From brain waves to words: a new path to communication without surgery • Hacker News Board

Re: From brain waves to words: a new path to communication without surgery

#101

Post by consumer451 » Wed, Jul 01, 2026, 5:18 PM UTC

ygouzerh wrote: post #71

consumer451 wrote: post #57

Please see my bio for the full rant. The key take-away is: > While we missed the boat on Internet tracking, there is still time to avoid sailing through the final frontier of neural tracking. > Thanks to the BCI, we will soon be offered the trade of our privacy for the convenience of password-free login and faster typing. Next, there will be a quick TSA neural scan prior to boarding...

It's good point! However, one of the main benefits of a technology like this, would be not really for everyday people, but for people with handicap or a speech impediment. I personally have a stammer. While mine is less severe, and I doesn't need directly it, I know several people that would quite be glad of the benefits that it could bring to them. (Example: pass online interviews). I agree however of the privacy co…

I totally respect that, and it would be really cool technology in general. However, it is truly last frontier of privacy. We can't just treat this as yet another little thing.

Re: From brain waves to words: a new path to communication without surgery

#102

Post by consumer451 » Wed, Jul 01, 2026, 5:40 PM UTC

rubyfan wrote: post #97

consumer451 wrote: post #57

Please see my bio for the full rant. The key take-away is: > While we missed the boat on Internet tracking, there is still time to avoid sailing through the final frontier of neural tracking. > Thanks to the BCI, we will soon be offered the trade of our privacy for the convenience of password-free login and faster typing. Next, there will be a quick TSA neural scan prior to boarding...

Yes, Meta focusing on this type of research does set off alarm bells for me. I suspect this isn’t about some altruistic intention to help people with disabilities but something a little more surveillance oriented.

Imagine the ad profile data value that this would unlock. CPC - > Cost per thought?

While allowing the user to type with their mind, we detected signs of depression. Full court press on all ad partners aiming for that group.

While allowing the user to type with their mind, we detected that this user pictures driving fast, our insurance partners have the user profile updated.

While allowing the user to type with their mind, we detected signs of - as required by local regulations, they are now labeled by the state as .

Re: From brain waves to words: a new path to communication without surgery

#103

Post by consumer451 » Wed, Jul 01, 2026, 8:51 PM UTC

consumer451 wrote: post #102

rubyfan wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, Meta focusing on this type of research does set off alarm bells for me. I suspect this isn’t about some altruistic intention to help people with disabilities but something a little more surveillance oriented.

Imagine the ad profile data value that this would unlock. CPC - > Cost per thought? While allowing the user to type with their mind, we detected signs of depression. Full court press on all ad partners aiming for that group. While allowing the user to type with their mind, we detected that this user pictures driving fast, our insurance partners have the user profile updated. While allowing the user to type with their…

Apologies, "CPC - > Cost per thought?" was very sloppy.

It's an improvement in CPA or ROAS.

Re: From brain waves to words: a new path to communication without surgery

#104

Post by robwwilliams » Thu, Jul 02, 2026, 2:05 AM UTC

moolcool wrote: post #68

smusamashah wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is the most pessimistic take on this tech here. You can view anything with the same lens.

I’m trying to not be snarky here, but it is difficult to have an optimistic take about an advertising company working on mind reading technology. At some point we have to call a spade a spade, I think.

Share your concern.

One point is that this is not “mind reading”. This is “motor command reading”. This is really no different than placing recording electrodes near motor neurons that direct vocalization. Or in terminal nerve fibers that move finger and wrist muscles.

For Meta this is a PR stunt of the type that I saw staged at a Human Brain Project demo in Budapest in 2012 in with an EEG-instrumented operator tried to move a robot around the stage with HBP leaders trying to narrate the “wonders of it all”. Sadly it was one of those classic demo failures in front of 200 neuroscientists and EU science bureaucrats. Didn’t stop the EU from funding the application the next year. About 1 billion euros not well spent.