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First ‘hive mind’ game of Tetris
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First ‘hive mind’ game of Tetris
JACK GUEZ/AFP/GETTY IMAGES
Three connected brains solve one problem in a world first. By Chelsea Whyte
Chelsea Whyte
USING only their thoughts to communicate, three people wearing brain-reading caps worked together to play Tetris. This is the first instance of more than two people collaborating through brainto-brain communication. “Our experiment can be regarded as the first proof-ofconcept demonstration that multiple human brains can consciously work together to solve a task that none of the brains individually could,” says Rajesh Rao at the University of Washington in Seattle. Using this BrainNet interface, three people can combine minds to play a slow version of Tetris. The first two send information about the state of the game to the third player, who decides which moves to make. The two senders wear electroencephalography (EEG) caps to record the brain signals produced by their thoughts, while the receiver wears a transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) cap that delivers the information to their brain.
advances. “Extrapolating this the receiver’s occipital lobe – the idea, one could regard networks brain’s visual processing centre – of connected brains as humanity’s is stimulated magnetically by solution to overcoming the the TMS cap when the senders biological limits on human brain think “yes”, causing the receiver evolution,” he says. to see a flash of light. “We are probably in a pre-hiveThe senders have 15 seconds to mind phase,” says Giulio Ruffini send their decision, and the two at Neuroelectrics in Barcelona, decisions are received 8 seconds apart. “The real Tetris game would Spain. This new work is an be too fast for the current version incremental improvement on of BrainNet,” says Rao. current technology, he says, but it The team also tested whether is a step forward for non-invasive, the receiver could judge if the brain-to-brain communication. guidance was accurate, by asking His colleague, Ana Maiques, one sender to give incorrect says the most practical use directions. The receiver then had for this technology would be to learn which sender was more helping people who cannot speak, reliable when deciding whether to either because of neurological or The senders can see the entire rotate the block. After each move, physical limitations. “Or you play area, and so have to tell the the receiver was told whether they receiver whether or not to rotate “Human brains can work the target block. The receiver only had made the right choice. together to solve a task Five groups of three people sees this current block, not the that none of the brains played Tetris as part of the state of play, so must rely on individually could” experiment, rotating the block information from the senders. so it fit into the row below with an They communicate with the receiver by focusing on one of two average accuracy of about 81 per could use many brains to flashing LED lights that sit next to cent, including in the trials where compute a difficult problem. the words YES or NO on either side the wrong instructions were sent Or to do something abstract like (arxiv.org/abs/1809.08632). of a computer screen. This choice write a song. But I think that’s Rao says that linking brains can be seen in the EEG data, in wishful thinking,” she says. together to solve problems in signals from the visual cortex. Attempts to merge human this way may bring significant To pass on this information, brains with computers – either Tetris telepathy with surgically implanted chips Two players send their move recommendations via brain-reading caps or non-invasive techniques like to a third player, who must decide whether to rotate the block without that developed by Rao and his being able to see the full state of play colleagues – are being undertaken by companies such as Facebook ROTATE? ROTATE? YES OR NO and Elon Musk’s Neuralink, a raft of start-ups, and the US military’s EEG EEG TMS research arm, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA). Don’t go thinking you are going to incept an idea into a pal’s mind any time soon, though. Facebook SIGNAL Sender 1 Sender 2 Receiver and DARPA have both said their PROCESSED early goals are to allow people to interact with software programs or type without using their hands. A mind-meld video game may still be years away. ■ 13 October 2018 | NewScientist | 5
First ‘hive mind’ game of Tetris
JACK GUEZ/AFP/GETTY IMAGES
Three connected brains solve one problem in a world first. By Chelsea Whyte
Chelsea Whyte
USING only their thoughts to communicate, three people wearing brain-reading caps worked together to play Tetris. This is the first instance of more than two people collaborating through brainto-brain communication. “Our experiment can be regarded as the first proof-ofconcept demonstration that multiple human brains can consciously work together to solve a task that none of the brains individually could,” says Rajesh Rao at the University of Washington in Seattle. Using this BrainNet interface, three people can combine minds to play a slow version of Tetris. The first two send information about the state of the game to the third player, who decides which moves to make. The two senders wear electroencephalography (EEG) caps to record the brain signals produced by their thoughts, while the receiver wears a transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) cap that delivers the information to their brain.
advances. “Extrapolating this the receiver’s occipital lobe – the idea, one could regard networks brain’s visual processing centre – of connected brains as humanity’s is stimulated magnetically by solution to overcoming the the TMS cap when the senders biological limits on human brain think “yes”, causing the receiver evolution,” he says. to see a flash of light. “We are probably in a pre-hiveThe senders have 15 seconds to mind phase,” says Giulio Ruffini send their decision, and the two at Neuroelectrics in Barcelona, decisions are received 8 seconds apart. “The real Tetris game would Spain. This new work is an be too fast for the current version incremental improvement on of BrainNet,” says Rao. current technology, he says, but it The team also tested whether is a step forward for non-invasive, the receiver could judge if the brain-to-brain communication. guidance was accurate, by asking His colleague, Ana Maiques, one sender to give incorrect says the most practical use directions. The receiver then had for this technology would be to learn which sender was more helping people who cannot speak, reliable when deciding whether to either because of neurological or The senders can see the entire rotate the block. After each move, physical limitations. “Or you play area, and so have to tell the the receiver was told whether they receiver whether or not to rotate “Human brains can work the target block. The receiver only had made the right choice. together to solve a task Five groups of three people sees this current block, not the that none of the brains played Tetris as part of the state of play, so must rely on individually could” experiment, rotating the block information from the senders. so it fit into the row below with an They communicate with the receiver by focusing on one of two average accuracy of about 81 per could use many brains to flashing LED lights that sit next to cent, including in the trials where compute a difficult problem. the words YES or NO on either side the wrong instructions were sent Or to do something abstract like (arxiv.org/abs/1809.08632). of a computer screen. This choice write a song. But I think that’s Rao says that linking brains can be seen in the EEG data, in wishful thinking,” she says. together to solve problems in signals from the visual cortex. Attempts to merge human this way may bring significant To pass on this information, brains with computers – either Tetris telepathy with surgically implanted chips Two players send their move recommendations via brain-reading caps or non-invasive techniques like to a third player, who must decide whether to rotate the block without that developed by Rao and his being able to see the full state of play colleagues – are being undertaken by companies such as Facebook ROTATE? ROTATE? YES OR NO and Elon Musk’s Neuralink, a raft of start-ups, and the US military’s EEG EEG TMS research arm, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA). Don’t go thinking you are going to incept an idea into a pal’s mind any time soon, though. Facebook SIGNAL Sender 1 Sender 2 Receiver and DARPA have both said their PROCESSED early goals are to allow people to interact with software programs or type without using their hands. A mind-meld video game may still be years away. ■ 13 October 2018 | NewScientist | 5