6 ms·

Robot That Makes People Feel a Ghostly Presence

47 points by fictivmade 12y ago

GuiA 12y ago
> when the researchers passed a mild current through the electrodes, stimulating a small region at the intersection of the temporal and parietal lobes of her brain, she experienced what she described as a shadowy presence lurking nearby, mimicking her own posture. Those kind of things feel very existentialist to me. This shows that human perception, sentience, and consciousness are deeply and essentially tied to our biology, and that we're all a few micrograms of chemicals or electrical impulses in the wrong part of our brain from complete schizophrenia. This seems like a very strong argument against any kind of transhumanist rhetoric, and that no matter how much our understanding of the universe and manipulation of the physical word progress, the very concept of being human is forever tied to our physical body.
- nitrogen 12y ago
  This seems like a very strong argument against any kind of transhumanist rhetoric, and that no matter how much our understanding of the universe and manipulation of the physical word progress, the very concept of being human is forever tied to our physical body. I would replace "physical body" with physics here, and from that draw the opposite conclusion. The fact that we are purely physical/electrical/chemical in our existence suggests that some other physical/electrical/chemical system could reproduce our existence if it behaved in the same way.
- eksith 12y ago
  That line of reasoning also has parallels to irreducible complexity, which time and again has been proven false. Just because the machine is so sophisticated and extremely delicate doesn't mean its functions will forever remain a mystery. Or that it will never be duplicated and controlled.
ColinWright 12y ago
The story I posted yesterday has more detail, and references. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8568135 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8568135 Here's the link to the actual article: http://phenomena.nationalgeographic.com/2014/11/06/its-behind-you-robot-creates-feeling-of-ghostly-presence/ http://phenomena.nationalgeographic.com/2014/11/06/its-behin... If you've read this Wired article first then the National Geographic article will feel familiar, but there is more, it's more complete, and it has references.
jglauche 12y ago
I'd be interested in developing this further. If you could have a whole robotic hand that you could move, it could produce a much nicer way of body contact. I'm thinking about this as a self-help device for people that are suffering from depression or social anxiety, giving that person full control about where and how to touch, but the illusion that another person does it for them.
- Void_ 12y ago
  So a robotic girlfriend is the way to treat depression?
  - jglauche 12y ago
    No, but physical body contact in a non-sexual way helps (me) a lot.
- pluma 12y ago
  So, how long until someone turns this into a sex robot?
petercooper 12y ago
Not the same thing as this, but I remember seeing a documentary about a scientist who kept feeling a "presence" in his lab, so he set out to work out what was going on. It turned out it was something to do with air distribution causing infrasound resonance. I haven't found the specific story but this one is very similar: http://www.prosoundweb.com/article/print/a_ghost_story_low_frequency_illusions_created_by_standing_waves http://www.prosoundweb.com/article/print/a_ghost_story_low_f...
- subir 12y ago
  Fascinating!
po 12y ago
I'm sure it's actually a spooky feeling people are getting but somehow this wired article fails to convince me. The researchers suggest that the subjects’ brains reconcile this mismatch by creating the illusion of another presence that’s doing the poking. After all, something is poking them in the back. Yeah, It's a robot! Why is it that people feel like it's a person and not a robot or a coat rack or whatever? That part seems odd to me. Is it not because we tend to only be poked by people in our daily lives so given the stimulus, we interpret it to be a person?
- hanoz 12y ago
  This reminds me of the book Phantoms in the Brain by one http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vilayanur_S._Ramachandran http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vilayanur_S._Ramachandran in which he describes a similar experiment. It's a great read by the way. Anyway, as I recall, watching someone tap and stroke a model body part, say a nose, in a non predictable pattern, whilst an unseen hand replicates the touches exactly on your own nose, can result in an overwhelming sensation that the model, though yards away from you, is actually your own nose. Always meant to try it out, it sounds great fun. I don't know if the Wired article or the experiment itself has glossed over this first stage - before the delay is introduced - but perhaps if the first step has already introduced the spooky feeling of your back being an arms length in front of you (maybe to a milder degree than if it had looked like a back), then when you start feeling your back (still in front of you) being touched when you can clearly see noone is touching it, this could naturally lead to a feeling of an invisible actor?

47 points by fictivmade 12y ago

GuiA 12y ago

> when the researchers passed a mild current through the electrodes, stimulating a small region at the intersection of the temporal and parietal lobes of her brain, she experienced what she described as a shadowy presence lurking nearby, mimicking her own posture. Those kind of things feel very existentialist to me. This shows that human perception, sentience, and consciousness are deeply and essentially tied to our biology, and that we're all a few micrograms of chemicals or electrical impulses in the wrong part of our brain from complete schizophrenia. This seems like a very strong argument against any kind of transhumanist rhetoric, and that no matter how much our understanding of the universe and manipulation of the physical word progress, the very concept of being human is forever tied to our physical body.

nitrogen 12y ago
This seems like a very strong argument against any kind of transhumanist rhetoric, and that no matter how much our understanding of the universe and manipulation of the physical word progress, the very concept of being human is forever tied to our physical body. I would replace "physical body" with physics here, and from that draw the opposite conclusion. The fact that we are purely physical/electrical/chemical in our existence suggests that some other physical/electrical/chemical system could reproduce our existence if it behaved in the same way.
eksith 12y ago
That line of reasoning also has parallels to irreducible complexity, which time and again has been proven false. Just because the machine is so sophisticated and extremely delicate doesn't mean its functions will forever remain a mystery. Or that it will never be duplicated and controlled.

ColinWright 12y ago

The story I posted yesterday has more detail, and references. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8568135 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8568135 Here's the link to the actual article: http://phenomena.nationalgeographic.com/2014/11/06/its-behind-you-robot-creates-feeling-of-ghostly-presence/ http://phenomena.nationalgeographic.com/2014/11/06/its-behin... If you've read this Wired article first then the National Geographic article will feel familiar, but there is more, it's more complete, and it has references.

jglauche 12y ago

I'd be interested in developing this further. If you could have a whole robotic hand that you could move, it could produce a much nicer way of body contact. I'm thinking about this as a self-help device for people that are suffering from depression or social anxiety, giving that person full control about where and how to touch, but the illusion that another person does it for them.

Void_ 12y ago
So a robotic girlfriend is the way to treat depression?
- jglauche 12y ago
  No, but physical body contact in a non-sexual way helps (me) a lot.
pluma 12y ago
So, how long until someone turns this into a sex robot?

petercooper 12y ago

Not the same thing as this, but I remember seeing a documentary about a scientist who kept feeling a "presence" in his lab, so he set out to work out what was going on. It turned out it was something to do with air distribution causing infrasound resonance. I haven't found the specific story but this one is very similar: http://www.prosoundweb.com/article/print/a_ghost_story_low_frequency_illusions_created_by_standing_waves http://www.prosoundweb.com/article/print/a_ghost_story_low_f...

subir 12y ago
Fascinating!

po 12y ago

I'm sure it's actually a spooky feeling people are getting but somehow this wired article fails to convince me. The researchers suggest that the subjects’ brains reconcile this mismatch by creating the illusion of another presence that’s doing the poking. After all, something is poking them in the back. Yeah, It's a robot! Why is it that people feel like it's a person and not a robot or a coat rack or whatever? That part seems odd to me. Is it not because we tend to only be poked by people in our daily lives so given the stimulus, we interpret it to be a person?

hanoz 12y ago
This reminds me of the book Phantoms in the Brain by one http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vilayanur_S._Ramachandran http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vilayanur_S._Ramachandran in which he describes a similar experiment. It's a great read by the way. Anyway, as I recall, watching someone tap and stroke a model body part, say a nose, in a non predictable pattern, whilst an unseen hand replicates the touches exactly on your own nose, can result in an overwhelming sensation that the model, though yards away from you, is actually your own nose. Always meant to try it out, it sounds great fun. I don't know if the Wired article or the experiment itself has glossed over this first stage - before the delay is introduced - but perhaps if the first step has already introduced the spooky feeling of your back being an arms length in front of you (maybe to a milder degree than if it had looked like a back), then when you start feeling your back (still in front of you) being touched when you can clearly see noone is touching it, this could naturally lead to a feeling of an invisible actor?