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DR. MICHIO KAMI PROFESSOR OF THEORETICAL PHYSICS CITY UNIVERSITY OI : NEW YORK THE SCIENTIFIC QUEST TO UNDERSTAND ENHANCE, AND EMPOWER THE MIND DOUBLEPAY NEW YORK LONDON TORONTO SYDNEY AUCKLAND Copyright © 2014 by Michio Kaku All rights reserved. Published in the United States by Doubleday, a division of Random House, LLC, New York, and in Canada by Random House of Canada Limited, Toronto, Penguin Random House companies. www.doubleday.com doubleday and the portrayal of an anchor with a dolphin are registered trademarks of Random House, LLC. Illustrations by Jeffrey L. Ward Jacket design by Michael J. Windsor Jacket illustration © CLIP AREA/Custom media/Shutterstock LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING-IN-PUBLICATION DATA Kaku, Michio. The future of the mind : the scientific quest to understand, enhance, and empower the mind / Dr. Michio Kaku, professor of Theoretical Physics, City University of New York. — First edition, pages cm Includes bibliographical references.

Includes bibliographical references. 1. Neuropsychology. 2. Mind and body—Research. 3. Brain—Mathematical models. 4. Cognitive neuroscience. 5. Brain-computer interfaces. I. Title. qp360.k 325 2014 612.8—dc23 2013017338 ISBN 978-0-385-53082-8 (hardcover) ISBN 978-0-385-53083-5 (eBook) v3.1 This book is dedicated to my loving wife, Shizue, and my daughters, Michelle and Alyson CONTENTS Cover Title Page Copyright Dedication ACKNOWLEDGMENTS INTRODUCTION BOOK I: THE MIND AND CONSCIOUSNESS 1 UNLOCKING THE MIND 2 CONSCIOUSNESS—A PHYSICIST’S VIEWPOINT BOOK II: MIND OVER MATTER 3 TELEPATHY: A PENNY FOR YOUR THOUGHTS 4 TELEKINESIS: MIND CONTROLLING MATTER 5 MEMORIES AND THOUGHTS MADE TO ORDER 6 EINSTEIN’S BRAIN AND ENHANCING OUR INTELLIGENCE BOOK III: ALTERED CONSCIOUSNESS 7 IN YOUR DREAMS 8 CAN THE MIND BE CONTROLLED? 9 ALTERED STATES OF CONSCIOUSNESS 10 THE ARTIFICIAL MIND AND SILICON CONSCIOUSNESS 11 REVERSE ENGINEERING THE BRAIN

10 THE ARTIFICIAL MIND AND SILICON CONSCIOUSNESS 11 REVERSE ENGINEERING THE BRAIN 12 THE FUTURE: MIND BEYOND MATTER 13 THE MIND AS PURE ENERGY 14 THE ALIEN MIND 15 CONCLUDING REMARKS APPENDIX: QUANTUM CONSCIOUSNESS? NOTES SUGGESTED READING ILLUSTRATION CREDITS A Note About the Author Other Books by This Author ACKNOWLEDGMENTS It has been my great pleasure to have interviewed and interacted with the following prominent scientists, all of them leaders in their fields. I would like to thank them for graciously giving up their time for interviews and discussions about the future of science. They have given me guidance and inspiration, as well as a firm foundation in their respective fields. I would like to thank these pioneers and trailblazers, especially those who have agreed to appear on my TV specials for the BBC, Discovery, and Science TV channels, and also on my national radio shows, Science Fantastic and Explorations.

Peter Doherty, Nobel laureate, St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital Gerald Edelman, Nobel laureate, Scripps Research Institute Leon Lederman, Nobel laureate, Illinois Institute of Technology Murray Gell-Mann, Nobel laureate, Santa Fe Institute and Cal Tech the late Henry Kendall, Nobel laureate, MIT Walter Gilbert, Nobel laureate, Harvard University David Gross, Nobel laureate, Kavli Institute for Theoretical Physics Joseph Rotblat, Nobel laureate, St. Bartholomew’s Hospital Yoichiro Nambu, Nobel laureate, University of Chicago Steven Weinberg, Nobel laureate, University of Texas at Austin Frank Wilczek, Nobel laureate, MIT Amir Aczel, author of Uranium Wars Buzz Aldrin, NASA astronaut, second man to walk on the moon Geoff Andersen, U.S. Air Force Academy, author of The Telescope Jay Barbree, author of Moon Shot John Barrow, physicist, Cambridge University, author of Impossibility Marcia Bartusiak, author of Einstein’s Unfinished Symphony

Marcia Bartusiak, author of Einstein’s Unfinished Symphony Jim Bell, Cornell University astronomer Jeffrey Bennet, author of Beyond UFOs Bob Berman, astronomer, author The Secrets of the Night Sky Leslie Biesecker, National Institutes of Health Piers Bizony, author of How to Build Your Own Starship Michael Blaese, National Institutes of Health Alex Boese, founder of Museum of Hoaxes Nick Bostrom, transhumanist, Oxford University Lt. Col. Robert Bowman, Institute for Space and Security Studies Cynthia Breazeal, artificial intelligence, MIT Media Lab Lawrence Brody, National Institutes of Health Rodney Brooks, director of the MIT Artificial Intelligence Laboratory Lester Brown, Earth Policy Institute Michael Brown, astronomer, Cal Tech James Canton, author of The Extreme Future Arthur Caplan, director of the Center for Bioethics at the University of Pennsylvania

Arthur Caplan, director of the Center for Bioethics at the University of Pennsylvania Fritjof Capra, author of The Science of Leonardo Sean Carroll, cosmologist, Cal Tech Andrew Chaikin, author of A Man on the Moon Leroy Chiao, NASA astronaut Eric Chivian, International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War Deepak Chopra, author of Super Brain George Church, director of Harvard’s Center for Computational Genetics Thomas Cochran, physicist, Natural Resources Defense Council Christopher Cokinos, astronomer, author of Fallen Sky Francis Collins, National Institutes of Health Vicki Colvin, nanotechnologist, University of Texas Neal Comins, author of Hazards of Space Travel Steve Cook, NASA spokesperson Christine Cosgrove, author of Normal at Any Cost Steve Cousins, CEO of Willow Garage Personal Robots Program Phillip Coyle, former assistant secretary of defense for the U.S. Defense Department Daniel Crevier, AI, CEO of Coreco

Daniel Crevier, AI, CEO of Coreco Ken Croswell, astronomer, author of Magnificent Universe Steven Cummer, computer science, Duke University Mark Cutkowsky, mechanical engineering, Stanford University Paul Davies, physicist, author of Superforce Daniel Dennet, philosopher, Tufts University the late Michael Dertouzos, computer science, MIT Jared Diamond, Pulitzer Prize winner, UCLA Marriot DiChristina, Scientific American Peter Dilworth, MIT AI Lab John Donoghue, creator of Braingate, Brown University Ann Druyan, widow of Carl Sagan, Cosmos Studios Freeman Dyson, Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton University David Eagleman, neuroscientist, Baylor College of Medicine John Ellis, CERN physicist Paul Erlich, environmentalist, Stanford University Daniel Fairbanks, author of Relics of Eden Timothy Ferris, University of California, author of Coming of Age in the Milky Way Galaxy Maria Finitzo, stem cell expert, Peabody Award winner Robert Finkelstein, AI expert

Maria Finitzo, stem cell expert, Peabody Award winner Robert Finkelstein, AI expert Christopher Flavin, World Watch Institute Louis Friedman, cofounder of the Planetary Society Jack Gallant, neuroscientist, University of California at Berkeley James Garwin, NASA chief scientist Evelyn Gates, author of Einstein’s Telescope Michael Gazzaniga, neurologist, University of California at Santa Barbara Jack Geiger, cofounder, Physicians for Social Responsibility David Gelertner, computer scientist, Yale University, University of California Neal Gershenfeld, MIT Media Lab Daniel Gilbert, psychologist, Harvard University Paul Gilster, author of Centauri Dreams Rebecca Goldberg, Environmental Defense Fund Don Goldsmith, astronomer, author of Runaway Universe David Goodstein, assistant provost of Cal Tech J. Richard Gott III, Princeton University, author of Time Travel in Einstein’s Universe Late Stephen Jay Gould, biologist, Harvard University

Late Stephen Jay Gould, biologist, Harvard University Ambassador Thomas Graham, spy satellites and intelligence gathering John Grant, author of Corrupted Science Eric Green, National Institutes of Health Ronald Green, author of Babies by Design Brian Greene, Columbia University, author of The Elegant Universe Alan Guth, physicist, MIT, author of The Inflationary Universe William Hanson, author of The Edge of Medicine Leonard Hayflick, University of California at San Francisco Medical School Donald Hillebrand, Argonne National Labs, future of the car Frank N. von Hippel, physicist, Princeton University Allan Hobson, psychiatrist, Harvard University Jeffrey Hoffman, NASA astronaut, MIT Douglas Hofstadter, Pulitzer Prize winner, Indiana University, author of Godel, Escher, Bach John Horgan, Stevens Institute of Technology, author of The End of Science Jamie Hyneman, host of MythBusters Chris Impey, astronomer, author of The Living Cosmos Robert Irie, AI Lab, MIT

Chris Impey, astronomer, author of The Living Cosmos Robert Irie, AI Lab, MIT P. J. Jacobowitz, PC magazine Jay Jaroslav, MIT AI Lab Donald Johanson, anthropologist, discoverer of Lucy George Johnson, New York Times science journalist Tom Jones, NASA astronaut Steve Kates, astronomer Jack Kessler, stem cell expert, Peabody Award winner Robert Kirshner, astronomer, Harvard University Kris Koenig, astronomer Lawrence Krauss, Arizona State University, author of Physics of Star Trek Lawrence Kuhn, filmmaker and philosopher, Closer to Truth Ray Kurzweil, inventor, author of The Age of Spiritual Machines Robert Lanza, biotechnology, Advanced Cell Technologies Roger Launius, author of Robots in Space Stan Lee, creator of Marvel Comics and Spider-Man Michael Lemonick, senior science editor of Time Arthur Lerner-Lam, geologist, volcanist Simon LeVay, author of When Science Goes Wrong John Lewis, astronomer, University of Arizona Alan Lightman, MIT, author of Einstein’s Dreams

John Lewis, astronomer, University of Arizona Alan Lightman, MIT, author of Einstein’s Dreams George Linehan, author of Space One Seth Lloyd, MIT, author of Programming the Universe Werner R. Loewenstein, former director of Cell Physics Laboratory, Columbia University Joseph Lykken, physicist, Fermi National Laboratory Pattie Maes, MIT Media Lab Robert Mann, author of Forensic Detective Michael Paul Mason, author of Head Cases: Stories of Brain Injury and Its Aftermath Patrick McCray, author of Keep Watching the Skies Glenn McGee, author of The Perfect Baby James McLurkin, MIT, AI Lab Paul McMillan, director of Space Watch Fulvia Melia, astronomer, University of Arizona William Meller, author of Evolution Rx Paul Meltzer, National Institutes of Health Marvin Minsky, MIT, author of The Society of Minds Hans Moravec, author of Robot Late Phillip Morrison, physicist, MIT

Hans Moravec, author of Robot Late Phillip Morrison, physicist, MIT Richard Muller, astrophysicist, University of California at Berkeley David Nahamoo, IBM Human Language Technology Christina Neal, volcanist Miguel Nicolelis, neuroscientist, Duke University Shinji Nishimoto, neurologist, University of California at Berkeley Michael Novacek, American Museum of Natural History Michael Oppenheimer, environmentalist, Princeton University Dean Ornish, cancer and heart disease specialist Peter Palese, virologist, Mount Sinai School of Medicine Charles Pellerin, NASA official Sidney Perkowitz, author of Hollywood Science John Pike, GlobalSecurity.org Jena Pincott, author of Do Gentlemen Really Prefer Blondes? Steven Pinker, psychologist, Harvard University Thomas Poggio, MIT, artificial intelligence Correy Powell, editor of Discover magazine John Powell, founder of JP Aerospace

Richard Preston, author of Hot Zone and Demon in the Freezer Raman Prinja, astronomer, University College London David Quammen, evolutionary biologist, author of The Reluctant Mr. Darwin Katherine Ramsland, forensic scientist Lisa Randall, Harvard University, author of Warped Passages Sir Martin Rees, Royal Astronomer of Great Britain, Cambridge University, author of Before the Beginning Jeremy Rifkin, Foundation for Economic Trends David Riquier, MIT Media Lab Jane Rissler, Union of Concerned Scientists Steven Rosenberg, National Institutes of Health Oliver Sacks, neurologist, Columbia University Paul Saffo, futurist, Institute of the Future Late Carl Sagan, Cornell University, author of Cosmos Nick Sagan, coauthor of You Call This the Future? Michael H. Salamon, NASA’s Beyond Einstein program Adam Savage, host of MythBusters Peter Schwartz, futurist, founder of Global Business Network Michael Shermer, founder of Skeptic Society and Skeptic magazine

Michael Shermer, founder of Skeptic Society and Skeptic magazine Donna Shirley, NASA Mars program Seth Shostak, SETI Institute Neil Shubin, author of Your Inner Fish Paul Shurch, SETI League Peter Singer, author of Wired for War Simon Singh, author of The Big Bang Gary Small, author of iBrain Paul Spudis, author of Odyssey Moon Limited Stephen Squyres, astronomer, Cornell University Paul Steinhardt, Princeton University, author of Endless Universe Jack Stern, stem cell surgeon Gregory Stock, UCLA, author of Redesigning Humans Richard Stone, author of NEOs and Tunguska Brian Sullivan, Hayden Planetarium Leonard Susskind, physicist, Stanford University Daniel Tammet, author of Bom on a Blue Day Geoffrey Taylor, physicist, University of Melbourne Late Ted Taylor, designer of U.S. nuclear warheads Max Tegmark, cosmologist, MIT Alvin Toffler, author of The Third Wave Patrick Tucker, World Future Society

Chris Turney, University of Wollongong, author of Ice, Mud and Blood Neil de Grasse Tyson, director of Hayden Planetarium Sesh Velamoor, Foundation for the Future Robert Wallace, author of Spycraft Kevin Warwick, human cyborgs, University of Reading, UK Fred Watson, astronomer, author of Stargazer Late Mark Weiser, Xerox PARC Alan Weisman, author of The World Without Us Daniel Wertheimer, SETI at Home, University of California at Berkeley Mike Wessler, MIT AI Lab Roger Wiens, astronomer, Los Alamos National Laboratory Author Wiggins, author of The Joy of Physics Anthony Wynshaw-Boris, National Institutes of Health Carl Zimmer, biologist, author of Evolution Robert Zimmerman, author of Leaving Earth Robert Zubrin, founder of Mars Society

I would also like to thank my agent, Stuart Krichevsky, who has been at my side all these years and has given me helpful advice about my books. I have always benefited from his sound judgment. In addition, I would like to thank my editors, Edward Kastenmeier and Melissa Danaczko, who have guided my book and provided invaluable editorial advice. And I would like to thank Dr. Michelle Kaku, my daughter and a neurology resident at Mount Sinai Hospital in New York, for stimulating, thoughtful, and fruitful discussions about the future of neurology. Her careful and thorough reading of the manuscript has greatly enhanced the presentation and content of this book. INTRODUCTION

INTRODUCTION The two greatest mysteries in all of nature are the mind and the universe. With our vast technology, we have been able to photograph galaxies billions of light-years away, manipulate the genes that control life, and probe the inner sanctum of the atom, but the mind and the universe still elude and tantalize us. They are the most mysterious and fascinating frontiers known to science. If you want to appreciate the majesty of the universe, just turn your gaze to the heavens at night, ablaze with billions of stars. Ever since our ancestors first gasped at the splendor of the starry sky, we have puzzled over these eternal questions: Where did it all come from? What does it all mean?

To witness the mystery of our mind, all we have to do is stare at ourselves in the mirror and wonder, What lurks behind our eyes? This raises haunting questions like: Do we have a soul? What happens to us after we die? Who am “I” anyway? And most important, this brings us to the ultimate question: Where do we fit into this great cosmic scheme? As the great Victorian biologist Thomas Huxley once said, “The question of all questions for humanity, the problem which lies behind all others and is more interesting than any of them, is that of the determination of man’s place in Nature and his relation to the Cosmos.”

There are 100 billion stars in the Milky Way galaxy, roughly the same as the number of neurons in our brain. You may have to travel twenty- four trillion miles, to the first star outside our solar system, to find an object as complex as what is sitting on your shoulders. The mind and the universe pose the greatest scientific challenge of all, but they also share a curious relationship. On one hand they are polar opposites. One is concerned with the vastness of outer space, where we encounter strange denizens like black holes, exploding stars, and colliding galaxies. The other is concerned with inner space, where we find our most intimate and private hopes and desires. The mind is no farther than our next thought, yet we are often clueless when asked to articulate and explain it.

thought, yet we are often clueless when asked to articulate and explain it. But although they may be opposites in this respect, they also have a common history and narrative. Both were shrouded in superstition and magic since time immemorial. Astrologers and phrenologists claimed to find the meaning of the universe in every constellation of the zodiac and in every bump on your head. Meanwhile, mind readers and seers have been alternately celebrated and vilified over the years.

The universe and the mind continue to intersect in a variety of ways, thanks in no small part to some of the eye-opening ideas we often encounter in science fiction. Reading these books as a child, I would daydream about being a member of the Sian, a race of telepaths created by A. E. van Vogt. I marveled at how a mutant called the Mule could unleash his vast telepathic powers and nearly seize control of the Galactic Empire in Isaac Asimov’s Foundation Trilogy. And in the movie Forbidden Planet, I wondered how an advanced civilization millions of years beyond ours could channel its enormous telekinetic powers to reshape reality to its whims and wishes.

Then when I was about ten, “The Amazing Dunninger” appeared on TV. He would dazzle his audience with his spectacular magic tricks. His motto was “For those who believe, no explanation is necessary; for those who do not believe, no explanation will suffice.” One day, he declared that he would send his thoughts to millions of people throughout the country. He closed his eyes and began to concentrate, stating that he was beaming the name of a president of the United States. He asked people to write down the name that popped into their heads on a postcard and mail it in. The next week, he announced triumphantly that thousands of postcards had come pouring in with the name “Roosevelt,” the very same name he was “beaming” across the United States.

I wasn’t impressed. Back then, the legacy of Roosevelt was strong among those who had lived through the Depression and World War II, so this came as no surprise. (I thought to myself that it would have been truly amazing if he had been thinking of President Millard Fillmore.) Still, it stoked my imagination, and I couldn’t resist experimenting with telepathy on my own, trying to read other people’s minds by concentrating as hard as I could. Closing my eyes and focusing intently, I would attempt to “listen” to other people’s thoughts and telekinetically move objects around my room. I failed.

move objects around my room. I failed. Maybe somewhere telepaths walked the Earth, but I wasn’t one of them. In the process, I began to realize that the wondrous exploits of telepaths were probably impossible—at least without outside assistance. But in the years that followed, I also slowly learned another lesson: to fathom the greatest secrets in the universe, one did not need telepathic or superhuman abilities. One just had to have an open, determined, and curious mind. In particular, in order to understand whether the fantastic devices of science fiction are possible, you have to immerse yourself in advanced physics. To understand the precise point when the possible becomes the impossible, you have to appreciate and understand the laws of physics.

These two passions have fired up my imagination all these years: to understand the fundamental laws of physics, and to see how science will shape the future of our lives. To illustrate this and to share my excitement in probing the ultimate laws of physics, I have written the books Hyperspace , Beyond Einstein, and Parallel Worlds. And to express my fascination with the future, I have written Visions, Physics of the Impossible, and Physics of the Future. Over the course of writing and researching these books, I was continually reminded that the human mind is still one of the greatest and most mysterious forces in the world. Indeed, we’ve been at a loss to understand what it is or how it works for most of history. The ancient Egyptians, for all their glorious accomplishments in the arts and sciences, believed the brain to be a useless organ and threw it away when embalming their pharaohs.

Aristotle was convinced that the soul resided in the heart, not the brain, whose only function was to cool down the cardiovascular system. Others, like Descartes, thought that the soul entered the body through the tiny pineal gland of the brain. But in the absence of any solid evidence, none of these theories could be proven. This “dark age” persisted for thousands of years, and with good reason. The brain weighs only three pounds, yet it is the most complex object in the solar system. Although it occupies only 2 percent of the body’s weight, the brain has a ravenous appetite, consuming fully 20 percent of our total energy (in newborns, the brain consumes an astonishing 65 percent of the baby’s energy), while fully 80 percent of our genes are coded for the brain. There are an estimated 100 billion neurons residing inside the skull with an exponential amount of neural connections and pathways.

Back in 1977, when the astronomer Carl Sagan wrote his Pulitzer Prize-winning book, The Dragons of Eden, he broadly summarized what was known about the brain up to that time. His book was beautifully written and tried to represent the state of the art in neuroscience, which at that time relied heavily on three main sources. The first was comparing our brains with those of other species. This was tedious and difficult because it involved dissecting the brains of thousands of animals. The second method was equally indirect: analyzing victims of strokes and disease, who often exhibit bizarre behavior because of their illness. Only an autopsy performed after their death could reveal which part of the brain was malfunctioning. Third, scientists could use electrodes to probe the brain and slowly and painfully piece together which part of the brain influenced which behavior.

But the basic tools of neuroscience did not provide a systematic way of analyzing the brain. You could not simply requisition a stroke victim with damage in the specific area you wanted to study. Since the brain is a living, dynamic system, autopsies often did not uncover the most interesting features, such as how the parts of the brain interact, let alone how they produced such diverse thoughts as love, hate, jealousy, and curiosity. TWIN REVOLUTIONS Four hundred years ago, the telescope was invented, and almost overnight, this new, miraculous instrument peered into the heart of the celestial bodies. It was one of the most revolutionary (and seditious) instruments of all time. All of a sudden, with your own two eyes, you

could see the myths and dogma of the past evaporate like the morning mist. Instead of being perfect examples of divine wisdom, the moon had jagged craters, the sun had black spots, Jupiter had moons, Venus had phases, and Saturn had rings. More was learned about the universe in the fifteen years after the invention of the telescope than in all human history put together. Like the invention of the telescope, the introduction of MRI machines and a variety of advanced brain scans in the mid-1990s and 2000s has transformed neuroscience. We have learned more about the brain in the last fifteen years than in all prior human history, and the mind, once considered out of reach, is finally assuming center stage.

Nobel laureate Eric R. Kandel of the Max Planck Institute in Tubingen, Germany, writes, “The most valuable insights into the human mind to emerge during this period did not come from the disciplines traditionally concerned with the mind—philosophy, psychology, or psycho-analysis. Instead they came from a merger of these disciplines with the biology of the brain....” Physicists have played a pivotal role in this endeavor, providing a flood of new tools with acronyms like MRI, EEG, PET, CAT, TCM, TES, and DBS that have dramatically changed the study of the brain. Suddenly with these machines we could see thoughts moving within the living, thinking brain. As neurologist V. S. Ramachandran of the University of California, San Diego, says, “All of these questions that philosophers have been studying for millennia, we scientists can begin to explore by doing brain imaging and by studying patients and asking the right questions.”

Looking back, some of my initial forays into the world of physics intersected with the very technologies that are now opening up the mind for science. In high school, for instance, I became aware of a new form of matter, called antimatter, and decided to conduct a science project on the topic. As it is one of the most exotic substances on Earth, I had to appeal to the old Atomic Energy Commission just to obtain a tiny quantity of sodium-22, a substance that naturally emits a positive electron (anti-electron, or positron). With my small sample in hand, I was able to build a cloud chamber and powerful magnetic field that allowed me to photograph the trails of vapor left by antimatter particles. I didn’t know it at the time, but sodium-22 would soon become instrumental in a new technology, called PET (positron emission tomography), which has since given us startling new insights into the thinking brain.

Yet another technology I experimented with in high school was magnetic resonance. I attended a lecture by Felix Bloch of Stanford University, who shared the 1952 Nobel Prize for Physics with Edward Purcell for the discovery of nuclear magnetic resonance. Dr. Bloch explained to us high school kids that if you had a powerful magnetic field, the atoms would align vertically in that field like compass needles. Then if you applied a radio pulse to these atoms at a precise resonant frequency, you could make them flip over. When they eventually flipped back, they would emit another pulse, like an echo, which would allow you to determine the identity of these atoms. (Later, I used the principle of magnetic resonance to build a 2.3-million-electron-volt particle accelerator in my mom’s garage.)

Just a couple of years later, as a freshman at Harvard University, it was an honor to have Dr. Purcell teach me electrodynamics. Around that same time, I also had a summer job and got a chance to work with Dr. Richard Ernst, who was trying to generalize the work of Bloch and Purcell on magnetic resonance. He succeeded spectacularly and would eventually win the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1991 for laying the foundation for the modern MRI (magnetic resonance imaging) machine. The MRI machine, in turn, has given us detailed photographs of the living brain in even finer detail than PET scans. EMPOWERING THE MIND

EMPOWERING THE MIND Eventually I became a professor of theoretical physics, but my fascination with the mind remained. It is thrilling to see that, just within the last decade, advances in physics have made possible some of the feats of mentalism that excited me when I was a child. Using MRI scans, scientists can now read thoughts circulating in our brains. Scientists can also insert a chip into the brain of a patient who is totally paralyzed and connect it to a computer, so that through thought alone that patient can surf the web, read and write e-mails, play video games, control their wheelchair, operate household appliances, and manipulate mechanical arms. In fact, such patients can do anything a normal person can do via a computer.

Scientists are now going even further, by connecting the brain directly to an exoskeleton that these patients can wear around their paralyzed limbs. Quadriplegics may one day lead near-normal lives. Such exoskeletons may also give us superpowers enabling us to handle deadly emergencies. One day, our astronauts may even explore the planets by mentally controlling mechanical surrogates from the comfort of their living rooms.

living rooms. As in the movie The Matrix, we might one day be able to download memories and skills using computers. In animal studies, scientists have already been able to insert memories into the brain. Perhaps it’s only a matter of time before we, too, can insert artificial memories into our brains to learn new subjects, vacation in new places, and master new hobbies. And if technical skills can be downloaded into the minds of workers and scientists, this may even affect the world economy. We might even be able to share these memories as well. One day, scientists might construct an “Internet of the mind,” or a brain-net, where thoughts and emotions are sent electronically around the world. Even dreams will be videotaped and then “brain-mailed” across the Internet.

Technology may also give us the power to enhance our intelligence. Progress has been made in understanding the extraordinary powers of “savants” whose mental, artistic, and mathematical abilities are truly astonishing. Furthermore, the genes that separate us from the apes are now being sequenced, giving us an unparalleled glimpse into the evolutionary origins of the brain. Genes have already been isolated in animals that can increase their memory and mental performance.

The excitement and promise generated by these eye-opening advances are so enormous that they have also caught the attention of the politicians. In fact, brain science has suddenly become the source of a transatlantic rivalry between the greatest economic powers on the planet. In January 2013, both President Barack Obama and the European Union announced what could eventually become multibillion-dollar funding for two independent projects that would reverse engineer the brain. Deciphering the intricate neural circuitry of the brain, once considered hopelessly beyond the scope of modern science, is now the focus of two crash projects that, like the Human Genome Project, will change the scientific and medical landscape. Not only will this give us unparalleled insight into the mind, it will also generate new industries, spur economic activity, and open up new vistas for neuroscience.

Once the neural pathways of the brain are finally decoded, one can envision understanding the precise origins of mental illness, perhaps leading to a cure for this ancient affliction. This decoding also makes it possible to create a copy of the brain, which raises philosophical and ethical questions. Who are we, if our consciousness can be uploaded into a computer? We can also toy with the concept of immortality. Our bodies may eventually decay and die, but can our consciousness live forever? And beyond that, perhaps one day in the distant future the mind will be freed of its bodily constraints and roam among the stars, as several scientists have speculated. Centuries from now, one can imagine placing our entire neural blueprint on laser beams, which will then be sent into deep space, perhaps the most convenient way for our consciousness to explore the stars.

A brilliant new scientific landscape that will reshape human destiny is now truly opening up. We are now entering a new golden age of neuroscience. In making these predictions, I have had the invaluable assistance of scientists who graciously allowed me to interview them, broadcast their ideas on national radio, and even take a TV crew into their laboratories. These are the scientists who are laying the foundation for the future of the mind. For their ideas to be incorporated into this book, I made only two requirements: (1) their predictions must rigorously obey the laws of physics; and (2) prototypes must exist to show proof-of-principle for these far-reaching ideas. TOUCHED BY MENTAL ILLN ESS

TOUCHED BY MENTAL ILLN ESS I once wrote a biography of Albert Einstein, called Einstein’s Cosmos, and had to delve into the minute details of his private life. I had known that Einstein’s youngest son was afflicted with schizophrenia, but did not realize the enormous emotional toll that it had taken on the great scientist’s life. Einstein was also touched by mental illness in another way; one of his closest colleagues was the physicist Paul Ehrenfest, who helped Einstein create the theory of general relativity. After suffering bouts of depression, Ehrenfest tragically killed his own son, who had Down’s syndrome, and then committed suicide. Over the years, I have found that many of my colleagues and friends have struggled to manage mental illness in their families.

Mental illness has also deeply touched my own life. Several years ago, my mother died after a long battle with Alzheimer’s disease. It was heartbreaking to see her gradually lose her memories of her loved ones, to gaze into her eyes and realize that she did not know who I was. I could see the glimmer of humanity slowly being extinguished. She had spent a lifetime struggling to raise a family, and instead of enjoying her golden years, she was robbed of all the memories she held dear. As the baby boomers age, the sad experience that I and many others have had will be repeated across the world. My wish is that rapid advances in neuroscience will one day alleviate the suffering felt by those afflicted with mental illness and dementia. WHAT IS DRIVING THIS REVOLUTION?

WHAT IS DRIVING THIS REVOLUTION? The data pouring in from brain scans are now being decoded, and the progress is stunning. Several times a year, headlines herald a fresh breakthrough. It took 350 years, since the invention of the telescope, to enter the space age, but it has taken only fifteen years since the introduction of the MRI and advanced brain scans to actively connect the brain to the outside world. Why so quickly , and how much is there to come?

Part of this rapid progress has occurred because physicists today have a good understanding of electromagnetism, which governs the electrical signals racing through our neurons. The mathematical equations of James Clerk Maxwell, which are used to calculate the physics of antennas, radar, radio receivers, and microwave towers, form the very cornerstone of MRI technology. It took centuries to finally solve the secret of electromagnetism, but neuroscience can enjoy the fruits of this grand endeavor. In Book I, I will survey the history of the brain and explain how a galaxy of new instruments has left the physics labs and given us glorious color pictures of the mechanics of thought. Because consciousness plays so central a role in any discussion of the mind, I also give a physicist’s perspective, offering a definition of consciousness that includes the animal kingdom as well. In fact, I provide a ranking of consciousness, showing how it is possible to assign a number to various

consciousness, showing how it is possible to assign a number to various types of consciousness.

But to fully answer the question of how this technology will advance, we also have to look at Moore’s law, which states that computer power doubles every two years. I often surprise people with the simple fact that your cell phone today has more computer power than all of NASA when it put two men on the moon in 1969. Computers are now powerful enough to record the electrical signals emanating from the brain and partially decode them into a familiar digital language. This makes it possible for the brain to directly interface with computers to control any object around it. The fast-growing field is called BMI (brain-machine interface), and the key technology is the computer. In Book II, I’ll explore this new technology, which has made recording memories, mind reading, videotaping our dreams, and telekinesis possible.

In Book III, I’ll investigate alternate forms of consciousness, from dreams, drugs, and mental illness to robots and even aliens from outer space. Here we’ll also learn about the potential to control and manipulate the brain to manage diseases such as depression, Parkinson’s, Alzheimer’s, and many more. I will also elaborate on the Brain Research Through Advancing Innovative Neurotechnologies (or BRAIN) project announced by President Obama, and the Human Brain Project of the European Union, which will potentially allocate billions of dollars to decode the pathways of the brain, all the way down to the neural level. These two crash programs will undoubtedly open up entirely new research areas, giving us new ways to treat mental illness and also revealing the deepest secrets of consciousness.

After we have given a definition of consciousness, we can use it to explore nonhuman consciousness as well (i.e., the consciousness of robots). How advanced can robots become? Can they have emotions? Will they pose a threat? And we can also explore the consciousness of aliens, who may have goals totally different from ours. In the Appendix, I will discuss perhaps the strangest idea in all of science, the concept from quantum physics that consciousness may be the fundamental basis for reality. There is no shortage of proposals for this exploding field. Only time will tell which ones are mere pipe dreams created by the overheated imagination of science-fiction writers and which ones represent solid avenues for future scientific research. Progress in neuroscience has been astronomical, and in many ways the key has been modern physics, which uses the full power of the electromagnetic and nuclear forces to probe the great secrets hidden within our minds.

I should stress that I am not a neuroscientist. I am a theoretical physicist with an enduring interest in the mind. I hope that the vantage point of a physicist can help further enrich our knowledge and give a fresh new understanding of the most familiar and alien object in the universe: our mind. But given the dizzying pace with which radically new perspectives are being developed, it is important that we have a firm grasp on how the brain is put together. So let us first discuss the origins of modern neuroscience, which some historians believe began when an iron spike sailed through the brain of a certain Phineas Gage. This seminal event set off a chain reaction that helped open the brain to serious scientific investigation. Although it was an unfortunate event for Mr. Gage, it paved the way for modern science. BOOK I THE MIND AND CONSCIOUSNESS My fundamental premise about the brain is that its workings—

BOOK I THE MIND AND CONSCIOUSNESS My fundamental premise about the brain is that its workings— what we sometimes call “mind”—are a consequence of its anatomy and physiology, and nothing more. —CARL SAGAN 1 UNLOCKING THE MIND In 1848, Phineas Gage was working as a railroad foreman in Vermont, when dynamite accidentally went off, propelling a three-foot, seven-inch spike straight into his face, through the front part of his brain, and out the top of his skull, eventually landing eighty feet away. His fellow workers, shocked to see part of their foreman’s brain blown off, immediately called for a doctor. To the workers’ (and even the doctor’s) amazement, Mr. Gage did not die on-site.

He was semiconscious for weeks, but eventually made what seemed like a full recovery. (A rare photograph of Gage surfaced in 2009, showing a handsome, confident man, with an injury to his head and left eye, holding the iron rod.) But after this incident, his coworkers began to notice a sharp change in his personality. A normally cheerful, helpful foreman, Gage became abusive, hostile, and selfish. Ladies were warned to stay clear of him. Dr. John Harlow, the doctor who treated him, observed that Gage was “capricious and vacillating, devising many plans of future operations, which are no sooner arranged than they are abandoned in turn for others appearing more feasible. A child in his intellectual capacity and manifestations, yet with the animal passions of a strong man.” Dr. Harlow noted that he was “radically changed” and that his fellow workers said that “he was no longer Gage.” After Gage’s death in 1860, Dr. Harlow preserved both his skull and the rod that had

death in 1860, Dr. Harlow preserved both his skull and the rod that had smashed into it. Detailed X-ray scans of the skull have since confirmed that the iron rod caused massive destruction in the area of the brain behind the forehead known as the frontal lobe, in both the left and right cerebral hemispheres.

This incredible accident would not only change the life of Phineas Gage, it would alter the course of science as well. Previously, the dominant thinking was that the brain and the soul were two separate entities, a philosophy called dualism. But it became increasingly clear that damage to the frontal lobe of his brain had caused abrupt changes in Gage’s personality. This, in turn, created a paradigm shift in scientific thinking: perhaps specific areas of the brain could be traced to certain behaviors. broca’s brain

broca’s brain In 1861, just a year after Gage’s death, this view was further cemented through the work of Pierre Paul Broca, a physician in Paris who documented a patient who appeared normal except that he had a severe speech deficit. The patient could understand and comprehend speech perfectly, but he could utter only one sound, the word “tan.” After the patient died, Dr. Broca confirmed during the autopsy that the patient suffered from a lesion in his left temporal lobe, a region of the brain near his left ear. Dr. Broca would later confirm twelve similar cases of patients with damage to this specific area of the brain. Today patients who have damage to the temporal lobe, usually in the left hemisphere, are said to suffer from Broca’s aphasia. (In general, patients with this disorder can understand speech but cannot say anything, or else they drop many words when speaking.)

Soon afterward, in 1874, German physician Carl Wernicke described patients who suffered from the opposite problem. They could articulate clearly, but they could not understand written or spoken speech. Often these patients could speak fluently with correct grammar and syntax, but with nonsensical words and meaningless jargon. Sadly, these patients often didn’t know they were spouting gibberish. Wernicke confirmed after performing autopsies that these patients had suffered damage to a slightly different area of the left temporal lobe. The works of Broca and Wernicke were landmark studies in neuroscience, establishing a clear link between behavioral problems, such as speech and language impairment, and damage to specific regions of the brain.

Another breakthrough took place amid the chaos of war. Throughout history, there were many religious taboos prohibiting the dissection of the human body, which severely restricted progress in medicine. In warfare, however, with tens of thousands of bleeding soldiers dying on the battlefield, it became an urgent mission for doctors to develop any medical treatment that worked. During the Prusso-Danish War in 1864, German doctor Gustav Fritsch treated many soldiers with gaping wounds to the brain and happened to notice that when he touched one hemisphere of the brain, the opposite side of the body often twitched. Later Fritsch systematically showed that, when he electrically stimulated the brain, the left hemisphere controlled the right side of the body, and vice versa. This was a stunning discovery, demonstrating that the brain was basically electrical in nature and that a particular region of the brain controlled a part on the other side of the body. (Curiously, the use

of electrical probes on the brain was first recorded a couple of thousand years earlier by the Romans. In the year A.D. 43, records show that the court doctor to the emperor Claudius used electrically charged torpedo fish, which were applied to the head of a patient suffering from severe headaches.) The realization that there were electrical pathways connecting the brain to the body wasn’t systematically analyzed until the 1930s, when Dr. Wilder Penfield began working with epilepsy patients, who often suffered from debilitating convulsions and seizures that were potentially life-threatening. For them, the last option was to have brain surgery, which involved removing parts of the skull and exposing the brain. (Since the brain has no pain sensors, a person can be conscious during this entire procedure, so Dr. Penfield used only a local anesthetic during the operation.)

Dr. Penfield noticed that when he stimulated certain parts of the cortex with an electrode, different parts of the body would respond. He suddenly realized that he could draw a rough one-to-one correspondence between specific regions of the cortex and the human body. His drawings were so accurate that they are still used today in almost unaltered form. They had an immediate impact on both the scientific community and the general public. In one diagram, you could see which region of the brain roughly controlled which function, and how important each function was. For example, because our hands and mouth are so vital for survival, a considerable amount of brain power is devoted to controlling them, while the sensors in our back hardly register at all. Furthermore, Penfield found that by stimulating parts of the temporal lobe, his patients suddenly relived long-forgotten memories in a crystal-

clear fashion. He was shocked when a patient, in the middle of brain surgery, suddenly blurted out, “It was like ... standing in the doorway at [my] high school.... I heard my mother talking on the phone, telling my aunt to come over that night.” Penfield realized that he was tapping into memories buried deep inside the brain. When he published his results in 1951, they created another transformation in our understanding of the brain. Figure 1. This is the map of the motor cortex that was created by Dr. Wilder Penfield, showing which region of the brain controls which part of the body, (illustration credit 1.1) A MAP OF THE BRAIN By the 1950s and ’60s, it was possible to create a crude map of the brain, locating different regions and even identifying the functions of a few of them.

In Figure 2, we see the neocortex, which is the outer layer of the brain, divided into four lobes. It is highly developed in humans. All the lobes of the brain are devoted to processing signals from our senses, except for one: the frontal lobe, located behind the forehead. The prefrontal cortex, the foremost part of the frontal lobe, is where most rational thought is processed. The information you are reading right now is being processed in your prefrontal cortex. Damage to this area can impair your ability to plan or contemplate the future, as in the case of Phineas Gage. This is the region where information from our senses is evaluated and a future course of action is carried out. FRONTAL LOBE PARIETAL LOBE OCCIPITAL LOBE TEMPORAL LOBE Figure 2. The four lobes of the neocortex of the brain are responsible for different, though related, functions, (illustration credit 1.2)

credit 1.2) The parietal lobe is located at the top of our brains. The right hemisphere controls sensory attention and body image; the left hemisphere controls skilled movements and some aspects of language. Damage to this area can cause many problems, such as difficulty in locating parts of your own body. The occipital lobe is located at the very back of the brain and processes visual information from the eyes. Damage to this area can cause blindness and visual impairment. The temporal lobe controls language (on the left side only), as well as the visual recognition of faces and certain emotional feelings. Damage to this lobe can leave us speechless or without the ability to recognize familiar faces. THE EVOLVING BRAIN

THE EVOLVING BRAIN When you look at other organs of the body, such as our muscles, bones, and lungs, there seems to be an obvious rhyme and reason to them that we can immediately see. But the structure of the brain might seem slapped together in a rather chaotic fashion. In fact, trying to map the brain has often been called “cartography for fools.”

To make sense of the seemingly random structure of the brain, in 1967 Dr. Paul MacLean of the National Institute of Mental Health applied Charles Darwin’s theory of evolution to the brain. He divided the brain into three parts. (Since then, studies have shown that there are refinements to this model, but we will use it as a rough organizing principle to explain the overall structure of the brain.) First, he noticed that the back and center part of our brains, containing the brain stem, cerebellum, and basal ganglia, are almost identical to the brains of reptiles. Known as the “reptilian brain,” these are the oldest structures of the brain, governing basic animal functions such as balance, breathing, digestion, heartbeat, and blood pressure. They also control behaviors such as fighting, hunting, mating, and territoriality, which are necessary for survival and reproduction. The reptilian brain can be traced back about 500 million years. (See Figure 3.)

But as we evolved from reptiles to mammals, the brain also became more complex, evolving outward and creating entirely new structures. Here we encounter the “mammalian brain,” or the limbic system, which is located near the center of the brain, surrounding parts of the reptilian brain. The limbic system is prominent among animals living in social groups, such as the apes. It also contains structures that are involved in emotions. Since the dynamics of social groups can be quite complex, the limbic system is essential in sorting out potential enemies, allies, and rivals. HUMAN BRAIN Hypothalamus MAMMALIAN L BRAIN . REPTILIAN BRAIN Corpus callosum Cingulate gyrus Frontal lobe Hippocampus Forn Cerebellum Brain stem Pituitary gland

Frontal lobe Hippocampus Forn Cerebellum Brain stem Pituitary gland Figure 3. The evolutionary history of the brain, with the reptilian brain, the limbic system (the mammalian brain), and the neocortex (the human brain). Roughly speaking, one can argue that the path of our brain’s evolution passed from the reptilian brain to the mammalian brain to the human brain, (illustration credit 1.3) The different parts of the limbic system that control behaviors crucial for social animals are: • The hippocampus. This is the gateway to memory, where short-term memories are processed into long-term memories. Its name means “seahorse,” which describes its strange shape. Damage here will destroy the ability to make new long-term memories. You are left a prisoner of the present. • The amygdala. This is the seat of emotions, especially fear, where emotions are first registered and generated. Its name means “almond.”

• The thalamus. This is like a relay station, gathering sensory signals from the brain stem and then sending them out to the various cortices. Its name means “inner chamber.” • The hypothalamus. This regulates body temperature, our circadian rhythm, hunger, thirst, and aspects of reproduction and pleasure. It lies below the thalamus—hence its name. Finally, we have the third and most recent region of the mammalian brain, the cerebral cortex, which is the outer layer of the brain. The latest evolutionary structure within the cerebral cortex is the neocortex (meaning “new bark”), which governs higher cognitive behavior. It is most highly developed in humans: it makes up 80 percent of our brain’s mass, yet is only as thick as a napkin. In rats the neocortex is smooth, but it is highly convoluted in humans, which allows a large amount of surface area to be crammed into the human skull.

In some sense, the human brain is like a museum containing remnants of all the previous stages in our evolution over millions of years, exploding outward and forward in size and function. (This is also roughly the path taken when an infant is born. The infant brain expands outward and toward the front, perhaps mimicking the stages of our evolution.) Although the neocortex seems unassuming, looks are deceiving. Under a microscope you can appreciate the intricate architecture of the brain. The gray matter of the brain consists of billions of tiny brain cells called neurons. Like a gigantic telephone network, they receive messages from other neurons via dendrites, which are like tendrils sprouting from one end of the neuron. At the other end of the neuron, there is a long fiber called the axon. Eventually the axon connects to as many as ten

thousand other neurons via their dendrites. At the juncture between the two, there is a tiny gap called the synapse. These synapses act like gates, regulating the flow of information within the brain. Special chemicals called neurotransmitters can enter the synapse and alter the flow of signals. Because neurotransmitters like dopamine, serotonin, and noradrenaline help control the stream of information moving across the myriad pathways of the brain, they exert a powerful effect on our moods, emotions, thoughts, and state of mind. (See Figure 4.) This description of the brain roughly represented the state of knowledge through the 1980s. In the 1990s, however, with the introduction of new technologies from the field of physics, the mechanics of thought began to be revealed in exquisite detail, unleashing the current explosion of scientific discovery. One of the workhorses of this revolution has been the MRI machine.

Figure 4. Diagram of a neuron. Electrical signals travel along the axon of the neuron until they hit the synapse. Neurotransmitters can regulate the flow of electrical signals past the synapse, (illustration credit 1.4) THE MRI: WINDOW INTO THE BRAIN To understand the reason why this radical new technology has helped decode the thinking brain, we have to turn our attention to some basic principles of physics. Radio waves, a type of electromagnetic radiation, can pass right through tissue without doing damage. MRI machines take advantage of this fact, allowing electromagnetic waves to freely penetrate the skull. In the process, this technology has given us glorious photographs of something once thought to be impossible to capture: the inner workings of the brain as it experiences sensations and emotions. Watching the dance of lights flickering in a MRI machine, one can trace out the thoughts moving within the brain. It’s like being able to see the inside of a clock as it ticks.

The first thing you notice about an MRI machine is the huge, cylindrical magnetic coils, which can produce a magnetic field twenty to sixty thousand times greater than the strength of Earth’s. The giant magnet is one of the principal reasons why an MRI machine can weigh a ton, fill up an entire room, and cost several million dollars. (MRI machines are safer than X-ray machines because they don’t create harmful ions. CT scans, which can also create 3-D pictures, flood the body with many times the dosage from an ordinary X-ray, and hence have to be carefully regulated. By contrast, MRI machines are safe when used properly. One problem, however, is the carelessness of workers. The magnetic field is powerful enough to send tools hurling through the air at high velocity when turned on at the wrong time. People have been injured and even killed in this way.)

MRI machines work as follows: Patients lie flat and are inserted into a cylinder containing two large coils, which create the magnetic field. When the magnetic field is turned on, the nuclei of the atoms inside your body act very much like a compass needle: they align horizontally along the direction of the field. Then a small pulse of radio energy is generated, which causes some of the nuclei in our body to flip upside down. When the nuclei later revert back to their normal position, they emit a secondary pulse of radio energy, which is then analyzed by the MRI machine. By analyzing these tiny “echoes,” one can then reconstruct the location and nature of these atoms. Like a bat, which uses echoes to determine the position of objects in its path, the echoes created by the MRI machine allow scientists to re-create a remarkable image of the inside of the brain. Computers then reconstruct the position of the atoms, giving us beautiful diagrams in three dimensions.

When MRIs were originally introduced, they were able to show the static structure of the brain and its various regions. However, in the mid- 1990s, a new type of MRI was invented, called “functional” MRI, or fMRI, which detected the presence of oxygen in the blood in the brain. (For different types of MRI machines, scientists sometimes put a lowercase letter in front of “MRI,” but we will use the abbreviation MRI to denote all the various types of MRI machines.) MRI scans cannot directly detect the flow of electricity in the neurons, but since oxygen is necessary to provide the energy for the neurons, oxygenated blood can indirectly trace the flow of electrical energy in the neurons and show how various regions of the brain interact with one another.

Already these MRI scans have definitively disproven the idea that thinking is concentrated in a single center. Instead, one can see electrical energy circulating across different parts of the brain as it thinks. By tracing the path taken by our thoughts, MRI scans have shed new light into the nature of Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s, schizophrenia, and a host of other mental diseases. The great advantage of MRI machines is their exquisite ability to locate minute parts of the brain, down to a fraction of a millimeter in size. An MRI scan will create not just dots on a two-dimensional screen, called pixels, but dots in three-dimensional space, called “voxels,” yielding a bright collection of tens of thousands of colored dots in 3-D, in the shape of a brain.

Since different chemical elements respond to different frequencies of radio, you can change the frequency of the radio pulse and therefore identify different elements of the body. As noted, fMRI machines zero in on the oxygen atom contained within blood in order to measure blood flow, but MRI machines can also be tuned to identify other atoms. In just the last decade, a new form of MRI was introduced called “diffusion tensor imaging” MRI, which detects the flow of water in the brain. Since water follows the neural pathways of the brain, DTI yields beautiful pictures that resemble networks of vines growing in a garden. Scientists can now instantly determine how certain parts of the brain are hooked up with other parts.

There are a couple of drawbacks to MRI technology, however. Although they are unparalleled in spatial resolution, locating voxels down to the size of a pinpoint in three dimensions, MRIs are not that good in temporal resolution. It takes almost a full second to follow the path of blood in the brain, which may not sound like a lot, but remember that electrical signals travel almost instantly throughout the brain, and hence MRI scans can miss some of the intricate details of thought patterns. Another snag is the cost, which runs in the millions of dollars, so doctors often have to share the machines. But like most technology, developments should bring down the cost over time.

In the meantime, exorbitant costs haven’t stalled the hunt for commercial applications. One idea is to use MRI scans as lie detectors, which, according to some studies, can identify lies with 95 percent accuracy or higher. The level of accuracy is still controversial, but the basic idea is that when a person tells a lie, he simultaneously has to know the truth, concoct the lie, and rapidly analyze the consistency of this lie with previously known facts. Today some companies are claiming that MRI technology shows that the prefrontal and parietal lobes light up when someone tells a lie. More specifically, the “orbitofrontal cortex” (which can serve, among other functions, as the brain’s “fact-checker” to warn us when something is wrong) becomes active. This area is located right behind the orbits of our eyes, and hence the name. The theory goes that the orbitofrontal cortex understands the difference between the truth and a lie and kicks into overdrive as a result. (Other areas of the

truth and a lie and kicks into overdrive as a result. (Other areas of the brain also light up when someone tells a lie, such as the superiormedial and inferolateral prefrontal cortices, which are involved in cognition.)

Already there are several commercial firms offering MRI machines as lie detectors, and cases involving these machines are entering the court system. But it’s important to note that these MRI scans indicate increased brain activity only in certain areas. While DNA results can sometimes have an accuracy of one part in 10 billion or better, MRI scans cannot, because it takes many areas of the brain to concoct a lie, and these same areas of the brain are responsible for processing other kinds of thoughts as well. EEG SCANS Another useful tool to probe deep inside the brain is the EEG, the electroencephalogram. The EEG was introduced all the way back in 1924, but only recently has it been possible to employ computers to make sense out of all the data pouring in from each electrode. To use the EEG machine, the patient usually puts on a futuristic- looking helmet with scores of electrodes on the surface. (More advanced versions place a hairnet over the head containing a series of tiny

electrodes.) These electrodes detect the tiny electrical signals that are circulating in the brain. (illustration credit 1.5) Figure 5. At the top, we see an image taken by a functional MRI machine, showing regions of high mental activity. In the bottom image, we see the flowerlike pattern created by a diffusion MRI machine, which can follow the neural pathways and connections of the brain, (illustration credit 1.5a)

An EEG scan differs from an MRI scan in several crucial ways. The MRI scan, as we have seen, shoots radio pulses into the brain and then analyzes the “echoes” that come back. This means you can vary the radio pulse to select different atoms for analysis, making it quite versatile. The EEG machine, however, is strictly passive; that is, it analyzes the tiny electromagnetic signals the brain naturally emits. The EEG excels at recording the broad electromagnetic signals that surge across the entire brain, which allows scientists to measure the overall activity of the brain as it sleeps, concentrates, relaxes, dreams, etc. Different states of consciousness vibrate at different frequencies. For example, deep sleep corresponds to delta waves, which vibrate at .1 to 4 cycles per second. Active mental states, such as problem solving, correspond to beta waves, vibrating from 12 to 30 cycles per second. These vibrations allow various parts of the brain to share information

These vibrations allow various parts of the brain to share information and communicate with one another, even if they are located on opposite sides of the brain. And while MRI scans measuring blood flow can be taken only several times a second, EEG scans measure electrical activity instantly.

The greatest advantage of the EEG scan, though, is its convenience and cost. Even high school students have done experiments in their living rooms with EEG sensors placed over their heads. However, the main drawback to the EEG, which has held up its development for decades, is its very poor spatial resolution. The EEG picks up electrical signals that have already been diffused after passing through the skull, making it difficult to detect abnormal activity when it originates deep in the brain. Looking at the output of the muddled EEG signals, it is almost impossible to say for sure which part of the brain created it. Furthermore, slight motions, like moving a finger, can distort the signal, sometimes rendering it useless. PET SCANS Yet another useful tool from the world of physics is the positron emission topography (PET) scan, which calculates the flow of energy in

the brain by locating the presence of glucose, the sugar molecule that fuels cells. Like the cloud chamber I made as a high school student, PET scans make use of the subatomic particles emitted from sodium-22 within the glucose. To start the PET scan, a special solution containing slightly radioactive sugar is injected into the patient. The sodium atoms inside the sugar molecules have been replaced by radioactive sodium-22 atoms. Every time a sodium atom decays, it emits a positive electron, or positron, which is easily detected by sensors. By following the path of the radioactive sodium atoms in sugar, one can then trace out the energy flow within the living brain. The PET scan shares many of the same advantages of MRI scans but does not have the fine spatial resolution of an MRI photo. However, instead of measuring blood flow, which is only an indirect indicator of energy consumption in the body, PET scans measure energy consumption, so it is more closely related to neural activity.

There is another drawback to PET scans, however. Unlike MRI and EEG scans, PET scans are slightly radioactive, so patients cannot continually take them. In general, a person is not allowed to have a PET scan more than once a year because of the risk from radiation. MAGNETISM IN THE BRAIN Within the last decade, many new high-tech devices have entered the tool kit of neuroscientists, including the transcranial electromagnetic scanner (TES), magnetoencephalography (MEG), near-infrared spectroscopy (NIRS), and optogenetics, among others.

In particular, magnetism has been used to systematically shut down specific parts of the brain without cutting it open. The basic physics behind these new tools is that a rapidly changing electric field can create a magnetic field, and vice versa. MEGs passively measure the magnetic fields produced by the changing electric fields of the brain. These magnetic fields are weak and extremely tiny, only a billionth of Earth’s magnetic field. Like the EEG, the MEG is extremely good at time resolution, down to a thousandth of a second. Its spatial resolution, however, is only a cubic centimeter. Unlike the passive measurement of the MEG, the TES generates a large pulse of electricity, which in turn creates a burst of magnetic energy. The TES is placed next to the brain, so the magnetic pulse penetrates the skull and creates yet another electric pulse inside the brain. This secondary electrical pulse, in turn, is sufficient to turn off or dampen the activity of selected areas of the brain.

Historically, scientists had to rely on strokes or tumors to silence certain parts of the brain and hence determine what they do. But with the TES, one can harmlessly turn off or dampen parts of the brain at will. By shooting magnetic energy at a particular spot in the brain, one can determine its function by simply watching how a person’s behavior has changed. (For example, by shooting magnetic pulses into the left temporal lobe, one can see that this adversely affects our ability to talk.)

One potential drawback of the TES is that these magnetic fields do not penetrate very far into the interior of the brain (because magnetic fields decrease much faster than the usual inverse square law for electricity). TES is quite useful in turning off parts of the brain near the skull, but the magnetic field cannot reach important centers located deep in the brain, such as the limbic system. But future generations of TES devices may overcome this technical problem by increasing the intensity and precision of the magnetic field. Wire coil Pulsed magnetic field Stimulated brain region Positioning frame Figure 6. We see the transcranial electromagnetic scanner and the magnetoencephalograph, which uses magnetism rather than radio waves to penetrate the skull and determine the nature of thoughts within the brain. Magnetism can temporarily silence parts of the brain, allowing scientists to safely determine how these regions perform without relying

on stroke victims, (illustration credit 1.6) DEEP BRAIN STIMULATION Yet another tool that has proven vital to neurologists is deep brain stimulation (DBS). The probes originally used by Dr. Penfield were relatively crude. Today these electrodes can be hairlike and reach specific areas of the brain deep within its interior. Not only has DBS allowed scientists to locate the function of various parts of the brain, it can also be used to treat mental disorders. DBS has already proven its worth with Parkinson’s disease, in which certain regions of the brain are overactive and often create uncontrollable shaking of the hands. More recently, these electrodes have targeted a new area of the brain (called Brodmann’s area number 25) that is often overactive in depressed patients who do not respond to psychotherapy or drugs. Deep brain stimulation has given almost miraculous relief after decades of torment and agony for these long-suffering patients.

Every year, new uses for deep brain stimulation are being found. In fact, nearly all the major disorders of the brain are being reexamined in light of this and other new brain-scanning technologies. This promises to be an exciting new area for diagnosing and even treating illnesses. OPTOGENETICS—LIGHTING UP THE BRAIN But perhaps the newest and most exciting instrument in the neurologist’s tool kit is optogenetics, which was once considered science fiction. Like a magic wand, it allows you to activate certain pathways controlling behavior by shining a light beam on the brain. Incredibly, a light-sensitive gene that causes a cell to fire can be inserted, with surgical precision, directly into a neuron. Then, by turning on a light beam, the neuron is activated. More importantly, this allows scientists to excite these pathways, so that you can turn on and off certain behaviors by flicking a switch.

Although this technology is only a decade old, optogenetics has already proven successful in controlling certain animal behaviors. By turning on a light switch, it is possible to make fruit flies suddenly fly off, worms stop wiggling, and mice run around madly in circles. Monkey trials are now beginning, and even human trials are in discussion. There is great hope that this technology will have a direct application in treating disorders like Parkinson’s and depression. THE TRANSPARENT BRAIN Like optogenetics, another spectacular new development is making the brain fully transparent so that its neural pathways are exposed to the naked eye. In 2013, scientists at Stanford University announced that they had successfully made the entire brain of a mouse transparent, as well as parts of a human brain. The announcement was so stunning that it made the front page of the New York Times, with the headline “Brain as Clear as Jell-0 for Scientists to Explore.”

At the cellular level, cells seen individually are transparent, with all their microscopic components fully exposed. However, once billions of cells come together to form organs like the brain, the addition of lipids (fats, oils, waxes, and chemicals not soluble in water) helps make the organ opaque. The key to the new technique is to remove the lipids while keeping the neurons intact. The scientists at Stanford did this by placing the brain in hydrogel (a gel-like substance mainly made of water), which binds to all the brain’s molecules except the lipids. By placing the brain in a soapy solution with an electric field, the solution can be flushed out of the brain, carrying along the lipids, leaving the brain transparent. The addition of dyes can then make the neural pathways visible. This will help to identify and map the many neural pathways of the brain.

Making tissue transparent is not new, but getting precisely the right conditions necessary to make the entire brain transparent took a lot of ingenuity. “I burned and melted more than a hundred brains,” confessed Dr. Kwanghun Chung, one of the lead scientists in the study. The new technique, called Clarity, can also be applied to other organs (and even organs preserved years ago in chemicals like formalin). He has already created transparent livers, lungs, and hearts. This new technique has startling applications across all of medicine. In particular, it will accelerate locating the neural pathways of the brain, which is the focus of intense research and funding. FOUR FUNDAMENTAL FORCES

FOUR FUNDAMENTAL FORCES The success of this first generation of brain scans has been nothing less than spectacular. Before their introduction, only about thirty or so regions of the brain were known with any certainty. Now the MRI machine alone can identify two to three hundred regions of the brain, opening up entirely new frontiers for brain science. With so many new scanning technologies being introduced from physics just within the last fifteen years, one might wonder: Are there more? The answer is yes, but they will be variations and refinements of the previous ones, not radically new technologies. This is because there are only four fundamental forces—gravitational, electromagnetic, weak nuclear, and strong nuclear—that rule the universe. (Physicists have tried to find evidence for a fifth force, but so far all such attempts have failed.)

The electromagnetic force, which lights up our cities and represents the energy of electricity and magnetism, is the source of almost all the new scanning technologies (with the exception of the PET scan, which is governed by the weak nuclear force). Because physicists have had over 150 years of experience working with the electromagnetic force, there is no mystery in creating new electric and magnetic fields, so any new brain-scanning technology will most likely be a novel modification of existing technologies, rather than being something entirely new. As with most technology, the size and cost of these machines will drop, vastly increasing the widespread use of these sophisticated instruments. Already physicists are doing the basic calculations necessary to make an MRI machine fit into a cell phone. At the same time, the fundamental challenge facing these brain scans is resolution, both spatial and temporal. The spatial resolution of MRI scans will increase as the

temporal. The spatial resolution of MRI scans will increase as the magnetic field becomes more uniform and as the electronics become more sensitive. At present, MRI scans can see only dots or voxels within a fraction of a millimeter. But each dot may contain hundreds of thousands of neurons. New scanning technology should reduce this even further. The holy grail of this approach would be to create an MRI-like machine that could identify individual neurons and their connections.

The temporal resolution of MRI machines is also limited because they analyze the flow of oxygenated blood in the brain. The machine itself has very good temporal resolution, but tracing the flow of blood slows it down. In the future, other MRI machines will be able to locate different substances that are more directly connected to the firing of neurons, thereby allowing real-time analysis of mental processes. No matter how spectacular the successes of the past fifteen years, then, they were just a taste of the future. NEW MODELS OF THE BRAIN Historically, with each new scientific discovery, a new model of the brain has emerged. One of the earliest models of the brain was the “homunculus,” a little man who lived inside the brain and made all the decisions. This picture was not very helpful, since it did not explain what was happening in the brain of the homunculus. Perhaps there was a homunculus hiding inside the homunculus.

With the arrival of simple mechanical devices, another model of the brain was proposed: that of a machine, such as a clock, with mechanical wheels and gears. This analogy was useful for scientists and inventors like Leonardo da Vinci, who actually designed a mechanical man.

During the late 1800s, when steam power was carving out new empires, another analogy emerged, that of a steam engine, with flows of energy competing with one another. This hydraulic model, historians have conjectured, affected Sigmund Freud’s picture of the brain, in which there was a continual struggle between three forces: the ego (representing the self and rational thought), the id (representing repressed desires), and the superego (representing our conscience). In this model, if too much pressure built up because of a conflict among these three, there could be a regression or general breakdown of the entire system. This model was ingenious, but as even Freud himself admitted, it required detailed studies of the brain at the neuronal level, which would take another century.

Early in the last century, with the rise of the telephone, another analogy surfaced—that of a giant switchboard. The brain was a mesh of telephone lines connected into a vast network. Consciousness was a long row of telephone operators sitting in front of a large panel of switches, constantly plugging and unplugging wires. Unfortunately, this model said nothing about how these messages were wired together to form the brain. With the rise of the transistor, yet another model became fashionable: the computer. The old-fashioned switching stations were replaced by microchips containing hundreds of millions of transistors. Perhaps the “mind” was just a software program running on “wetware” (i.e., brain tissue rather than transistors). This model is an enduring one, even today, but it has limitations. The transistor model cannot explain how the brain performs computations that would require a computer the size of New York City. Plus the brain has no programming, no Windows

operating system or Pentium chip. (Also, a PC with a Pentium chip is extremely fast, but it has a bottleneck. All calculations must pass through this single processor. The brain is the opposite. The firing of each neuron is relatively slow, but it more than makes up for this by having 100 billion neurons processing data simultaneously. Therefore a slow parallel processor can trump a very fast single processor.) The most recent analogy is that of the Internet, which lashes together billions of computers. Consciousness, in this picture, is an “emergent” phenomenon, miraculously arising out of the collective action of billions of neurons. (The problem with this picture is that it says absolutely nothing about how this miracle occurs. It brushes all the complexity of the brain under the rug of chaos theory.)