It's probably a good idea to keep your opinions to yourself if your friend gets a terrible new haircut - but soon you might not get a choice. That's because scientists at the University of Texas at Austin have trained an artificial intelligence (AI) to read a person's mind and turn their innermost thoughts into text. Three study participants listened to stories while lying in an MRI machine, while an AI'decoder' analysed their brain activity. They were then asked to read a different story or make up their own, and the decoder could then turn the MRI data into text in real time. The breakthrough raises concerns about'mental privacy' as it could be the first step in being able to eavesdrop on others' thoughts.

Mind-reading technology can now transcribe people's thoughts in real-time based on the blood flow in their brain. A study put three people in MRI machines and got them to listen to stories. For the first time, researchers claim, they produced a rolling text of people's thoughts, and not just single words or sentences, without using a brain implant. The mind-reading technology did not exactly replicate the stories, but captured the main points. The breakthrough raises concerns about'mental privacy' as it could be the first step in being able to eavesdrop on others' thoughts.

Neurable CEO Ramses Alcaide has a mission: bring neurotechnology out of research labs -- and surgical suites -- and into everyday life. "Neurable exists to make brain-computer interfaces an everyday thing," Alcaide says. He envisions a future where the neurotechnology that allows Neurable's products to read brainwaves via electrical signals -- without surgical implants -- is used to track cognitive capability and mental health, like a Fitbit for the brain. The company is also building towards a future where brain-computer interfaces (BCI) allow people with disabilities to easily control prosthetics and robotics, and even lets people who cannot speak communicate again. Their current device, still only available as a preorder, is a set of headphones, called Enten. The headphones are designed to read electrical signals produced by neurons in your brain, a technique called electroencephalography, or EEG for short.

The dreams of those who want to connect their brains to computers could be about to take another step towards reality, as Elon Musk took to Twitter to tease an "awesome" update around his neural interface start-up Neuralink. Commenting on the findings of analysis firm ARK, which ranked deep learning as the number one "big idea of 2020", Musk Tweeted that the impact of high-bandwidth combined with high-precision neural interfaces is "underappreciated". "Neuralink may have this in a human as soon as this year," he added. And then in another Tweet, the Tesla CEO said rather mysteriously: "Wait until you see the next version vs what was presented last year. Elon Musk took to Twitter this week to tease an "awesome" update to his 31 million followers. In a presentation a few months ago, Musk effectively pitched the first findings of Neuralink, which he believes down the line will lead to a perfect mesh of humans and artificial intelligence. The three year-old company is working on ...

Technology allowing our thoughts and feelings to be translated into a digital form – and shared – is already a reality. Brain computer interfaces (BCI) allow us to connect our minds to computers for some limited purposes, and big tech companies including Facebook and many startups want to make this technology commonplace. The AI and ML deployments are well underway, but for CXOs the biggest issue will be managing these initiatives, and figuring out where the data science team fits in and what algorithms to buy versus build. For those of you terrified by the prospect of technology recording – and broadcasting – your opinions of the boss, your secret fears, or anything else – relax. BCIs are currently not sophisticated enough to collect such granular information.

Facebook may be planning to use people's thoughts for advertising purposes. The social network is developing advanced new technologies that would let you type words "directly from your brain". Its ambitious vision has caused widespread concern amongst privacy advocates, and the company has refused to confirm or deny if it will use people's thoughts to sell ads. The I.F.O. is fuelled by eight electric engines, which is able to push the flying object to an estimated top speed of about 120mph. The giant human-like robot bears a striking resemblance to the military robots starring in the movie'Avatar' and is claimed as a world first by its creators from a South Korean robotic company Waseda University's saxophonist robot WAS-5, developed by professor Atsuo Takanishi and Kaptain Rock playing one string light saber guitar perform jam session A man looks at an exhibit entitled'Mimus' a giant industrial robot which has been reprogrammed to interact with humans during a photocall at the new Design Museum in South Kensington, London Electrification Guru Dr. Wolfgang Ziebart talks about the electric Jaguar I-PACE concept SUV before it was unveiled before the Los Angeles Auto Show in Los Angeles, California, U.S The Jaguar I-PACE Concept car is the start of a new era for Jaguar.

It is often said that, given an infinite amount of time, monkeys hitting random keys on a typewriter will eventually type the works of Shakespeare. While it may seem far fetched, an unusual experiment has achieved the fabled task. To illustrate how paralysed people can type using a device called a'brain-computer interface', scientists used monkeys to show how it can be done. Two rhesus macaque monkeys (stock picture left) had electrodes implanted in part of the brain that controls hand movement. As a result, they were able to type a passage from William Shakespeare's Hamlet The technology uses a multi-electrode array implanted in the brain to directly read signals from a region that directs hand and arm movements used to move a computer mouse.