We might soon be able to communicate telepathically

At least, that’s the gist of a new report about neural implant technology by the Royal Society, that was reviewed by The Independent. The document hypes some of the more exciting things brain-computer interfaces could make possible, but also warns that brains hooking to the computers ( watching too many SciFi movies!!) could also compromise individual privacy.

“Not only thoughts, but sensory experiences, could be communicated from brain to brain,” the report reads. “Someone on holiday could beam a ‘neural postcard’ of what they are seeing, hearing or tasting into the mind of a friend back home.” - Little bit of exaggeration.... Do you guys think that way? 

To make sure that these neural implants of the future are used to benefit people and society, the Royal Society is calling for a government probe into the tech, The Independent reports. Otherwise, companies like Facebook and Tweeter that are already working on their own systems will be able to dictate how the tech is used on their own terms.

“They could bring huge economic benefits to the UK and transform sectors like the NHS, public health and social care,”  report co-chair Christofer Toumazou from Imperial College of London told The Independent. “But if developments are dictated by a handful of companies then less commercial applications could be side-lined. That is why we are calling on the government to launch a national investigation”

READ MORE: Brain-Computer Interface Will Make People Telepathic, Scientists Say [The Independent]

My Linguistic Relativity thoughts!

I always believed that language helps or drive our thought process. But does an increased vocabulary change the way a person thinks? I'm not entirely sure about it! However it will drive for knowledge, conscious or not, that will leads to a larger vocabulary. A larger vocabulary may facilitate learning - example Nandu, my 10 year old son— he can connect ideas and information better. And knowing (and using) more words can help him communicate those ideas better.

If language can alter one's thought-paths, then certain languages constrain thought to a greater degree than other languages. The reasoning is simple: if our mother-tongue uses abstract terms to define concepts, one must first translate that abstraction to be able to parse it more effectively. This translation is, by its very definition, a constraint.

The native language we speak may determine how your brain solves mathematical puzzles, according to a new study. Brain scans have revealed that Chinese speakers rely more on visual regions than English speakers when comparing numbers and doing sums. Interesting!!  Our mother tongue may influence the way problem-solving circuits in our brains develop, suggest the researchers. But they add that different teaching methods across cultures, or genes, may also have primed the brains of Chinese and English speakers to solve equations differently.

I think most of Indian language, including my mother-tongue  Malayalam, speakers will be having more activity in the visual and spatial brain centre - visuo-premotor association network. The researches suggests that the native English speakers have more activity in the language network known as perisylvian cortices in the left half of the brain. This might be different to the first and second generation migrators. I particularly noticed my son's ability of visually thinking about things, but could it be a bit of hereditary 'genes " from us? My wife is pretty good at learning new languages. I speak three languages proficiently but she speaks four. However, I think I'm more of a visual person than my wife :) Unfortunately my  son speaks only 'English' though his parents are multilingual. We still trying to teach him Malayalam, our mother-tongue!

Another thought!

People who suffer some kind of brain damage that stops them using language can still think just fine. It may be that some people think more verbally and others visually; these are really just tools for the thought process;  probably even someone who was blind from birth and then suffered the additional problem of damaging the language centres of their brain, would still be able to think, although it's hard to imagine what that would be like.