Ariel Garten: Know thyself, with a brain scanner

翻译人员: Ting Huang 校对人员: dong liu

The maxim, "Know thyself" has been around since the ancient Greeks.

“了解你自己”这句名言

最早出现在古希腊

有人将这句永恒的真理归功于柏拉图

Some attribute this golden world knowledge to Plato, others to Pythagoras.

有人认为是毕达哥拉斯提出来的

But the truth is it doesn't really matter which sage said it first,

但其实这究竟是哪位圣人提出来的并不重要

because it's still sage advice, even today.

因为在当今，这仍然是圣人的建议

“了解你自己”

"Know thyself."

It's pithy almost to the point of being meaningless,

这句话十分精炼

几乎精炼到没有意义的地步

but it rings familiar and true, doesn't it?

但是这听起来却很熟悉又有道理，不是么？

“了解你自己”

"Know thyself."

我认为这个永恒不变的格言

I understand this timeless dictum as a statement about the problems,

是对意识相关的问题，或者更确切的说，是对意识的混乱性

or more exactly, the confusions, of consciousness.

的宣言

I've always been fascinated with knowing the self.

我总是对了解自己非常感兴趣

这种迷恋让我沉浸在艺术的海洋里

This fascination led me to submerge myself in art,

然后学习了神经系统科学

study neuroscience, and later, to become a psychotherapist.

后来成为了一名精神治疗师

今天我将所有的热情

Today I combine all my passions as the CEO of InteraXon,

投入到InteraXon公司CEO的工作中

a thought-controlled computing company.

这是一个思维控制计算公司

我的目标很简单

My goal, quite simply, is to help people become more in tune with themselves.

就是帮助人们更了解

他们自己

I take it from this little dictum, "Know thyself."

我这个理念来自于这个精炼的名言

“了解你自己”

If you think about it,

仔细想想，

this imperative is kind of the defining characteristic of our species, isn't it?

这句话有点像是对我们人类特点的解释，

不是么？

我是说，自我意识

I mean, it's self-awareness

that separates Homo sapiens from earlier instances of our mankind.

使我们现代人类

区别与早期人类。

Today we're often too busy

今天我们过分沉溺于

iPhone和iPod这些东西，

tending to our iPhones and iPods to really stop and get to know ourselves.

所以没办法真正了解自己。

我们生活中充斥着大量短信

Under the deluge of minute-to-minute text conversations,

e-mails, relentless exchange of media channels

电子邮件、持续不断的媒体信息、

and passwords and apps and reminders and Tweets and tags,

密码、apps、事件提醒、推特、标签，

we lose sight of what all this fuss is supposed to be about in the first place:

于是我们就没办法看清这些东西最初究竟是为了做什么：

为我们自己服务。

Ourselves.

很多时候我们都被这些

Much of the time we're transfixed

自己在外部世界的表现所困，

by all of the ways we can reflect ourselves out into the world.

And we can barely find the time to reflect deeply back in on our own selves.

却几乎没有时间再去

回头思考我们自己。

We've cluttered ourselves up with all this.

我们被这些东西搞得乱七八糟。

于是觉得应该走远一点，

And we feel like we have to get far, far away to a secluded retreat,

逃到一个安静的地方，把这些都留在身后。

leaving it all behind.

于是我们逃得远远的

So we go far away to the top of a mountain,

逃到了山顶

assuming that perching ourselves on a piece

想象着躺在山顶休息

is bound to give us the respite we need to sort the clutter, the chaotic everyday,

一定可以让我们有空

来整理一下之前的混乱，那些日常生活的嘈杂，

然后重新找到自己。

and find ourselves again.

但是虽然我们在山上

But on that mountain where we gain that beautiful peace of mind,

得到了美妙的安静时光，

我们真正获得了什么？

what are we really achieving?

It's really only a successful escape.

我们得到的真的只是成功的逃离。

想想我们用的词，“撤退”。

Think of the term we use, "Retreat."

这个词通常是军队在打了败仗之后才用的。

This is the term that armies use when they've lost a battle.

这意味着我们需要离开战场。

It means we've got to get out of here.

难道这就是我们应对压力的方法么？

Is this how we feel about the pressures of our world,

为了更了解自己的内心，

that in order to get inside ourselves,

就不得不爬到山上么？

you have to run for the hills?

And the problem with escaping your day-to-day life

但是问题是，虽然你逃离了日常生活，

你总有一天是要回家的。

is that you have to come home, eventually.

所以如果你仔细想想，

So when you think about it,

我们在山上不过

we're almost like a tourist visiting ourselves over there.

像个观光客。

And eventually, that vacation's got to come to an end.

最终旅行会结束的。

So my question to you is,

所以我的问题是，

can we find ways to know ourselves without the escape?

我们能找到一种不用逃离

却能了解我们自己的方法么？

我们如何重新定义

Can we redefine our relationship with the technologized world

自己和这个高科技世界的关系

以深入了解

in order to have the heightened sense of self-awareness that we seek?

我们自己？

Can we live here and now in our wired web

我们能住在一个充满网络的世界，

却还遵循着那些古代的指示——

and still follow those ancient instructions, "Know thyself?"

“了解你自己”么？

我说可以。

I say the answer is yes.

And I'm here today to share a new way

今天我就来跟你分享一下

我们利用高科技来进行的一个新研究，

that we're working with technology to this end,

这可以让我们更加了解自己内心，

to get familiar with our inner self like never before --

这件事情史无前例。

humanizing technology and furthering that age-old quest of ours

我们努力使科技更人性化，

进一步研究“更了解自己”

这个古老的问题。

to more fully know the self.

It's called thought-controlled computing.

这个研究叫做“思维控制计算”。

你或许注意到

You may or may not have noticed

that I'm wearing a tiny electrode on my forehead.

我额头上带了一个小小的电导条，

This is actually a brainwave sensor

这其实是一个脑电波感应器。

that's reading the electrical activity of my brain

在我做演讲的时候它可以读出

我大脑中的电波活动。

as I give this talk.

These brainwaves are being analyzed and we can see them as a graph.

然后对这些脑电波进行分析。我们可以看这个图，

我给你展示一下这个是什么样的。

Let me show you what it looks like.

那条蓝色的线是我的脑电波。

That blue line there is my brainwave.

It's the direct signal being recorded from my head, rendered in real time.

它是对我大脑进行记录的直接信号，

随时提供大脑的变化趋势。

The green and red bars show that same signal displayed by frequency,

绿色和红色的柱形图显示的是同样的信号，不过它们计算的是频率，

这边是低频率，

with lower frequencies here

那边是高频率。

and higher frequencies up here.

我现在讲话的时候你其实是在看着我的大脑。

You're actually looking inside my head as I speak.

These graphs are compelling, they're undulating,

这些图是很有说服力的，它们呈波状。

but from a human's perspective, they're actually not very useful.

但是从一个人的角度看，

他们其实并不是特别有用。

这也是我们花许多时间

That's why we've spent a lot of time

来研究

thinking about how to make this data meaningful to the people who use it.

如何使它更有效的原因。

For instance,

比如，我用这个数据来分析

what if I could use this data to find out how relaxed I am at any moment?

我现在的放松程度是怎样的？

或者如果我把这些信息

Or what if I can take that information

变成一个有机的体系展示在屏幕上呢？

and put it into an organic shape up on the screen?

右边的那个形状

The shape on the right over here

has become an indicator of what's going on in my head.

就是我大脑活动的指示器。

我越放松，

The more relaxed I am,

耗费能量的数量越低。

the more the energy's going to fall through it.

我还想知道

I may also be interested in knowing how focused I am,

我有多集中精力，

so I can put my level of attention into the circuit board on the other side.

所以我就把注意力程度放进电路板的另一边。

这时我越集中精力，

And the more focused my brain is,

the more the circuit board is going to surge with energy.

电路板上的能量值就会不断攀升。

Ordinarily, I would have no way of knowing how focused or relaxed I was

一般来说，我不可能以一种可视的方式来看到

我究竟多么集中精力或者放松。

in any tangible way.

As we know, our feelings about how we're feeling

我们都知道，我们对于自己内心想法的感觉

通常都是很不靠谱的。

are notoriously unreliable.

We've all had stress creep up on us without even noticing it

我们通常会被压力缠身自己却意识不到，

until we lost it on someone who didn't deserve it,

最后发现自己把它浪费在一些不值得的人身上。

然后我们才意识到或许应该早一点

and then we realize that we probably should have checked in with ourselves

进行自我检视。

a little earlier.

这种新的观点

This new awareness opens up vast possibilities

为我们打开了更多的可能，

for applications that help improve our lives and ourselves.

可以帮助我们提高生活质量和自身。

我们正在努力创造一种技术，

We're trying to create technology that uses the insights

可以用洞察力使我们的工作更有效，休息时间更放松，

to make our work more efficient, our breaks more relaxing

and our connections deeper and more fulfilling than ever.

联系更紧密，生活更充实。

I'm going to share some of these visions with you in a bit,

待会我会跟你们稍微分享一个这些内容，

but first I want to take a look at how we got here.

但是首先我想带你们看看我们如何做到这些。

By the way, feel free to check in on my head at any time.

顺便说一句，你可以通过这些图像随时看我脑中的变化。

(Laughter)

（笑声）

My team at InteraXon and I

我们InteraXon团队

have been developing thought-controlled application for almost a decade now.

十年以来一直致力于发明这个思想控制装置。

第一个阶段

In the first phase of development,

we were really enthused by all the things we could control with our mind.

我们被这些可以控制意识的东西深深吸引。

我们仅仅通过思考来使事情

We were making things activate, light up and work just by thinking.

更有意思。

We were transcending the space between the mind and the device.

我们超越了思维和设备

之间的空间，

并把大量可以控制意识的设计和产品

We brought to life a vast array of prototypes and products

带到日常生活中，

that you could control with your mind,

比如思想控制家庭装置、

like thought-controlled home appliances

插槽汽车游戏、电脑游戏、

or slot-car games or video games or a levitating chair.

飘浮椅。

我们创造了

We created technology and applications that engaged people's imaginations,

加入人们想象力的科技和产品，

这真的很令人激动。

and it was really exciting.

And then we were asked to do something really big for the Olympics.

然后我们被邀请为奥林匹克比赛

做点大项目。

我们被邀请为2010年

We were invited to create a massive installation

温哥华冬奥会

at the Vancouver 2010 winter Olympics,

安装一个大设备，

were used in Vancouver,

got to control the lighting on the CN Tower,

来用意识控制

整个国家的C.N.塔、加拿大议会大楼、

the Canadian Parliament buildings and Niagara Falls

尼亚加拉大瀑布上

from all the way across the country using their minds.

的灯光。

Over 17 days at the Olympics, 7,000 visitors from all over the world

冬奥会举办的17天里，

actually got to individually control the light

有来自世界各地的7000多名游客，

from the CN Tower, parliament and Niagara in real time

每个人都用他们的意识

参与控制了C.N.塔、加拿大议会大楼、尼亚加拉大瀑布上的灯光，

with their minds from across the country, 3,000 km away.

这些地方跨度有3000千米。

So controlling stuff with your mind is pretty cool.

用你的意识来控制东西

真的很有意思。

但是我们通常都对多层次的人际互动感兴趣。

But we're always interested in multitiered levels of human interaction.

所以我们开始尝试发明

And so we began looking into inventing thought-controlled applications

一种比仅仅控制意识

in a more complex frame than just control.

更复杂的大脑控制装置，

And that was responsiveness.

那就是反应。

我们明白现在已经有

We realized that we had a system

that allowed technology to know something about you.

一个让科技了解人类的体系了，

而且这个可以增加你和科技的互动。

And it could join into the relationship with you.

We created the responsive room

我们建立了一个反应室，

where the lights, music and blinds adjusted to your state.

这里灯光、音乐和窗帘都可以根据你的状态进行调整。

他们通过你的大脑活动来做这些改变。

They followed these little shifts in your mental activity.

所以当你经过劳累的一天坐下休息的时候，

So as you settled into relaxation at the end of a hard day,

在办公室的沙发上，

on the couch in our office,

音乐会使你缓和。

the music would mellow with you.

When you read, the desk lamp would get brighter.

当你阅读的时候，桌上的台灯会变亮。

如果你点头示意，系统也会了解，

If you nod off, the system would know, dimming to darkness as you do.

然后就会像你通常做的那样将光线调暗。

We then realized that if technology could know something about you

我们于是明白了如果科技产品知道你的相关信息，

并且利用这些信息来帮助你，

and use it to help you,

there's an even more valuable application than that.

那么它们就会更有价值。

That you could know something about yourself.

你就可以更加了解自己。

我们可以知道自己一些

We could know sides of ourselves that were all but invisible

隐形的侧面，

and come to see things that were previously hidden.

然后看到之前隐藏的东西。

现在我给你举个例子仔细解释一下。

Let me show you an example of what I'm talking about here.

这是我为iPad制作的

Here's an application that I created for the iPad.

一个应用

So the goal of the original game Zen Bound is to wrap a rope around a wooden form.

早期终极缠绕的游戏目标

是把绳子绕在一个木雕上。

现在你带上耳机，

So you use it with your headset.

这个耳机通过无线网与iPad或者智能手机相连。

The headset connects wirelessly to an iPad or a smartphone.

耳机上

In that headset, you have fabric sensors on your forehead and above the ear.

装有布制的感应器，位于你的额头和耳朵上。

In the original Zen Bound game,

玩终极缠绕的时候，

you play it by scrolling your fingers over the pad.

你在Pad上滑动手指。

In the game that we created, of course,

在我们设计的游戏里，

you control the wooden form that's on the screen there with your mind.

你用意识控制屏幕上

的木雕。

当你集中注意在木雕上时，

As you focus on the wooden form,

它就开始旋转。

it rotates.

The more you focus, the faster the rotation.

你越集中注意力，它转的越快。

这是真的，

This is for real.

This is not a fake.

不是谎言。

What's really interesting to me though

对我来说比较有趣的是

is at the end of the game, you get stats and feedback about how you did.

游戏结束时你就可以得到一个

刚才那些行为的数据和反馈。

You have graphs and charts that tell you how your brain was doing --

你会看到一些展示大脑变化情况的图表，

不是关于你用了多少绳子

not just how much rope you used or what your high score is,

或者得了多高的分，

but what was going on inside of your mind.

是关于你大脑刚才的

活动情况。

我们可以利用这个反馈

And this is valuable feedback

that we can use to understand what's going on inside of ourselves.

来了解大脑的

变化情况。

我想称之为

I like to call this "intra-active."

“人人交互”。

一般我们都认为科技

Normally, we think about technology as interactive.

是人机交互式的。

这个技术是

This technology is intra-active.

人人交互式的。

It understands what's inside of you

这个技术可以了解你的

内在然后在你和科技之前建立

and builds a sort of responsive relationship

between you and your technology

一种反应关系，

so that you can use this information to move you forward.

这样你就可以运用这个信息

前进。

你可以利用这个信息

So you can use this information to understand you in a responsive loop.

在这个反应环里了解你自己。

在InteraXon,

At InteraXon --

intra-active technology is one of our really defining mandates.

人人互动的技术

是我们真正的任务之一。

It's how we understand the world inside and reflect it outside

它告诉我们如何理解内部世界，

并且通过这个紧密的环

into this tight loop.

反映出来。

For example, thought-controlled computing

比如，思想控制计算

可以帮助有多动症的孩子

can teach children with ADD how to improve their focus.

提高他们的注意力。

With ADD, children have a low proportion of beta waves for focus states

患有多动症的孩子注意力的beta波都很低，

theta波很高。

and a high proportion of theta states.

所以你可以创造一种可以对集中注意力的状态进行表扬的设备。

So you can create applications that reward focused brain states.

想象一下孩子们玩游戏的时候，

So you can imagine kids playing video games with their brain waves

可以通过脑电波的变化来提高他们的注意力，改变多动症的症状。

and improving their ADD symptoms as they do it.

这就像利他林（兴奋剂）一样有效。

This can be as effective as Ritalin.

Perhaps even more importantly,

或许更重要的是，

thought-controlled computing can give children with ADD

思想控制计算可以让患有多动症的儿童

了解他们变化着的思想状态，

insights into their own fluctuating mental states,

这样他们就更了解自己和

so they can better understand themselves and their learning needs.

他们的学习需求。

The way these children will be able to use their new awareness to improve themselves

孩子们利用新的意识来提高自己的这种方式

will upend many of the damaging and widespread social stigmas

会颠覆许多具有破坏力和广泛传播的社会不良现象，

that people who are diagnosed as different are challenged with.

那就是被认为是不同的人总会

遭受各种挑衅。

我们可以看一下大脑内部，

We can peer inside our heads

and interact with what was once locked away from us,

看看那些过去我们看不到的东西，

这些东西曾经使我们感到迷惑不解。

what once mystified and separated us.

Brainwave technology can understand us, anticipate our emotions

大脑电波的技术可以了解我们自己，预测我们的感觉，

and find the best solutions for our needs.

然后找到满足我们需要的最佳方式。

Imagine this collected awareness of the individual

想象一下这些整个人生中积累和反映出来

computed and reflected across an entire lifespan.

的个人感觉集合吧。

Imagine the insights that you can gain from this kind of second sight.

想象你能从这第二层视觉中

得到的感悟吧。

It would be like plugging into your own personal Google.

这就像登录到你自己的谷歌上一样。

说到谷歌，

On the subject of Google,

today you can search and tag images

现在你可以进行搜索，

based on the thoughts and feelings you had while you watched them.

并且对你看到的东西标上标签，写出你的感受和想法。

You can tag pictures of baby animals as happy,

你还可以给动物的幼仔贴上“快乐”标签，

或者你觉得它们是什么样的就贴上什么标签。

or whatever baby animals are to you,

and then you can search that database, navigating with your feelings,

然后你就可以搜索这个数据库，

根据你的感受来进行查询，

rather than the keywords that just hint at them.

而不只是那些暗示词语。

Or you could tag Facebook photos

或者你可以

根据你记忆上的那些感觉

with the emotions that you had associated with those memories

来对Facebook贴标签，

and then instantly prioritize the streams that catch your attention,

然后马上对你脑中出现的东西

进行排序，

就像这样。

just like this.

Humanizing technology is about taking what's already natural

科技智能化

主要是将一些自然存在的人机感受进行记录，

about the human-tech experience

and building technology seamlessly in tandem with it.

然后用串联的方式将他们建立起来。

As it aligns with our human behaviors,

它与人类行为相联系，

因此可以使我们更了解我们做的是什么，

it can allow us to make better sense of what we do

而且更重要的是，

and, more importantly, why.

为什么将那些

Creating a big picture out of all the important little details

影响我们的重要细节

that make up who we are.

都展示出来。

我们还可以通过智能化的科技

With humanized technology we can monitor the quality of your sleep cycles.

来监控睡眠周期的质量。

当我们的工作效率降低时，

When our productivity starts to slacken, we can go back to that data

我们可以去看这些数据，

and see how we can make more effective balance between work and play.

然后想办法让工作休息之间的平衡更有效率。

更有效率。

你知道自己为什么会感到疲倦呢，

Do you know what causes fatigue in you or what brings out your energetic self,

或者说什么让你充满活力，

什么使你感到沮丧，

what triggers cause you to be depressed

or what fun things are going to bring you out of that funk?

或者什么让你走出恐惧呢？

想象一下你可以看到一些数据，

Imagine if you had access to data

that allowed you to rank on a scale of overall happiness

这些数据让你能对一大堆，使你快乐的事情进行排序，

which people in your life made you the happiest,

找出最能使你快乐的人，

或者最能使你快乐的活动。

or what activities brought you joy.

Would you make more time for those people? Would you prioritize?

这样你会花更多的时间与那些人在一起么？你会对他们的重要性进行排序么？

Would you get a divorce?

你还会离婚么？

(Laughter)

What thought-controlled computing can allow you to do

思想控制计算可以让你建立一个生活的多层次图像。

建立一个生活的多层次图像。

is build colorful layered pictures of our lives.

这样，我们就可以大概了解内心的想法，

And with this, we can get the skinny on our psychological happenings

然后形成日积月累形成对我们行为的认识。

and build a story of our behaviors over time.

我们可以看到那些促使我们前进的

We can begin to see the underlying narratives that propel us forward

深层因素，

and tell us about what's going on.

并且了解周围发生了什么。

这样我们还可以学到

And from this, we can learn how to change the plot, the outcome

如何改变生命的情节、

结果以及

and the character of our personal stories.

自己的性格特点。

两千年前，

Two millennia ago, those Greeks had some powerful insights.

希腊人有很多睿智的想法。

他们知道当你开始如果你度过儿童时期后，

They knew that a fundamental piece falls into place

并且开始了解你自己，

when you start to live out their little phrase,

when you come into contact with yourself.

你就会理解一些基本的东西。

They understood the power of human narrative

他们把对人类的描述和价值看作

是变化的，演进的

and the value that we place on humans as changing, evolving and growing.

以及不断增长的。

But they understood something more fundamental --

但是他们把一些更基础的东西，

比如发现的乐趣，

the sheer joy in discovery,

在这个世界里

the delight and fascination that we get from the world

and being ourselves in it;

做自己的快乐和愉悦，

以及我们看到、感觉到和了解到的

the richness that we get from seeing, feeling and knowing the lives that we are.

生活中得到的乐趣。

我妈妈是艺术家，

My mom's an artist,

and as a child, I'd often see her bring things to life with the stroke of a brush.

童年时期我经常看到她用笔刷使一些东西充满生命力。

有时候都是白色的空间，充满无限可能。

One moment, it was all white space, pure possibility.

有时候，又因为

The next, it was alive with her colorful ideas and expressions.

她彩色的想象力和表达而有生命。

As I sat easel-side, watching her transform canvas after canvas,

我坐在画板旁边，

看她在画布之间来回穿梭，

于是明白了人们可以创造属于自己的世界。

I learned that you could create your own world.

我明白了我们的内心世界——

I learned that our own inner worlds --

想法、感情和想象力，

our ideas, emotions and imaginations --

实际上都没有被大脑和身体限制。

were, in fact, not bound by our brains and bodies.

If you could think it, if you could discover it,

如果你考虑一下，你就可以发现，

你可以把它们变成事实。

you could bring it to life.

对我来说，思想控制计算

To me, thought-controlled computing

就和画笔一样简单有力，

is as simple and powerful as a paintbrush --

也是一个可以解锁和激活

one more tool to unlock and enliven the hidden worlds within us.

我们内心世界的工具。

我希望看到有一天，

I look forward to the day that I can sit beside you, easel-side,

我坐在你旁边，在你的画板旁边，

看到我们用新工具

watching the world that we can create with our new toolboxes

创造的世界，

以及我们对自己

and the discoveries that we can make about ourselves.

的发现。

谢谢。

Thank you.

(Applause)

（掌声）