A computer predicts your thoughts, creating images based on them | Computers & Math - Science Daily

Summary:

Researchers have developed a technique in which a computer models visual perception by monitoring human brain signals. In a way, it is as if the computer tries to imagine what a human is thinking about. As a result of this imagining, the computer is able to produce entirely new information, such as fictional images that were never before seen. The technique is based on a novel brain-computer interface.

---

Researchers at the University of Helsinki have developed a technique in which a computer models visual perception by monitoring human brain signals by University of Helsinki.

The images generated by the computer were evaluated by the participants. They nearly perfectly matched with the features the participants were thinking of.
Photo: Cognitive Computing research group

In a way, it is as if the computer tries to imagine what a human is thinking about. As a result of this imagining, the computer is able to produce entirely new information, such as fictional images that were never before seen.

The technique is based on a novel brain-computer interface. Previously, similar brain-computer interfaces have been able to perform one-way communication from brain to computer, such as spell individual letters or move a cursor.

As far as is known, the new study is the first where both the computer's presentation of the information and brain signals were modelled simultaneously using artificial intelligence methods...

The subjects were asked to concentrate on certain features, such as faces that looked old or were smiling. While looking at a rapidly presented series of face images, the EEGs of the subjects were fed to a neural network, which inferred whether any image was detected by the brain as matching what the subjects were looking for.

Based on this information, the neural network adapted its estimation as to what kind of faces people were thinking of. Finally, the images generated by the computer were evaluated by the participants and they nearly perfectly matched with the features the participants were thinking of. The accuracy of the experiment was 83 per cent.

Read more...  

Additional resources

Journal Reference:

1. Lauri Kangassalo, Michiel Spapé, Tuukka Ruotsalo. Neuroadaptive modelling for generating images matching perceptual categories. Scientific Reports, 2020; 10 (1) DOI: 10.1038/s41598-020-71287-1

 Source: Science Daily