brainpower

Fast Forward to 2040: How to prepare for the new era in brain enhancement that will change the way we think, work, and heal

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Decades from now when our aug­ment­ed brains have enhanced our cog­ni­tive func­tion and trans­formed near­ly every aspect of our lives, many of us will look back and won­der why we didn’t do more to pre­pare for these inevitable changes. Gov­ern­ment lead­ers may grap­ple with the run­away effects of AI and brain enhance­ment on geopol­i­tics. Com­pa­nies that fail to incor­po­rate neu­rotech­nolo­gies and BCI into their oper­a­tional flow could lose sig­nif­i­cant mar­ket share and be forced to scram­ble in an attempt to regain a foothold in an indus­try they once dominated.

Work­ers who don’t heed the warn­ings to re-skill or upskill may find them­selves out of a job as entire indus­tries dis­ap­pear. Grad­u­at­ing col­lege stu­dents may dis­cov­er their field of study is no longer rel­e­vant in the busi­ness world, leav­ing them unpre­pared for the chang­ing job mar­ket. Tech inno­va­tors could be caught up in fierce com­pe­ti­tion to snap up employ­ees from a very lim­it­ed tal­ent pool, dri­ving up the cost of inno­va­tion and ham­per­ing its devel­op­ment. And every­day cit­i­zens may be wrestling with the unex­pect­ed con­se­quences of unin­ten­tion­al­ly giv­ing away the rights to their neur­al data.

Rest assured, it doesn’t have to be this way. [Read more…] about Fast For­ward to 2040: How to pre­pare for the new era in brain enhance­ment that will change the way we think, work, and heal

The NeuroGeneration and Humankind’s Quest to Enhance the Brain

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Some peo­ple may be uneasy with the idea of “brain enhance­ment,” but the quest to boost our brain­pow­er is noth­ing new; it is an essen­tial part of human nature. Ever since Homo sapi­ens emerged near­ly 200,000 years ago, we have been search­ing for ways to upgrade the hard­ware and wet­ware in our heads, and we’ve been cre­at­ing and using tools to help us do it—physical and cog­ni­tive tools that help us solve prob­lems and com­plete tasks more effi­cient­ly, tools that extend our nat­ur­al abil­i­ties and allow us to do things that weren’t pos­si­ble before. Lan­guage, num­bers, sci­ence, education—these are all tools we’ve devel­oped to improve our men­tal capacities.

Our most pow­er­ful tool for nav­i­gat­ing the ever-chang­ing world, how­ev­er, is the brain itself. [Read more…] about The Neu­ro­Gen­er­a­tion and Humankind’s Quest to Enhance the Brain

Ohio Opioid Technology Challenge funds program testing neurofeedback-based brain training to reduce cravings and battle opioid addiction

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Soft­ware engi­neer Kel­ly Cash­ion (right) adjusts a wire­less EEG head­set on research engi­neer Nilesh Powar. Cred­it: The Uni­ver­si­ty of Day­ton Research Institute

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Bat­tling Addic­tion With Brain­pow­er (Uni­ver­si­ty of Day­ton press release):

“The Uni­ver­si­ty of Day­ton Research Insti­tute has won a $10,000 Ohio Opi­oid Tech­nol­o­gy Chal­lenge award for a pro­gram that will teach peo­ple with opi­oid addic­tions how to reduce their crav­ings by regain­ing con­trol of their brains.

“Using neu­ro­feed­back, we’ll work with our vol­un­teers to help them learn to reg­u­late activ­i­ty in the part of their brain asso­ci­at­ed with crav­ings and rewire some of those path­ways, allow­ing them to reduce their crav­ings and expe­ri­ence a more ‘nor­mal’ state even with­out opi­oids.” [Read more…] about Ohio Opi­oid Tech­nol­o­gy Chal­lenge funds pro­gram test­ing neu­ro­feed­back-based brain train­ing to reduce crav­ings and bat­tle opi­oid addiction

Study: Hearing aids, by reducing cognitive load, can improve brain function in persons with hearing loss

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hearing_brain

UTEP pro­fes­sor shows that hear­ing aids improve mem­o­ry, speech (press release):

“A recent study by Jamie Des­jardins, Ph.D., an assis­tant pro­fes­sor in the speech-lan­guage pathol­o­gy pro­gram at The Uni­ver­si­ty of Texas at El Paso, found that hear­ing aids improve brain func­tion in per­sons with hear­ing loss. [Read more…] about Study: Hear­ing aids, by reduc­ing cog­ni­tive load, can improve brain func­tion in per­sons with hear­ing loss

Emerging apps: Train the brain to train the eye

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vision iris scan New vision app keeps base­ball play­ers’ eye on the ball (CBS News):

“Andriese and Chavez were among the 19 mem­bers of the base­ball team at the Uni­ver­si­ty of Cal­i­for­nia River­side tak­ing part in an exper­i­ment. The goal: train­ing their brain to see bet­ter. The play­ers spent [Read more…] about Emerg­ing apps: Train the brain to train the eye

Why do steroid-taking athletes pay attention to their physical exercise regimens?

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brainTo Boost Brain Health and Per­for­mance, Har­ness Neu­ro­plas­tic­i­ty The Right Way (Cre­ativ­i­ty Post):

“…How­ev­er, despite large invest­ments, evi­dence that “smart” drugs or brain sup­ple­ments actu­al­ly work is scarce at the present. The [Read more…] about Why do steroid-tak­ing ath­letes pay atten­tion to their phys­i­cal exer­cise regimens?