
Hacking the Brain - whereareyo
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6429408/
======
manmal
I haven’t found near infrared radiation referenced in the article - I‘m using
near infrared as a brain hack, by shining a cheap 850nm LED light on my
forehead. This has, over the last 2 years, enabled me to code for weeks on
end, for 12+ hours a day, with only minor cognitive decline. It’s not
something I really want to do, but sometimes it’s useful.

Before I started the near infrared routine (~5 minutes every other day), 5-6
hours of coding per day was all I could do - eg after coding for 8h, I noticed
serious cognitive and emotional decline, and might need to do less the
following day. Not anymore - nowadays I can be productive whenever I’m awake,
with little side effects. Near infrared radiation is safe (thousands of
studies demonstrated only very mild side effects), and is even used to treat
Alzheimer’s. I have no idea why its beneficial effects are not more widely
known - for some people, it’s life changing.

Sidenote: 850nm light works way better for me than 830nm.

~~~
iikoolpp
This is the funniest post I've ever read on this website

Either it's entirely the placebo effect, or it somehow actually does something
and you're cooking your brain to wage slave even harder

~~~
manmal
A simple "pubmed near infrared brain" web search will yield enough results to
dispel your concerns somewhat. Overdosing is of course not desirable, so yes,
don't use a 10W laser for several minutes. There are plenty of therapeutic
options which make it hard to overdose.

Since you mentioned wage slaving - I chose coding performance as an example,
but I could also have mentioned improved guitar playing skills. Or being a
better listener. On average, I don't code that much more now, maybe 6h per day
(as a freelancer, there's also lots of other things to do).

~~~
voldacar
So do you just tape the thing to your third eye or something? Do you have some
kind of harness rigged up for it?

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curo
I have a tangential question around brain hacking.

The Flynn effect says we're gaining an avg of 3 IQ pts every decade since the
early 20th century. Meaning our great grandparents, on average, would be
considered mentally handicapped compared to today's intellect.

Now certain biochemical explanations for the Flynn effect explain raw
neurophysiological gains (e.g., iodine fortification in the early 20th century
added 5 pts).

So my question: for whatever isn't explained by biochemical enhancement, is
there an equal cognitive tradeoff in something less measurable than IQ?

I.e., do our brains act like muscle and the info age as a super gym? Or are we
becoming "mentally impaired" compared to our great grandparents in other
aspects (e.g., working with our hands, building communities, etc)?

I imagine our neuro-plastic brains try to make use of all of its real-estate.
If so, then could it just be that we're growing in measurable ways, and
becoming "mentally impaired" in non-measurable ways?

Sounds Ludditic, maybe an expert can weigh in

~~~
JaceLightning
This started going back down in the 1970s: [https://www.sciencealert.com/iq-
scores-falling-in-worrying-r...](https://www.sciencealert.com/iq-scores-
falling-in-worrying-reversal-20th-century-intelligence-boom-flynn-effect-
intelligence)

~~~
curo
I'm not an expert, but a brief scan of secondary sources (Wikipedia and Our
World In Data) show it going back to 1910 in the Americas at least:

[https://ourworldindata.org/intelligence](https://ourworldindata.org/intelligence)

Edit: ah excuse me, I misread. I have seen a question about its recent
reversal.

~~~
esalman
I think there's more nuance to the claim from statistical perspective. How is
the average estimated, what kind of a distribution does population IQ have,
and what factors influence it?

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throwawawathrow
It really takes a special kind of mind to take something originally intended
to be fun, subversive and/or spiritual (recreational drugs) that's existed for
decades or even centuries, and turn it into yet another tool to boost your
React productivity by 12.3% on Friday evenings, under the new brand of
'enhancement' or 'hacking'. Because to what other end would that 'performance'
boost be put to use?

~~~
bboygravity
According to what bible/religion are "recreational drugs" (whatever the
definition of that is) "intended to be" for fun, subversive and/or spiritual
use only and why should anybody care?

A random fun hypothesis by Paul Staments (in my own words): that the neocortex
in humans evolved the way it did, because hominids have been consuming
Psilocybin mushrooms for millions of years (until Christians and Nixon banned
them and pushed the rest of the world to follow). In other words: there's
symbiosis between hominids and Psilocybin mushrooms. Psilocybin mushrooms as
food = more intelligent hominids (after the trip) = higher survival rate of
hominids = higher survival rate for the mushroom due to active conservation by
hominids.

Fun fact (according to Staments): Psilocybin mushrooms occur in higher
concentrations around human settlements than in "wild nature" (still today).

~~~
emmelaich
Interesting! That helps explain why Lenin was a mushroom.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lenin_was_a_mushroom](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lenin_was_a_mushroom)

~~~
to1y
As if it wasn't thoroughly explained enough already.

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CodiePetersen
For those who don't want to read the whole thing.

Use your brain regularly on many types of tasks, drink coffee or tea, play
video games, exercise, and provide your brain with either proper nutrients or
appropriate levels of supplements. Too much or too little supplements will
have negative or no effects. Everything else doesn't have enough research and
some side effects might not be what you wanted. Not to mention there are
placebo effects as well.

If you didn't know that before then go ahead and read it. You might get
something from it.

~~~
pinouchon
Also, get high quality sleep. I'm still not sold on video games and
coffee/tea. I'll have to look at it more. If you some research that shows the
beneficial effects of coffee/tea and video games, please share

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KhoomeiK
I think new forms of human-computer interaction will likely have the largest
effect on cognition, whether that's Augmented Reality or Brain-Computer
Interfaces or both. It's interesting to see how quickly BCI's are developing
and I wonder if AR will actually ever have commercial success. If BCI's are
able to 'hotwire' human vision and pass information directly to our brain, AR
displays would be rendered obsolete.

The only remaining question is how fast BCI technology can reach that level.
If it takes more than 10-15 years, I think there could certainly be an age of
AR devices that we soon find ourselves in, where AR goggles parallel our
current smartphones. On the other hand, the rate at which the BCI field is
progressing makes me feel like society might just 'skip over' this AR stage
all the way to BCI's.

------
carapace
See also
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intelligence_amplification](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intelligence_amplification)

------
she11c0de
Sleep 8h each day, eat clean, workout - especially high intensity stuff, watch
your stress levels, meditate daily. I've found those to make huge difference
if you have the discipline.

------
Donald
> This work was supported by the Volkswagen Foundation, Germany.

What an odd area of research for Volkswagen to fund.

~~~
germanier
The Volkswagen Foundation is completely independent of the company named
Volkswagen. It was found with the proceeds from the sale of the company to
private investors by the state of Lower Saxony and the Federal Republic in the
60s and receives the dividends of the still publicly held shares. It's not a
company foundation and Volkswagen has no say in any form. It's just a large
public science foundation.

~~~
dredmorbius
Compare the Rockefeller, Carnegie, Ford, Pew, and MacArthur foundations, for
the US. These don't represent the interests of Standard Oil, US Steel, Ford
Motor, Sun Oil, or Bankers Life & Casualty.

------
carapace
The word "hypnosis" does not appear anywhere in this document, that's a pretty
glaring omission, IMO.

~~~
whereareyo
This is interesting, more?

~~~
carapace
In re: hypnosis in general the books I recommend are: "TRANCE-formations" by
Bandler and Grinder, and "Monsters and Magical Sticks: There's No Such Thing
as Hypnosis?" by Heller.

For specifically improving "cognitive enhancement" the easiest, safest, and
most far-reaching technique involves modifying your self-image. You can
reprogram yourself to believe that you're smarter and your mind will modify
your behaviour to meet your belief. For better or worse one's intelligence
level is generally tied into one's self-image, and the only barrier to being
smarter is your natural reluctance to become a different person.

For self-image engineering the best books I've found are "Psycho Cybernetics"
by Maltz and "With Winning in Mind" by Bassham.

[https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/447454.Monsters_and_Magi...](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/447454.Monsters_and_Magical_Sticks)

[https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/956297.Trance_Formations](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/956297.Trance_Formations)

[https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/155981.Psycho_Cybernetic...](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/155981.Psycho_Cybernetics_A_New_Way_to_Get_More_Living_Out_of_Life)

[https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/208926.With_Winning_in_M...](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/208926.With_Winning_in_Mind)

(But really, read "Prometheus Rising" by R. A. Wilson and do the exercises.)

~~~
theNJR
Usually around October, as the temperature falls and the sun sets earlier, I
delve more into the esoteric. RAW has always been a go-to and his lessons are
eye opening. When I finally manifest my quarter I was ecstatic :)

The Master Key system is an interesting read too
[https://www.amazon.com/Master-Key-System-Charles-Haanel-
eboo...](https://www.amazon.com/Master-Key-System-Charles-Haanel-
ebook/dp/B001H32E6W/)

------
r34
One extremely important topic wasn't mentioned here - the impact of sunlight.
For those, who feel that sunlight is crucial for their cognitive and (more
important) emotional base-level, I recommend a great book by Linda Geddes -
"Chasing the sun"[1].

One of important findings in the mentioned book was that blue light (as
emitted by computer and smartphone screens) inhibits melatonin excretion and
thus have negative impact on the quality of sleep and makes it harder to fall
asleep. I replicated author's experiment and haven't used smartphone &
computer after 8PM (for about a week) and my sleep quality improved greatly.

[1] [https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/42603316-chasing-the-
sun](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/42603316-chasing-the-sun)

------
itissid
I recently read Andrew Gelman's description of these effect sizes from short
studies. I think the idea was that if many small interventions created large
positive effects then there could also be as many interventions on the
negative side and we would not see any effects at all.

Yet there are interventions that clearly create massive net +ve effects, one
just has to do experiments which is repeatable and stands the test of time.

Rhetorical Q: Does this IR thingy do that?

------
Medicalidiot
I'm skeptical of IQ enhancing drugs ever coming about. Intelligence is so
complex even the actual definition is a controversial topic.

So far we can show that intelligent enhancement can be predicated on exercise,
outside of that there are temporary drugs (e.g. coffee) that "boost"
intelligence but in actuality boost attention.

~~~
dr_dshiv
"In the first test, conducted in Northern California in the late 1960s, a
researcher named Calvin Edlund selected 79 children between the ages of 5 and
7, all from “low-middle class and lower-class homes.” The children were
randomly divided into an experimental group and a control group. First, they
all took a standard version of the Stanford-Binet IQ test. Seven weeks later,
they took a similar test, but this time the kids in the experimental group
were given one M&M for each correct answer. On the first test, the two groups
were evenly matched on IQ. On the second test, the IQ of the M&M group went up
an average of 12 points—a huge leap."

From Paul Tough's book "how children succeed"

~~~
LeftHandPath
We're all going to be fucked, when it comes to employment in twenty years,
then.

Forget the M&M's. Video games are a skinner box on steroids. Kids are going to
learn _fast_.

Edit: I may have missed the point -- it looks like motivation improves
performance, not necessarily actual "cognitive ability", if we can quantify
that.

------
t0ughcritic
REad this the other day [https://careclinic.io/low-level-laser-therapy-
photobiomodula...](https://careclinic.io/low-level-laser-therapy-
photobiomodulation/) same thing??

------
le3dh4x0r
Has anyone here tried Dual N-Back for more than a couple of weeks? Does it
really improve working memory and indirectly your IQ?

~~~
Tenoke
Short answer - it probably doesn't do too much outside of making you better at
tasks similar to n back.

Long answer - [https://www.gwern.net/DNB-FAQ](https://www.gwern.net/DNB-FAQ)

------
narrator
Did not see any genetic engineering of somatic cells using viral vectors. I
guess that's just too extreme.

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aussieguy1234
When it's possible, id like to upload my mind into a machine.

~~~
flatline
What good would this do you? Or the machine for that matter?

~~~
swirepe
Really, REALLY targeted ads

------
idclip
Talk about all these pharmaceuticals .. Shortcuts will fry the hardware.

A dangerous game. Good luck to those who dare. Ill always propone meditation
and developing attentive discipline.

~~~
dr_dshiv
Not a coffee drinker, eh?

~~~
hybrids
Somehow I feel like the Age of Enlightenment occurring at around the same time
as when coffee drinking was becoming increasingly widespread in Europe can't
have been a coincidence

~~~
mattkrause
As I understand it, the coffee largely replaced alcohol, so there was an
effective two-for-one effect of less depressant and more stimulant
consumption.

