The Independent — A device that can read people’s minds by detecting their brainwaves has been developed in a breakthrough that could eventually enable people with “locked-in syndrome” to communicate.
The system was only partially effective with a 90 per cent success rate when trying to recognise numbers from zero to nine and a 61 per cent rate for single syllables in Japanese, the researchers said.
But, nonetheless, a statement about the research issued by the Toyohashi University of Technology in Japan said it showed that an effective device to read people’s thoughts and relay them to others was possible in the “near future”.
They even suggested an “easily operated” device with a smartphone app could be ready in just five years.
An electroencephalogram (EEG) was used to monitor people’s brain waves while they spoke.
The brain waves were then matched to the syllables and numbers using “machine learning”, a process used to develop artificial intelligence.
The statement said the researchers had “developed a technology that can recognise the numbers zero to nine with 90 per cent accuracy using brain waves, or electroencephalogram (EEG), while uttering the numbers”.
“At the same time, 61 per cent accuracy in 18 Japanese monosyllable recognition was achieved, outperforming performance in previous research (humans have sufficient intelligibility of sentences with an 80 per cent monosyllable recognition rate).”
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