Headscratchers / Brainstorm

• If the device can cause heart attacks and psychoses, can it cure people with those issues if they view healthy tapes?
  • Yes and no. You can't use this technology to cure physical ailments such as heart disease because the physical conditions that cause it are still there. But, it might be possible to treat psychological ones. Might being the operative term. It's not a matter of recording a "healthy" person and then playing that recording back. It depends on the issue in question. It may be possible to use this to treat anxiety or depression. But "curing" someone of it is unlikely. Some mental illness are caused by chemical imbalances that require medication and therapy. Bottom line, this technology could be used to help treat mental illness, but it's not a cure.
    • Although, I wonder if some version of the Hat could be built to suppress motion sickness? Use it to loop a recording that stimulates the part of the brain that causes motion sickness?
    • Or just loop a recording of the sensation of immobility, so the person's sense of equilibrium is deceived by an impression of stillness and never triggers nausea in the first place. Good for air or car sickness, although you'd have to turn it off when you visit a plane's restroom because it'd seriously mess up your ability to balance yourself.
  • Also of note: The death tape caused a heart attack because the person playing the tape had their brain being stimulated and that stimulation wreaked havoc with their own systems. Basically, the playback overrode their brain's autonomic functions (breathing, heartbeat, etc) which induced the heart attack. Michael survived because Hal was there and immediately stopped the playback before it could cause a heart attack. It killed Gordy because Landon—the hack—didn't listen to the technician who knew that Michael had rewired his equipment's output concerning respiration and heart function. Then later, when there was a problem, Landon thought the issue was hardware-related (he looked at the unit's CRT), ignored Gordy's very clear suffering, and didn't act quickly enough to stop it. The idiot didn't develop the technology to begin with, clearly didn't understand how it worked and ignored important information.
• After Hal experiences the night-long "orgasm" loop and subsequent recovery, what does he mean when says that he's more than he was? What feeling did he have?