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Neuroscientists' Open Letter To DIY Brain Hackers

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Re: Neuroscientists' Open Letter To DIY Brain Hackers

#71

Post by djtriptych »

spdustin wrote: post #28
louprado wrote: post #21

RadioLab's 9-Volt Nirvana episode discussed how DARPA uses tCDS to enhance sharp-shooting ability. At the end of the episode, the reporter conveyed a sense of loss when the tCDS system was no longer available to her. She sounded like a drug addict that pines for that feeling of their first high and then risks spending their life in vain trying to recover that feeling. If your life literally depends on a skill and sup…

A quote from the reporter's blog [0]: "When the nice neuroscientists put the electrodes on me, the thing that made the earth drop out from under my feet was that for the first time in my life, everything in my head finally shut the fuck up." I'll be honest, that is a pretty compelling testimonial for many folks. [0]: http://www.lastwordonnothing.com/2012/02/09/better-living-th...

Similar feeling to transcendental meditation. You can change your brain..

Re: Neuroscientists' Open Letter To DIY Brain Hackers

#72

Post by AnkhMorporkian »

gherkin0 wrote: post #70
AnkhMorporkian wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

10,000 IU per day. A loading dose is in the range of 100,000IU to 1,000,000IU, depending on age and body weight. Hypervitaminosis D only occurs when you take a loading dose level for months or years; it's not possible to acutely overdose on vitamin D.

That's a lot. Vitamin D tests are easy to get, so I just took a few over a few months to find a dose that would keep me at ~50ng/ml. Previous to that, I had taken 5000+ IU/day for some time and the test showed my levels were very high. It looks like this site has a nice chart: https://www.vitamindcouncil.org/further-topics/i-tested-my-v...

I did end up taking a Vitamin D test after I had started supplementing, and on that dosage I'm still a little below normal levels.

Re: Neuroscientists' Open Letter To DIY Brain Hackers

#73

Post by scott_s »

Karunamon wrote: post #29
ricksplat wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's pseudoscience if it's presented as "scientific fact"; science is the process by which such facts are established. Otherwise you're talking about a hypothesis.

http://jjodx.weebly.com/home/seven-papers-about-tdcs Sounds like scientific fact to me. We know it works, it's just a matter of establishing effects on specific tasks.

I suggest reading the submitted article, starting from the heading "What are your other concerns?"

Re: Neuroscientists' Open Letter To DIY Brain Hackers

#74

Post by freshhawk »

praptak wrote: post #64
pavel_lishin wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Larry Niven arguably predicted the existence of wireheads, although his wires ran directly to the brain's pleasure center.

Suppose you can achieve happiness with a wire to the brain. Is there a good argument against doing this?

That depends. If your end goal is merely happiness then no, as long as you can still find a way to motivate yourself to eat, get enough physical activity to stay alive and provide yourself at least basic shelter and essentials.

If your end goal isn't happiness but fulfillment or meaning or something else that will also trigger happiness then there's an excellent argument against doing that, since it will eventually become all you do or care about.

Re: Neuroscientists' Open Letter To DIY Brain Hackers

#75

Post by ejk314 »

praptak wrote: post #64
pavel_lishin wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Larry Niven arguably predicted the existence of wireheads, although his wires ran directly to the brain's pleasure center.

Suppose you can achieve happiness with a wire to the brain. Is there a good argument against doing this?

The same arguments against doing heroin?

Re: Neuroscientists' Open Letter To DIY Brain Hackers

#76

Post by amelius »

etrautmann wrote: post #59

Neuroscientist here: Just listened to a talk from a reseacher who studied tDCS and tACS in human subjects, and found that IQ scores were actually going down relative to control groups. It's absolutely not clear what the appropriate protocols are, and behavioral outcomes could be incredibly sensitive to factors such as 1) electrode placement, 2) stimulation frequency, 3) amplitude, 4) direct or alternating current, et…

> IQ scores were actually going down

By how much?

If someone can trade severe anxiety for perhaps 5-10 IQ points, then in most cases they will probably sign up.

Re: Neuroscientists' Open Letter To DIY Brain Hackers

#77

Post by freshhawk »

stared wrote: post #30

Forgive my votum separatum, but: > The biggest risk is that we just don't know what all the risks are. I think that's the biggest risk. I would call it "an opportunity". And as far as it is being done voluntarily, and there is a non-zero entry barrier, I am indebted to all those who (maybe) risk their health and lives for possible progress of science, medicine and technology. Compare it to extreme sports, where there…

The problem is that no one gets any decent data out of that harm. The benefit is pretty minimal compared to the societal cost of potential harm. We can even ignore the personal costs completely and just focus on the societal costs of these people harming themselves and no longer being productive and instead being a burden, it still seems like a poor trade-off.

So, if you are going to self-experiment, please take copious, detailed and careful notes, video and pictures I guess.

Re: Neuroscientists' Open Letter To DIY Brain Hackers

#78

Post by freshhawk »

6stringmerc wrote: post #20
api wrote: post #5

TDCS seems like using a sledgehammer to tune a piano.

Nicely put. I'd venture that a lot of the "plug in and go" crowd might be better served with some vigorous exercise rather than electrical stimulation. At least one of the two has viable, peer reviewed studies and results to consider. But hey, Darwin Awards ain't going to write themselves.

In addition to vigorous exercise, add in all the promising results from studies on mindfulness meditation as well. But clearly the cyberpunk aesthetic, and techno-solutionism is what is motivating here, it's not the evidence.

Re: Neuroscientists' Open Letter To DIY Brain Hackers

#79

Post by st3v3r »

Karunamon wrote: post #24
BlanketLogic wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> They don't know the effects yet. That's what makes it 'pseudo'.

So by that definition, any new and untested-en-masse "thing" is "pseudoscience", with all the implied quackery baggage that term applies. That is not a useful definition.

It is a quite useful definition. Until it's proven, someone claiming that it's great is spewing quackery.

Re: Neuroscientists' Open Letter To DIY Brain Hackers

#80

Post by qrybam »

srtjstjsj wrote: post #57
kbenson wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From that blog post: And then, finally, the main question: what role does doubt and fear play in our lives if its eradication actually causes so many improvements? Do we make more ethical decisions when we listen to our inner voices of self-doubt or when we’re freed from them? If we all wore these caps, would the world be a better place? That's a really interesting thought. Not so much "would the world be better", as…

It's a leap to say that suppressing doubt and fear makes people more rational. It could just as well make people more impulsive.

It's also a leap to say the world would be a better place. One person's version of rationality can be quite different to another's. Imagine of someone feels that the only rational thing for them to do is to do something "normally rational" people would find irrational- like kill your neighbour's dog because it's bark is keeping you up at night, but social pressures, anxiety and fear actually keep them in check from the perspective of the whole population.

Are psychopaths not a good indicator of what might happen if your self limiting emotions/thoughts were turned off?

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