Thinking Cap: Good thing or bad thing?

I've been reading about tDCS (transcranial direct current stimulation) and came across this. Basically, tDCS works by stimulating or dampening parts of your brain with faint electric currents given by electrodes stuck to your head. Studies show that this is a technique that can accelerate learning. Personally, as a transhumanist I just go "yay" especially when this does not involve any implants and can be turned off at any time.

What do you guys think?

While I can see this having beneficial therapeutic uses, it's not something I'd be eager to attach to a growing child. I believe that some doctors already prescribe this or something similar to help treat depression, so it probably has other beneficial uses for consenting adults.

Although I'm not quite sure how putting electrodes on your head leads straight to transhumanism.

edited 4th Mar '12 7:42:26 PM by AceofSpades

I believe his point was that its essentially transhumanism (letting us increase our intelligence) without all the mess of brain surgery.

Well, I would want a lot of long-term studies on this thing before I'd be willing to let it roll out onto the shelves. And by long term I mean decades.

Well, stimulating the brain doesn't necessarily lead to transhumanism. This kind of mechanism is basically in the infancy stages, so I'd hold off on going "whoa we're breaking boundaries" until this kind of machine can officially make all of us understand physics.

"a technique that can accelerate learning."

interesting. Where can I sign up?

@ Ace: Well, my definition of "transhumanism" includes any technological means to purely improve the human abilities, so this fits the bill.

@ Loni: And as I said, unlike most things, this can be turned off and entirely reversible.

There are forums online already where people are talking about making their own thinking caps which are just electrodes attached to your head. Look up tDCS on google. Not recommended though if you're not careful in what you're doing.

edited 4th Mar '12 8:28:26 PM by IraTheSquire

Yes, but that doesn't mean any effects it has while it's working are also irreversible.

The brain is a complicated thing, and while we're coming to understand it better I don't think anybody can say that we completely understand it yet. Adding new variables to a biological system can have unforeseen consequences, and the body works long-term. If you do a twelve-month study, you are going to miss any effects that don't show up until after five years, or twenty years.

edited 4th Mar '12 8:33:00 PM by LoniJay

True, though I highly doubt that there would be long term effects like that. After all, this is just electrical current which does not linger when it is switched off (unlike drugs), and neurons adjust rather quickly.

I, for one though, am very tempted to learn electronics just to try this. The brain is way too plastic and different between individuals I think that there's no way to tell what are the exact effects unless you try it yourself.

edited 4th Mar '12 8:49:08 PM by IraTheSquire

I wonder what it says about us that we're so willing to tinker with our brains when there's so much we don't know about them. (General we're, that.)

@Ira: 'Just' electricity? Oh dear. The brain runs on electricity. The body runs on electricity.

Now, I'm not some sort of "Mobile phones are giving us cancer!" scare-monger, but I just think it requires rigorous testing, as does any other medical 'innovation'.

Also, good grief, don't go trying this sort of thing on yourself by building it at home when you have little idea of the theories behind it!

Isn't that what Lou Reed's parents did to him in order to try to quote-unquote shock the gayness out of him or something?

@ 0dd: Not sure, though I doubt it. As far as I know electro-convulsion therapy is another kettle of fish.

@ Loni: Obviously I'll need more reasearch if I want to try it out (yay for having access to full articles in peer reviewed journals!). Though I do know that deep brain stimulation has already been accepted in clinical use (that's implanting electrodes inside the brain to stimulate those deeper regions), so I really doubt the dangers.

Dude, they only do that in either extreme circumstances (other methods have failed) or for experimenting to see what it does to the brain. It's not exactly an everyday solution.

Deep brain stimulation? It has already been approved and out.

edited 5th Mar '12 12:18:18 AM by IraTheSquire

@Ira: The trouble with such journals is that they're written for qualified neurologists by qualified neurologists. Even if you have access to them, you might need their 5+ years of schooling before you can properly understand them. Nobody can put the entirety of their degree into a paper; some things have to be assumed knowledge.

If it were possible for anybody to interpret and put into the practice things found in these journals, we wouldn't need so many scientists and there would be no point in getting science degrees.

edited 5th Mar '12 1:01:14 AM by LoniJay

Hm, as interesting as this is, I'd never use one.

I'm fine with replacing an arm or my legs or some internal parts with bionics when we get to the point where the bionic part is better than human, but I draw the line at my brain. That is not being messed with.

The part where you can stop using it instantly is key. If it's proven safe and not physiologically addictive, I'd use it. (Probably helps that I'm a bit of a scatterbrain.)

Strictly speaking, you are "messing with your brain" whenever you have a cup of coffee or a tea or a beer or whatever.

If this was proven to be no more dangerous that such things (and that's not a really strict requirement: I mean, alcohol can mess someone up terminally if they overdo it) then I'd have nothing against it. But as Loni says, I'd first want to know more about long-term effects: even if you can stop the current instantaneously, this does not necessarily mean that all of its effects do so too.

edited 5th Mar '12 5:39:06 AM by Carciofus

ITT: amateur, self-applied brain surgery for fun and profit.

It would not be surgery, technically. You would not go and poke directly anything on the inside; rather, you would apply electric currents to the brain from the "outside", so to speak. It would be entirely non-invasive, and not all that different from drinking coffee for being more alert and so on.

But, exactly as I would not try to prepare and drink an experimental substance just because some researchers said that it seems to have positive effects on the brain, I would not try to subject myself to a self-made electric brain stimulation device of the sort that is being described.

edited 5th Mar '12 9:14:10 AM by Carciofus

Right, my point is that there are innumerable reasons why using a home-made rig to run electric currents through your brain might not be the world's greatest idea. Especially since the poster suggesting it got all 'it's just electricity, what's the harm?'.

Electrocuting your brain IS NOT CAREFUL. If you're not at least a neurologist then you don't know what the heck you're doing.

Mmmm. Going to have to agree that the DIY ones are a really bad idea. Loni's got the right idea in that long term studies are needed, although I'm not exactly sure about decades. I don't really know how long would be reasonable!

I know that my textbooks and lecture notes on neuroscience will come in handy one day, though I might need some refreshment from old classmates. I'm less worried about the neuro bit and more the electronic (current control) bit though, since that subject is one I've failed.

edited 5th Mar '12 1:01:32 PM by IraTheSquire