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Conversations with Coleman

Mind-Reading Tech is Here with Nita Farahany

Conversations with Coleman

The Free Press

Society & Culture, Philosophy

4.5625 Ratings

🗓️ 17 March 2023

⏱️ 73 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

My guest today is Nita Farahany. Nita is a professor of Law and Philosophy at Duke Law School. She is the founding director of the Duke Science and Society. She is the faculty chair of the Duke MA in Bioethics and Science Policy and Principal Investigator at slap lab. In 2010, she was appointed by President Obama to the Presidential Commission for the Study of Bioethical Issues where she served until 2017. She's an appointed Member of the National Advisory Council for the National Institute for Neurological Disease and Stroke and she is a past president of the International Neuroethics Society. This is only a small slice of her bio. The topic of this conversation is mind reading, and I don't mean trying to guess what's in somebody's head. I mean actual technology that scans your brain and reliably conveys what you are thinking or feeling. Now, this seemed like science fiction to me, but Nita convinced me in this conversation that this technology is already here, and there are a host of ethical questions relating to privacy and other things. Nita and I talk about how EEG scans can give us information about our minds. We talk about the relationship between EEG scans and classical questions in the philosophy of mind, such as consciousness, as well as free will. We talk about the uses of mind-reading technology in criminal investigations, which has already happened. We talk about the current uses of mind-reading tech in Chinese factories. And yes, that is already happening too. We talk about tattoos that can pick up your brain activity. And once again, that already exists. We talk about the combination of artificial intelligence and mind-reading tech and what that promises for the future. We talk about whether excellent liars would be able to pass mind-reading technology. We also talk about how mind-reading tech has even been used to tell whether couples are in love. I really hope you enjoy this conversation as much as I did. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0

When your souls on trial

0:02.0

And I did have help but I still outplayed all the cards I was dealt

0:07.0

And when the going got tough it's the man in the mirror who I caught when he fell

0:12.0

And when the judgment day come it's no place you could run either heaven or it's heaven

0:18.0

So get your alibi straight when your soul's on fire, when your souls

0:22.5

on fire. A couple people said I should probably stay in my lane. Stick to where I'm good,

0:27.1

but I'm good at too many things. Cold man got more lanes than L.A. highways. So like Sinatra,

0:32.6

I had to have it my way. The track you just heard is an excerpt from my brand new album, Amor Fati.

0:39.4

You may remember the music videos I put out last year, blasphemy, straight A's, and

0:43.7

Forward.

0:44.5

This new album features all three of those singles plus seven brand new songs.

0:49.3

Now, I put my all into this project, and it's a real representation of my passion for music.

0:53.7

So if you want to listen

0:54.4

to the whole thing, click in the description or search Cold X-Man on Spotify, Apple Music, or wherever

1:00.7

you listen to music. Now back to the podcast. Welcome to another episode of conversations

1:09.0

with Coleman. My guest today is Nita Farahani.

1:12.2

Nita is a professor of law and philosophy at Duke Law School.

1:15.8

She's the founding director of the Duke Science and Society.

1:19.4

She is the faculty chair of the Duke MA in Bioethics and Science Policy

1:23.5

and principal investigator at Slap Lab.

1:25.7

In 2010, she was appointed by President Obama to the

1:28.9

Presidential Commission for the Study of Bioethical Issues, where she served until 2017.

...

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