PassingNotes.com

so remember a while back when i was telling prestidigitators to beware of their lying eyes? well, i stumbled onto a couple of companies with brain-scanning-lie-detecting technology that just might chill your shit…as you might or might not know, polygraph testing (aka ‘lie detectors‘) are considered unreliable and inadmissible in our legal system (for example, they smack of cold war interrogations and mccarthy era dramas)…but there’s a new technology that goes on sale this year built from ‘fmri‘ research - that’s functional magnetic resonance imaging…i won’t put you to sleep with the geeky details ’cause it makes more sense to just give you the skinny on this…

basic idea: in order to tell a lie, you must first stop telling the truth. this is a simple hypothesis developed by daniel langleben at u.penn… the implications of this for brain scanning suggest (after kazillions of peer reviewed studies) that the brain will literally produce hot and cold spots (in fmri scans) as individuals move from truth to fiction - and it doesn‘t matter if the answers are spoken, since mere fictional or truthful thoughts will produce the same fmri scan results…sounds cool, huh? well, fortunately for the government, their agencies are free from the laws that would prohibit such use in the private sector (think ‘the ultimate hiring process for the next enron’ or a way to save money when martha stewart does something wrong again and lies like clinton puffing on a hoochy-dipped stogie)….

as for these two companies i mentioned - no lie mri and cephos corporation, you just gotta love their marketing song…from no lie, “Liars benefit from their skills at the expense of other individuals or groups. It is estimated that at least one out of three conversations involve a lie and it is estimated that 5% of the population are what is referred to as “seamlessâ€? liars or “naturalâ€? liars.” - and then check out their “markets served” (welcome back mr. orwell! we missed you!)…from cephos, “The company believes that truth is a valuable commodity and anticipates offering similar services to clients in a variety of industries.” (nice crisp copy, huh? i’ll sell you some truth: you freak me out dudes)…oh, and did i mention that they’ve both put together incredibly impressive management and advisory teams that effectively eliminate opposition? and that this technology all grew from government grants (duh)?

…but there’s a problem (there’s always a problem, right?), these scanners are huge machines and they’re gonna be crazy expensive and the subjects have got to stay very still (that makes speaking tough work, hence the value of thinking the answers)….this is ideal for voluntary (or mostly voluntary) participants, but britton chance at u.penn is chasing a more practical idea, a small wearable hat that fits into a briefcase and can do the trick even on unwilling participants…he imagines a near future (using optics and fmri technologies) in which there is nothing worn at all, and scanners simply aimed at the target look for truth (as in, “has anybody else had your luggage?” or, “have you actually seen the WOMD?” or, “does my ass look fat?”)…

does this kind of stuff bother you? does it really, really freak you out to the point where you’re like, “what kind of fucking world do we live in?“…you’re not alone…paul root wolpe at the center for bioethics at u.penn tracks lie detection technologies, and he sees this commercialization of fmri as a clear example of how special interests can accelerate the development of something that ultimately begs for a lot more thinking…you might want to spend some of your down time this week visiting the center for cognitive liberty and ethics to bone up on these kinds of issues…and you know what would be really cool? have the founders of these companies go into their own scanners and answer a series of questions about their explicit plans for the future….yeah, that’ll happen…btw, happy new year - and be sure to add “won’t accept hats from strangers” to your list of resolutions…

update (1/6/05): wrote this based on a print article from wired, you can read the very long and completely detailed piece regarding these companies, the grants, the research, the people (and so on) online as of this week…it was written by steve silberman

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