1. One thing that helps
Can we make people more altruistic, or less selfish, by adjusting their neurons? And should we? Italian researchers think it’s possible.
The purpose of the study was to identify the neural mechanism involved in altruistic behaviour by making mice play their own version of the “Dictator Game.” This involves a choice of what, and how much, to share with others. The mice were observed to consider factors such as familiarity, sex, hunger levels and hierarchical status when deciding whether to share food, and with whom. The researchers were then able to silence specific neurons and observe the effect on behaviour.
“We observed that silencing the neurons in the prefrontal cortex that are connected to the basolateral amygdala modulated choices guided by self-interest,” said Diego Scheggia.
The work by Scheggia and his colleagues is controversial due to the potential to modify personalities. However, the possible benefits include a better understand of some psychiatric disorders and a way to improve lives on a wide scale.
2. One to be wary of
Oh My God. I can’t believe anyone thinks this is a thing that should exist.
When is a game really over? For Palmer Luckey, founder of Oculus, it’s when you die in real life. Inspired by the anime Sword Art Online, he is creating a headset that literally kills the player when it’s game over. Luckey wants people to feel more accountability, just like in real life, by putting players’ lives on the line. To be clear, Oculus is the company Facebook bought and all their headsets are Oculus headsets.
What happens if a player dies in-game? The headset watches out for the red game over screen at a specific frequency then explodes the attached explosive charge modules! I’m assuming this is all a stunt – but I’m still feeling a bit nervous about using my Oculus headset.
I’ll leave you with Luckey’s quotes because… well, you’ll understand.
“There are a huge variety of failures that could occur and kill the user at the wrong time,” he wrote. “This is why I have not worked up the balls to actually use it myself”.
3. One to amaze
“I like Shazam – but I’d love one for bird noises” you say. Well, you are in luck!
The Haikubox is perfect for you. It’s an AI-powered box that listens for bird songs 24/7 and identifies which species are in the vicinity. It works by filtering out background noise and just picking up birds. Once it detects a bird’s song, it connects to servers in the Cornell Lab of Ornithology and gets to work.
Neural networks analyse the bird song, sifting through data and identifying which species paid a visit. The accompanying app allows you to check more information about the species and see their pictures. You can also help the neural network by giving feedback to its identification or misidentification of sounds.
The microphone captures all sounds, including human voice. But Loggerhead Instruments, Haikubox’s parent company, assures that no human voice data is stored by the network. There is also an option to keep your data private. If you’re committed to bird-watching, this will be amazing for you. If you’re not, this may just fall into the “mildly interesting” category🙂