Hypnosis Machine?

[Meepy]

Judge for yourselves:

http://www.digg.com/health/Machine_Gives_Full_Night_s_Sleep_In_3_Hours

If they can put people to sleep by altering their brain waves, what is stopping them from putting people in suggestive state?

At any rate, I'm already getting devilish ideas...:twisted:

[Jacara]

Wow, I'd never heard of this, so I looked for other references to "transcranial magnetic stimulation" and it's apparently legitimate.
It seems similar to the way flashing lights or binaurals affect the brain, only with magnets & more effective. I would definitely think this could be used for hypnotic purposes. Worth a second look.

[aviant]

I'll again sound as a sceptic, but things are not *THAT* easy. Transcranial magnetic stimulation is legitimate, but the author of the article in Sun is probably retarded.

Here is the abstract of the original publication by Massimini et.al as cited in PubMed:

During much of sleep, cortical neurons undergo near-synchronous slow oscillation cycles in membrane potential, which give rise to the largest spontaneous waves observed in the normal electroencephalogram (EEG). Slow oscillations underlie characteristic features of the sleep EEG, such as slow waves and spindles. Here we show that, in sleeping subjects, slow waves and spindles can be triggered noninvasively and reliably by transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS). With appropriate stimulation parameters, each TMS pulse at <1 Hz evokes an individual, high-amplitude slow wave that originates under the coil and spreads over the cortex. TMS triggering of slow waves reveals intrinsic bistability in thalamocortical networks during non-rapid eye movement sleep. Moreover, evoked slow waves lead to a deepening of sleep and to an increase in EEG slow-wave activity (0.5-4.5 Hz), which is thought to play a role in brain restoration and memory consolidation.

Noone speaks of putting people to sleep with this (they are already asleep), nor for 8 hour sleep in 3 hours.

[Jacara]

Have they tried it in awake subjects? I would expect it would have at least some results in that way too. As for getting the same sleep in less time, the abstract doesn't mention that specifically, but it does say that the level of sleep could be made deeper, so one would assume that the length of needed sleep would be a little shorter. That's not why the original poster brought it up anyway though, they thought that the possibility of magnetically altering brain states was an intriguing concept, and I agree.

That being said, I didn't understand the whole abstract; I'm not dumb, but I don't know what "bistability in thalamocortical networks" refers to :roll:

[Meepy]

Good thinking looking up the abstract aviant. I find this article mostly interesting because they have shown a truly 'noninvasive' control over brain wave activity that does not utilize any of the human senses; it is a purely external method of stimulation. Next time on a college campus I'll look it up and see how much they were able to increase EEG slow-wave activity. I will also ask my girlfriend what she thinks about it (she is a neuroscience graduate student).

[aviant]

Jacara, one is better not to assume anything in this field. Long time ago Samuel Hahnemann tried curing people by asumptions and most of the time it didn't work (although as a talented physician he discovered a lot of things including homeopathy and quarantine).
I suppose it takes a professional to understand everything in the abstract, but it is far better than reading tabloid-like blabber.

Meepy, noninvasive methods for gaining some control over brain are not something new. After all schizoid patients were treated with electric shocks and unless I'm mistaken it is still used on some occasions. Ask your girlfriend about the article and please keep us updated.

[Blink]

Meepy, noninvasive methods for gaining some control over brain are not something new. After all schizoid patients were treated with electric shocks and unless I'm mistaken it is still used on some occasions.

You might have heard me cringe when I read that.

Electroconvulsive Therapy (ECT), formerly known as Electroshock Therapy, has a long and somewhat sordid history in psychiatric treatment. It is noninvasive in that no instrument penetrates the body, but there are support groups for people who identify themselves as victims of ECT who would argue the point. (I'm an advocate for psychiatry, not against. In any case, Googling "ECT" and "victim" will turn up relevant pages along with some pages written by very literate, intelligent, paranoid people.)

There was a time when ECT was used so routinely that patients on state hospital grounds would line up for their turn on the "black box." Like the frontal lobotomy, it was useful when there was nothing else available, and, being a useful tool in an otherwise nearly empty toolbox, it was probably used far more often than necessary.

It is still indicated in cases of either severe depression or severe mania which are intractable to medication (and, thus, potentially life-threatening and certainly life-altering). The problem is finding clinicians who are willing to perform the procedure. It drips with stigma, even though, in these limited instances, it's the best we have to offer.

I'm not keen to have strong magnetic fields shootin' through my brain, either. I keep thinking "leukemia... leukemia... leukemia..." the whole time I'm looking at the equipment.

-- Blink

[tsd]

its certainly an interesting theory.... and one which if proven to be useful could have valuable applications both in and out of medicine... and while it would be cool, i still look at it wiht some trepidation.
last year i had an MRI scan and i can honestly say it terrified me. the fact i will probably need to have more as time goes on terrifies me even more... so unless they made this VERY user friendly its not something that i think people would necessarily want to use for recreational purposes.

[aviant]

Blink, I don't argue that ECT is rather outdated and far from harmless for the patient, I was just arguing that using electric or magnetic currents is something new.
As for the strong magnetic fields, there was a research on the regenerative properties of lizards, when in strong magnetic fields. The reparative regeneration was severely impaired, but iirc there were no tumors. I don't know what side effects will they have on human brain (after all it does not regenerate), but I'm not very eager to find out by myself too.

[Blink]

Blink, I don't argue that ECT is rather outdated and far from harmless for the patient, I was just arguing that using electric or magnetic currents is something new.

I didn't think you were advocating large-scale "juicing" of the population. :) I took your casual mention as an opportunity to do a little community educating. I'm like that.

And don't worry that I think you're evil. I'm pretty sure you're not. I'm evil, and I never see you at the meetings. ;)

As for the strong magnetic fields, there was a research on the regenerative properties of lizards, when in strong magnetic fields. The reparative regeneration was severely impaired, but iirc there were no tumors. I don't know what side effects will they have on human brain (after all it does not regenerate), but I'm not very eager to find out by myself too.

Long-term exposure to magnetic fields is a reputed risk factor for certain types of cancer. You might remember high-energy power transmission lines getting a lot of popular attention some time ago. IIRC, the Scandinavian countries have also set limits on RF emissions for office equipment. I'm not up-to-the-minute (or the year, for that matter) in this area, but my understanding is that the threshhold limits haven't been set in stone yet.

As with most things, I could be wrong.

Thanks for your civil and well-written reply, by the way.

-- Blink

[aviant]

I don't know for the Scandinavian countries, but the Soviets surely had regulations for minimal distance of such lines to habitable buildings and minimal height. They are probably still there in most of the ex-Soviet countries.