Review by Choice Review
Inventor and entrepreneur Le compellingly portrays research trends and applications involving artificial intelligence (AI) technologies that seek to enhance the potential of the brain, through a series of case histories involving brain-machine interface exploits, some illustrating experimental techniques that may ultimately be used to affect behavior, restore memory, and boost the economy. As Le claims, this explosive research direction has ushered in a new historical era, memorialized in the title of her book. In an absorbing, journalistic narrative Le reports on a whirlwind of interviews, for example with neuroscientists who described their research on "mind control" using EEG headsets and "zapping" rat brains to enhance cognition. In another trip she visited a paralytic who underwent advanced neurofeedback treatments with an exoskeleton and after a miraculous recovery became an entrepreneur himself. Other chapters cover neuropharmaceuticals that influence neurotransmitters and are consequential for athletes, development of robotic prosthetics to restore movement in paralyzed limbs, and use of robotics in industry and the operating room. Deep brain stimulation (DBS) and transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) are two more invasive techniques used to help alleviate tremors, depression, and pain. Part 2 more soberly emphasizes that such rapidly developing brain augmentation technologies demand regulation, as their potential introduces novel physical, mental, and ethical risks. Summing Up: Recommended. All readers. --Rita A. Hoots, emeritus, Sacramento City College
Copyright American Library Association, used with permission.
