:40

out or fall over or

50:42

lose consciousness or anything like that. At

50:45

the time, she didn't know what they were. And

50:47

she wasn't formally diagnosed with epilepsy until

50:50

a few years later. My

50:52

first big seizure was in the summer of

50:54

2017. And luckily it was with other people,

50:59

but I have no memory of it happening. It was one

51:02

minute I was sitting at the kitchen table and the next minute

51:04

I was with a bunch of

51:06

EMTs who were in the living room with me. After

51:09

that, Kate had started on medications that

51:11

were supposed to prevent these seizures. And

51:14

they seemed to help at first. But

51:17

a few years later, she had another big

51:19

one. I was driving in my

51:21

car, which was terrifying. Luckily,

51:23

it was the only place on the

51:26

route that I was driving that didn't

51:28

have any trees or guardrails. And I just kind of

51:30

drifted across the field. After

51:32

that one, I stopped driving. This

51:35

kept happening more and more

51:37

frequently. I was

51:39

having seizures alone at home. I

51:42

was having seizures at work. I

51:45

eventually had to leave that

51:47

chef job because open

51:49

flames and sharp knives and seizures

51:52

are not a great combination. It's

51:55

devastating to feel so limited

51:57

in what I can do.

52:00

It's the idea of

52:02

hurting someone else if I was driving a

52:04

car. Like, I don't

52:06

know how I managed to not hurt anybody.

52:09

I am haunted by the idea of what

52:11

could have happened. And I really

52:13

missed having the freedom to go where I

52:15

wanted and to go hiking

52:17

by myself or go to the store by

52:20

myself or go swimming or take a bubble

52:22

bath. But in

52:24

2023, Kate's neurologist had

52:26

a new idea. She surgically

52:29

implants a vagus nerve stimulation device.

52:31

Which is a battery that goes

52:33

in your chest on the left

52:35

side, just underneath the skin. And

52:38

it's connected to a wire that wraps around

52:40

the vagus nerve, which is part of a

52:43

parasympathetic nerve system. And

52:46

the battery is programmed

52:49

by the neurologist to emit

52:51

small electrical pulses. It

52:54

sends an extra burst of electricity

52:57

into the brain and can increase

52:59

blood flow to certain areas of the brain and

53:02

can prevent seizures from

53:04

happening. And right now my

53:07

battery is programmed to send a pulse every

53:09

five minutes for a 30 second

53:12

interval. And the

53:15

interesting side effect is that whenever the

53:17

electrical pulse goes off, there

53:19

it goes, so yeah. So as you can hear it

53:21

happening right now, the battery is going off. The

53:24

vagus nerve also works around

53:26

your vocal cords. And so your voice goes

53:29

a little strange. It's

53:31

not painful at all. I remember

53:33

for the first couple weeks, it

53:36

felt like it was really hard to catch my breath. Even

53:39

though I was breathing normally and breathing fine, it's

53:41

kind of that same feeling. So that

53:43

was hard to get used to. And after

53:46

30 seconds, then it goes away. And

53:48

my voice goes back to normal. It's

53:51

not a cure for epilepsy. And

53:53

it's not effective for everyone. But

53:56

for Kate. I haven't had a seizure since

53:58

I got the device put in. I

54:01

now have control to some

54:03

extent over a part of my brain that

54:05

I didn't have before. The

54:08

possibility of the freedom that

54:10

this could potentially bring. I might be

54:12

able to start titrating off

54:14

the epilepsy drugs that I'm on, which

54:16

those have some not fun side effects.

54:20

I want to be able to go

54:22

through a day

54:24

without having the intrusive

54:26

thought of I'm carrying

54:28

a 40 gallon pot of hot

54:30

soup and thinking on today's episode

54:32

of Bad Times to Have Seizures,

54:36

it'd be wonderful to have that kind of

54:38

freedom. I mean it's an incredible

54:40

piece of technology and then even

54:43

though I have a weird voice now

54:45

it's of I'm optimistic that

54:47

this will make life easier and open

54:50

up possibilities. That's

54:53

Kate Faulkner. We are so grateful to

54:55

her for telling her story. And you

54:57

can learn more about her condition and

55:00

treatment at ted.npr.org. Thank

55:06

you so much for listening to our show

55:08

Brain Hacks. This episode was

55:10

produced by Rachel Faulkner-White, Katie Montelillon,

55:12

and Fiona Gearan. It was edited

55:15

by Sanaz Mehskinpour, James De La

55:17

Houssey, and me. Our

55:19

production staff at NPR also includes

55:21

Matthew Cloutier and Tarsha Nahada. Bireen

55:23

Noguchi is our executive producer. Our

55:27

audio engineers were Robert Rodriguez,

55:29

Margaret Luthar, and Ted Miebain.

55:32

Our theme music was written by Romtien

55:35

Arablui. Our partners at Ted are

55:37

Chris Anderson, Michelle Quint, Alejandro

55:39

Salazar, and Daniela Balarezzo. I'm

55:42

Anoush Azomorodi and you've been listening to the

55:44

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