So this is a pretty crazy story: Scientists have developed a method of generating an image by analyzing the blood flow of a person’s brain!
One of the things that becomes apparent when you read the article closely is that the images they’ve extracted are actually based on an image the person was shown while they were doing the extraction.
As the image to the left shows, they were looking at the image of the text “neuron” and then the computer was able to determine the visual pattern.
On one hand, this is a far cry from printing out your imagination, but on the other hand, looking back over the acceleration of technology advances, especially in the recent decades, means that this could be just the black-and-white television version of what soon could be a full-blown mind’s-eye printer. It’s still amazing either way.
I have mused over the nature of mental images for some time now. As a visual artist, I would find it extremely handy to have crisp mental imagery which I could manipulate before sketching. I have on occasion, just as I was falling asleep (the half-awake/half-asleep hypnagogic state), had experiences like this so I know my mind is capable of it. However I cannot seem to control it consciously at all.
Continue reading 'Imagination.eps'
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