THE EXPOSURE OF WATERGATE/MKULTRA/COINTELPRO
According to testimony by Senator Edward Kennedy in 1977,
“Some 2 years ago, the Senate Health Subcommittee heard chilling
testimony about
the human experimentation activities of the Central Intelligence
Agency. The Deputy
Director of the CIA revealed that over 30 universities and
institutions were involved
in an ‘extensive testing and experimentation’ program which included
covert drug
tests on unwitting citizens ‘at all social levels, [high and low],
native Americans and
foreign.’ Several of these [tests involved] the administration of
LSD to ‘unwitting
subjects in [social] situations.’ ... The Central Intelligence
Agency drugged American
citizens without their knowledge or consent. It used university
facilities and personnel
without their knowledge.” 78
As an example of the hubris wrought by institutions veiled in
secrecy, given unlimited funds and
staffed with amoral people we can only refer to the statement made
by George White in a letter to
MKUltra director Sidney Gottleib:
“I toiled wholeheartedly in the
vineyards because it was fun, fun,
fun! Where else could an American boy lie, cheat, rape and pillage
with the sanction and blessing of
the All Highest?” 79
After Watergate, more information hit the papers,
COINTELPRO was
uncovered by a group of
people who have never been apprehended, in spite of a six-year FBI
investigation. The
COINTELPRO program was secret until 1971, when an FBI field office
was burglarized by a group calling themselves the Citizens’
Commission to Investigate the FBI.
77 “Intracerebral Radio Stimulation and Recording in Completely Free
Patients,” The Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease, Lippincott
Williams & Wilkins, October, 1968.
78 Testimony of US Senator Edward Kennedy, Joint Hearing before the
Select Committee on Intelligence, US Senate, 95th Congress, 1977.
79 (letter to Sidney Gottleib) See also Sex, drugs and the CIA, by
Douglas Valentine posted at
http://www.counterpunch.org/valentine0621.html
These people broke into an FBI office in Pennsylvania, rifled
through the filing cabinets and leaked to the press documents
detailing the abuses suffered by a wide variety of activists,
including a long-term plan to destroy Martin Luther King Jr.:
“Agents tapped his phone, bugged his rooms, trumpeted his supposed
commie
connections, and his sexual proclivities, and sicced the Internal
Revenue Service on
him. When it was announced in 1964 that King would receive a Nobel
Peace Prize,
the FBI grew desperate. Hoping to prevent King from accepting the
award, the
Bureau mailed him a package containing a tape of phone calls
documenting King’s
extramarital affairs and an anonymous, threatening letter (shown
here in censored
form). In barely concealed language, King was told to commit suicide
before the
award ceremony or risk seeing his “filthy, abnormal fraudulent self”
exposed to the
nation. Fortunately, King ignored the FBI’s advice. He accepted the
award and lived
four more years until his assassination.”
80
Some of the largest COINTELPRO campaigns targeted the Socialist
Worker’s Party, the Ku Klux
Klan, the “New Left” (including several anti-war groups such as the
Students for a Democratic
Society and the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee), Black
Liberation groups (such as the
Black Panthers and the Republic of New Africa), Puerto Rican
independence groups, the American
Indian Movement, and the Weather Underground. Later, Director Hoover
declared that the
centralized COINTELPRO was over, and that all future
counterintelligence operations would be
handled on a case-by-case basis.81
In addition, the MKULTRA documents hit the press and a number of
books were written about the
subject, most notable were’ “The Search for the Manchurian
Candidate” by John Marks, “Bluebird"
by Colin A. Ross MD, and “A Nation Betrayed" by Carol Rutz. At this
point victims began to come
forward with claims of being horribly abused in these programs, one
of the most famous is a woman
named Candy Jones who described in stunning detail a tale of
corruption and abuse.82
80 Martin Luther King, Jr., “Statement on Joseph Alsop and J. Edgar
Hoover’s charge of alleged Communist
infiltration of the Civil Rights Movement,” 23 April 1964 and Select
Committee to Study Governmental
Operations with Respect to Intelligence Activities, United States
Senate, Supplementary Detailed Staff Reports
on Intelligence Activities and the Rights of Americans, Book III,
Final Report. 14 April 1976
81 “Me and My Shadow”: A History of the FBI’s Covert Operations and COINTELPRO - Part 1. Produced by Adi
Gevins, Pacifica Radio. 1976. Rebroadcast by Democracy Now!
Wednesday, June 5, 2002. See also Paul Wolf’s website
for a detailed archive of official COINTELPRO documents and
transcripts of the Church Committee
hearings:
http://www.icdc.com/~paulwolf/cointelpro/cointel.htm
82 Donald Bain, . The Control of Candy Jones. Chicago, Playboy
Press, 1976. (Reissued in 2002 by Barricade books as
The CIA’s Control of Candy Jones with a new introduction by Bain)
When Jimmy Carter became President in 1976 he promptly moved to
introduce a modicum
of control, he instituted the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act
establishing an 11 member
secret court to oversee the surveillance activities of our covert
agencies. As an example of the
limited reporting requirements for the court we have the first
report issued to Vice President
Mondale from Attorney General Benjamin R. Civiletti in 1979:
This report is submitted pursuant to Section 107 of the Foreign
Intelligence
Surveillance Act of 1978, Title 50, United States Code Section 1807.
During calendar year 1979, 199 applications were made for orders and
extensions of
orders approving electronic surveillance under the Act. The United
States Foreign
Intelligence Surveillance Court issued 207 orders granting authority
for the requested
electronic surveillances. No orders were entered which modified or
denied the
requested authority.83
Pointedly Carter’s reform measure did not do anything to insure that
the American public would be
protected in the future from abuse and testing at the hands of the
intelligence arm of the military-industrial complex. Carter’s move to reform the CIA was to appoint
an outsider as head of the
agency, Admiral Stansfield Turner. After Turner took over as
Director of the CIA 800 “rogue”
agents were let go, though most all of them found work in various
false front companies that had
been set up in the previous years. 84
Both the Rockefeller Commission and the Church Committee revealed a
long standing pattern of
both developing new psychological, pharmaceutical and radiological
technologies, to influence
individuals and groups and long standing pattern of behavior whereby
politically disruptive citizens
were systematically targeted, harassed and destroyed. Yet there
have, to date, been no provisions
instituted which would stop this behavior, nor is there any
guarantee that these kinds of covert
programs ever actually ceased.
The only practical change engendered
by the disclosures of the 1970s
was to drive these kinds of operations further into the shadows.
That such research and
experimentation may still be occurring is evidenced by a DOD
directive, issued by the Secretary of
the Navy on November 6, 2006 that specifically requires prior
approval of the Under Secretary of
the Navy before conducting “severe or unusual intrusions, either
physical or psychological, on
human subjects (such as consciousness altering drugs, or
mind-control techniques).” 85
83 1979 FISA report can be obtained at the Federation of American
Scientists website:
http://www.fas.org/irp/agency/doj/fisa/1979rept.html.
84 William Blum, The CIA: A Forgotten History, Atlantic Highlands,
New Jersey, Zed Books Ltd. 1986; Alan Moore Bill
Sienkewitz, Shadowplay-The Secret Team, Forestville CA, Eclipse
Books, 1987 and Leslie Cockburn, Out of Control,
New York, Atlantic Monthly Press 1987.
85 SECNAV Instruction 3900.39D, Subj: “Human Research Protection
Program”, November 6, 2006.
www.fas.org/irp/DODdir/navy/secnavinst/3900_39d.pdf
Non-Lethal Weapons Research Today
There is a long history that illustrates US Intelligence operations
had tragic results for many
involved. There was, however, no public debate surrounding these
black operations because they
were classified under the guise of national security. MKULTRA,
Project PANDORA, plutonium
testing, and many more projects conducted by the DOD and the CIA
were exposed by committees
led by Senators Rockefeller and Church in the 1970s.86 However,
tighter restrictions on human
experiment including accountability and transparency did not occur
until 1997, when President
Clinton instituted revised protocols on human experiments.87
Official reports insist that the research involving experiments
during the 1950s through the 1970s
was destroyed. Yet, the scientists involved went without punishment,
free to continue their careers.88
Given the levels of ongoing EMF technology research today, and the
recent retroactive approval of
torture approved by the Military Commissions Act, it may be that
human testing is occurring under
post-9/11 national security protocols. Can we accept that all the
psychological research conducted
with government funding up to the 1970s was simply destroyed? At
this time, the American public
has no way to answer this question. The current administration
classifies more information than any
previous US administration.89 Unclassified documents have even been
recalled and re-classified.90
In the 1980s nuclear radiation experiments on humans became public
knowledge and Russian tests making use of the electromagnetic
spectrum were exposed.91 Countries around the world passed laws and
signed treaties in response to the danger of weapons that could
adversely effect human behavior or manipulate human cognition. The
Russians banned all EMF weapons in 2001.
These treaties have roots in the human radiation experiments of the
1950s, 1960s and 1970s. In effect, these treaties declared a basic
tenant of human rights and cognitive liberties.92
In the quest for global military superiority, the US stepped up
funding for the concept of the “Future Warrior” beginning in the
late 1990s with the use of advanced nano-technology.93
The idea was to streamline the military, improve soldier
performance, control the fighting in real-time and avoid soldier
mortality. Toward this end, the concept was to enhance the ability
of soldiers in the field to interface with computer systems by using
their own brain waves.94
86 The Church and Rockefeller Committee reports can be accessed
through the Assassination Archives and Research
Center:
http://www.aarclibrary.org/publib/church/contents.htm
87
Memorandum of March 27, 1997--Strengthened Protections for Human
Subjects of Classified Research. [Federal
Register: May 13, 1997 (Volume 62, Number 92)] [Page 26367-26372].
88 Scientific American talks about the work of Jose Delgado and
states that Dr. Delgado stopped doing research as late as
the 1990’s, see: John Horgan, “The Forgotten Era of the Brain”,
Scientific American, September 26, 2005.
89 Declassification in Reverse: The US Intelligence Community’s
Secret Historical Document Reclassification Program,
Matthew M. Aid. Located at the George Washington University National
Security Archive,
http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB179/#report.
90 Executive Order 12958, originally signed by Clinton after Wen Ho
Lee, a Los Alamos scientist was accused of giving
the Chinese information, was amended by George W. Bush pm March 25,
2003. The amendment can be accessed at the
White House website,
http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2003/03/20030325-11.html.
91 The United Nations and Disarmament: 1945-1985 by the UN
Department for Disarmament Affairs. (1985) New York,
UN Publication Sales
92 For a comprehensive listing of treaties and international
conferences surrounding these concerns, see the Sunshine Project at
http://www.sunshine-project.org/, See Also: Human Rights: Beyond the
Liberal Vision, Judith Blau and Alberto Moncada, Rowman and
Littlefield Publishers, 2005
93 Amy Kruse, Program Manager at
Defense Sciences Office, DARPA “Defense and Biology: Fundamentals
for the Future”. MIT also has The Institute for Soldier
Nanotechnologies established in 2002 with a five-year, $50 million
contract from the US Army,
http://web.mit.edu/isn/index.html.
94 See DARPA, “Neurotechnology for Intelligence Analysts”,
http://www.darpa.mil/dso/thrust/biosci/nia.htm.
The US began to fund research
into decoding the brain as well as other neurological research.
President George H.W. Bush declared
the 1990s “The Decade of the Brain”.95 At the same time, funding for
computer to human interface
poured into universities and Defense Advanced Research Projects
Agency (DARPA) stepped up
their research and development. In the universities, the field
became “cognitive science” and within
DARPA, the term “augmented cognition” was born.96
While developments in brain research are
touted for their amazing therapeutic advances in the medical field,
they primarily serve the purposes of the US military.97
Americans have little idea about the research concerning the
capabilities of electromagnetism,
directed acoustics, or computer-human interfacing. The majority of
Americans do not know that we
are currently using these new-concept weapons in Iraq and
Afghanistan. Indiana University law
professor David Fidler stated to the Economist,
“because these
weapons are most likely to be used
on civilians, it is not clear that using them is legal under the
international rules governing armed
conflict…if they are used in conjunction with conventional weapons,
they could end up making war
more deadly, rather than less.” 98
A peek into the US arsenal of weapons is like a look into a science
fiction film. DARPA and various military research labs provide a
view of the current technology available to enhance US soldiers in
the field and manipulate the emotions and behaviors of the perceived
enemy. As American sentiment toward the Iraq war spirals downward,
along with the approval ratings of the US president, domestic civil
disobedience is likely to rise, as it has in many countries in
response to US foreign policy.
Are new electromagnetic weapons in the possession of the government
be used on American citizens? The issue at hand is whether the
research and technology currently being developed will benefit or
harm us and how much liberty we are willing to sacrifice for a
possibly skewed sense of national security and protection.
In September 2006, Air Force Secretary Michael Wynne announced that
crowd control weapons
should be tested on Americans first.
“If we’re not willing to use it
here against our fellow citizens,
then we should not be willing to use it in a wartime situation,”
said Wynne. “(Because) if I hit
somebody with a non-lethal weapon and they claim that it injured
them in a way that was not
intended, I think that I would be vilified in the world press.”
99
95 The proclamation declaring the 1990’s the “Decade of the Brain”
was signed by President George H.W. Bush on July
17, 1990, which can be accessed at the Library of Congress,
http://www.loc.gov/loc/brain/proclaim.html.
96 See the Augmented Cognition International Society,
http://www.augmentedcognition.org/history.htm.
97 Fronteirs in Neuroscience- Artificial Intelligence in the
Pentagon and Beyond.
http://www.neuropsychiatryreviews.com/mar06/android.html
98
“Electromagnetic weapons: Come fry with me”, The Economist, January
30, 2003.
99 Lolita C. Baldor, Associated Press, 9/12/2006. In addition to
this comment, the Air Force released a declassified
document located at the website of the Federation of American
Scientists, (
http://www.fas.org/sgp/eprint/hamilton.pdf
directing the acquisitions team from the media. The author is the
USAF principal deputy assistant secretary for acquisition,
management and logistics, Darlene Druyun: “Effective immediately, I
do not want anyone within the Air Force acquisition community
discussing any of our programs with the media (on or off the
record). This includes presenting program briefings in any forums at
which the media may be present.”
Non-lethal weapons sound harmless in relation to guns and bombs.
However, non-lethal weapons
are not just tazers and annoying sounds. Nor are they harmless. In
fact, NLWs are such a concern
that many countries have treaties demanding transparency. Beginning
in the 1990s, groups have
formed to provide oversight of NLW research, including international
committees, concerned
scientists, and citizens’ groups including the Federation of
American Scientists and the Center for
Cognitive Liberty and Ethics.100 The proliferation of NLWs have
raised concern within the EU,
Russia, and other countries, as records of Cold War abuses come to
light and people come forward
with complaints of illegal testing.101
The concern is more than a political issue and stretches beyond
civil liberties into human rights as they relate to a person’s
cognitive liberties. The following section highlights technologies
with the capability to control and manipulate individuals or large
groups of people.
Crowd Control using the Electromagnetic Spectrum
The electromagnetic spectrum has provided the military with an
expanse of weapons, which are operational and in military and
private use today in the form of millimeter waves,102 pulsed energy
projectiles, and high power magnetic weapons.
Project Sheriff The US has deployed the Project Sheriff active denial weapon in
Iraq. Raytheon outfitted Humvees with their Silent Guardian
Protection System, a device capable of heating the skin to 1/64 of
an inch, causing instant pain similar to intense sunburn,
103 with
the goal to facilitate dispersing a crowd.
According to a report released by the Air Force on the human effects
of this weapon, people with
contact lenses and those wearing metal suffered greater effects. An
imprint of a coin was discovered
on the skin of a test subject and death or severe heart problems may
occur.104
100 For a list of these groups see, Non Lethal Weapons, July 2005,
compiled by Terry Kiss, Bibliographer, Air University
Library, Maxwell AFB, AL accessed at the Maxwell Internet site,
http://www.au.af.mil/au/aul/bibs/soft/nonlethal.htm and Appendix A
of this paper. 101 For further reading on these treaties, see The Bulletin of
Atomic Scientists , September/October 1994 pp. 40-45 (vol.
50, no. 05), “The Soft Kill Fallacy” by Steven Aftergood and Barbara
Hatch Rosenberg’s in the same issue, “Sidebar: A
non-lethal laundry list”. Rosenberg cites the Conference on
Disarmament, Report of the Ad Hoc Committee on Chemical
Weapons to the Conference on Disarmament, Aug. 26, 1992, Nos. 22,
25, 34 (CD/1170) as well as the treaty,
“Convention on Prohibition or Restriction of the Use of Certain
Conventional Weapons Which May Be Deemed to Be
Excessively Injurious or to Have Indiscriminate Effects.”
102 A detailed study conducted by Andrei G. Pakhomov, Yahya Akyel,
Olga N. Pakhomova, Bruce E. Stuck, and
Michael R. Murphy with the Brooks Air Force Base, Human
Effectiveness Directorate, offers a scientific analysis of the
effects of millimeter waves, “Current State and Implications of
Research on Biological Effects of Millimeter Waves: A
Literature Review”, McKesson BioServices (A.G.P., Y.A., O.N.P.), U.
S. Army Medical Research Detachment of the Walter Reed Army
Institute of Research (B.E.S.), and Directed Energy Bioeffects
Division, Human Effectiveness Directorate, Air Force Research
Laboratory (M.R.M.), Brooks Air Force Base, San Antonio, TX.
103 US Non Lethal Weapons for Iraq
http://www.oft.osd.mil/library/library_files/article_461_Boston
Globe.doc
104 “Rumsfeld’s Ray Gun,” By Kelly Hearn, AlterNet. Posted August
19, 2005,
http://www.alternet.org/story/24044/
Pulsed Energy Projectiles
Pulsed Energy Projectiles (PEPs) are another form of weaponry that
is used to paralyze a victim with
pain. According to New Scientist magazine, the expanding plasma
effects nerve cells, but the long-term effects remain a public mystery.105 The Joint Non-Lethal
Weapons Program reports that, PEPs
create a flash bang effect that startles and distracts.106 However,
the effects are much greater than just
startling an individual. A 2001 Time magazine article states that
the PEP
“superheats the surface
moisture around a target so rapidly that it literally explodes,
producing a bright flash of light and a
loud bang. The effect is like a stun grenade, but unlike a grenade
the pep travels at nearly the speed
of light and can take out a target with pinpoint accuracy…as far
away as 2 km.” 107
While the effects of these weapons appear to be short-term and
topical in nature, there is evidence that electromagnetic weapons
have effects on the brain, including sleep disruption and behavior
changes.108 They can produce anxiety and fear or compliance in
humans. It is possible to use these weapons as a means of torture,
yet without knowing exactly when, where, and how the weapons are
used, we are left to speculate.109 An article by
David Hambling in
New Scientist magazine, March 2005, was titled, “Maximum pain is aim
of new US weapons.”
In 2006, Dr. Brian Martin, associate professor
in Science, Technology and Society, University of Wollongong,
Australia, co-authored a paper entitled “Looming struggles over
technology for border control,” which describes the potential
catastrophes that would lead to an extreme border protection plan.
In the event of a natural disaster, or the rapid reduction of
resources, or a major climactic change such as drought, rich
countries will have a need to reinforce their borders against a
massive influx of refugees. This scenario is often described in the
nation-state context but it is possible to imagine such a perceived
need in the event of internal civil unrest.
Directed Acoustics
In Maoist China, cities were equipped with megaphones, bombarding
the people with on-going
propaganda. The megaphones were in full vision of the people, yet
there was no way to escape the
sound. Today technology exists that fills a similar purpose. Voice
to Skull directed acoustic devices
are neuro-electromagnetic non-lethal weapons that can produce sounds
within the skull of a
human.110
A similar technology, known as
Hypersonic Sound, is used in a
similar fashion. According to its
inventor, Elwood Norris of American Technology Corporation (ATC),
the handheld speaker can focus sound waves directly at a person without anyone else hearing
the sound. The technology is being tested by corporations such as
McDonald’s and Wal Mart to direct advertisements into a consumer’s
head.
105 See government contract M67854-04-C-5074, University of Florida,
Division of Sponsored Research, July 1, 2004.
Also located at
http://www.defensetech.org/peoplezapping.pdf
106
According to a 2002 Joint Non Lethal Weapons Program document:
www.dtic.mil/ndia/2002infantry/swenson.pdf
107 Lev Grossman, “Beyond the Rubber Bullet”, Time Magazine, July
21, 2002. 108 David S. Walonick, “Effects of 6-10 Hz ELF on Brain
Waves,
www.borderlands.com/archives/arch/elf.htm 109 David Hambling,
Maximum Pain is Aim Of New US Weapons, New Scientist, March 2005.
110 Definition from the Center for Army Lessons Learned, Fort
Leavenworth, KS: “Nonlethal weapon which includes (1)
a neuro-electromagnetic device which uses microwave transmission of
sound into the skull of persons or animals by way
of pulse-modulated microwave radiation; and (2) a silent sound
device which can transmit sound into the skull of person
or animals. NOTE: The sound modulation may be voice or audio
subliminal messages. One application of V2K is use as
an electronic scarecrow to frighten birds in the vicinity of
airports.” http://call.army.mil/products/thesaur/00016275.htm
The Long Rage Acoustical Device (LRAD),111 is used by the military
in situations such as crowd control, mass notification, and
perimeter enforcement. For instance, an unruly mob may not hear a
warning to disperse with traditional acoustic technology, or border
enforcement agents may need to warn an approaching intruder to turn
away or face bodily harm. The technology has advantages over lethal
force, yet it also has the potential to inflict physical harm,
emotional manipulation, and death.
According to Defense Update, the LRAD can produce a 150-decibel
acoustic beam from 300 meters
away. The human threshold for pain is between 120 to 140
decibels.112 In a 2003 New York Times
article Mr. Norris demonstrates his technology to the reporter. At
1% of capacity, the reporter’s eyes
hurt, and hours later still experienced a headache.113
This technology can inflict permanent damage and death despite its
classification as a non-lethal
weapon. While the LRAD may be seen as a way to save lives in times
of disaster or to avoid civilian
casualties, the LRAD and similar directed acoustics may be cause for
concern to those who exercise
their right to assemble and conduct peaceful demonstrations and
protests. The New York City police
used the LRAD at the Republican National Convention and it was also
used in Miami at a WTO
Free Trade protests.114
Covering one’s ears will not protect a
person and given, the long-range
capabilities, fleeing from the beam may not help either (as
evidenced in the use of directed acoustics
against Jewish settlers in Gaza). The Associated Press (AP) reported
that a device called “the
scream” was used in a 2005 protest against Palestinians who,
“covered
their ears and grabbed their
heads, overcome by dizziness and nausea, after the vehicle-mounted
device began sending out bursts
of audible, but not loud, sound at intervals of about 10 seconds. An
AP photographer at the scene
said that even after he covered his ears, he continued to hear the
sound ringing in his head.” 115
Neurological Technology
Neurobiology has many facets including therapeutic applications with
Alzheimer’s, epilepsy, depression, and stroke victims using
Trancranial Magnetic Stimulation (TMS). Bush’s Decade of the Brain
produced outstanding advances for those with spinal cord injuries as
well, which allows a paralyzed person to control a computer screen
or a limb with a brain implant. There is also a new field in
neurological research, Augmented Cognition. From universities to
private business to the military, advances in neuro-technology can
be used for amazing good. However, as we learned from the history of
the Cold War, technology that has the capacity to heal also has the
capacity to harm.
Of great concern is the research being conducted at DARPA, which is
trying to revolutionize the
way soldiers receive information, respond to orders, adapt to
stress, and perform while sleep
deprived.
111 The LRAD is another invention of Elwood Norris of American
Technology Corporation. 112 Jurgen Altmann, “Acoustic Weapons: A Prospective Assessment,”
Science and Global Security, Vol. 9, p. 13.
113 Marshall Sella, “The Sound of Things to Come”, New York Times,
March 23, 2003. 114 Amanda Onion, “RNC to Feature Unusual Forms of
Sound”, Aug. 25, 2004, ABC News 115 Associated Press, “Israel May
Use Sound Weapon On Settlers”, 6/10/2005. Available at:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2005/06/10/israel-may-use-sound-weap_n_2444.html
TMS is being developed for military purposes using electrical
impulses at close proximity to the skull to enhance mood, affect
sleep patterns, and increase creativity.116 This technology is
beginning to replace electro-shock therapy. DARPA granted a contract
to the Medical University of South Carolina to research now to
improve a soldier’s performance. A soldier’s reaction to stress may
be less intense, or a 40-hour flight will allow for the soldier to
remain awake without the side effects of sleep deprivation.117
Few,
if any, understand the long-term effects of TMS, given its relative
infancy in the overall field of Augmented Cognition. Does TMS
produce unknown neurological effects ten, twenty, fifty years down
the road? To what extent is TMS being researched? TMS is part of the
overall field of Augmented Cognition. In essence, Augmented
Cognition allows a human to interact with a computer through brain
waves. The idea is to enhance a person’s cognitive capabilities in
the area of memory, learning, attention, visualization, and
decision-making.
One application of augmented cognition allows a user to monitor a
person’s brain functions and send anticipatory commands to the
person being monitored. For instance, a military command unit will
be able to monitor a pilot in a cockpit, and based on the sensory
output of the soldier, the base command can input messages directly
into the pilot’s brain to improve performance. DARPA describes this
as a human computer symbiosis whereby,
“This research will enable
development of closed loop human-computer technologies, where the
state of the user is measured, analyzed, and automatically adapted
to by the computational system.”118
The increase in human-computer
relations and the ability to manipulate and control a person’s
senses, memory, and neural output has wide implications.
The basic ability to enter a person’s mind is not a futuristic
fantasy. This is real and in prototype. DARPA began this research in
1983.119 The Internet has become a focal point in our lives with
reliance for information and communication. Our interaction and
intimacy with computers is increasingly pervasive, as is our
exposure to the field of augmented cognition. DARPA does not address
the implications of such symbiosis, or the dilemma of he extent to
which a person can or should be manipulated. The use of this
technology is used for military purposes but it may not be long
until it is used to “improve” the factory worker, prisoners, or the
mentally ill.
116 “Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation: An Introduction”, Grant
Balfour, v1.0 -May 6, 2002 available at:
www.cognitiveliberty.org/issues/TMS_index.html
117 MUSC To Develop Brain Stimulation Device For Military,
Charleston, SC, May 9, 2002,
www.musc.edu/pr/darpa.htm , “The overall goal of the project is to
use the unique resources at MUSC’s Brain
Stimulation Laboratory and Center for Advanced Imaging Research to
determine if: 1. non-invasive stimulation of the brain can improve a soldier’s performance, 2. and then design,
manufacture and test a prototype of a system that would
be capable of delivering this technology in the field.”
118 Improving Human Performance Through Advanced Cognitive System
Technology, Dylan D Schmorrow and Amy
A
Kruse, LCDR MSC USN, Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency,
Arlington, VA, Strategic Analysis Inc.,
Arlington, VA, Available at:
http://ntsa.metapress.com/ (2pq1al55mfylqgf0n3cvjc45)/app/home/contribution.asp?referrer=parent&backto=issue,91,167;journal,5,7;linkingpublicationresults,1:113340,1
119 New Generation Technology: A strategic plan for its Development
and Application to Critical Problems in Defense,
DARPA, 1983.
The Implant
Another realm of brain research is the field of
neural implants.
Until recently, implants were a futuristic fantasy. Current advances
in the private and military sectors have produced an implant that
can allow a victim of a spinal cord injury to walk again or give an
amputee the ability to control her leg with her mind. In the private
sector, Cyberkinetics is leading the way to liberating some people
from wheelchairs. This technology is a path to a more functional way
of life, but it is also possible that the use of implants could be
used for malevolence.
John Donohoe, founder, chief scientific officer, and director of
Cyberkinetics, addressed the issue of
mind control and neural implants. When asked if creating a
brain-machine interface will open the
door to mind control Donohoe responded,
“We do that all the time
already. Advertising is mind
control. Even pharmaceutical agents are a form of mind control. When
people have behaviors that
deviate far from the norm, they are given medications that bring
their mind back into the realm of
behavior that we call normal. If a child were to have a seizure and
became unconscious because of
the seizure, and we controlled his mind so that he did not have
seizures, that would be a wonderful
thing. We want to do that.”120
120 Neuroscience: John Donoghue By Aaron J. Sender, Discover Vol. 25
No. 11, November 2004, Mind & Brain
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