Machines that decode your thoughts aren’t limited to the realm of science fiction anymore.
A computer program that analyzes brain scans was able to tell which of three short films people were thinking about, according to a study in the journal Current Biology.
“We were able to predict just from their brain activity which of those memories they were recalling,” says Eleanor A. Maguire, one of the study’s authors and a professor of cognitive neuroscience at University College London.
This is a major step forward, Maguire says. But it falls short of what most people would call mind reading. “We can’t put somebody in a brain scanner and immediately know what thoughts they are having,” she says.