Neurotechnologies for Human Cognitive Augmentation: Current State of the Art and Future Prospects

Abstract

Recent advances in neuroscience have paved the way to innovative applications that cognitively augment and enhance humans in a variety of contexts. This paper aims at providing a snapshot of the current state of the art and a motivated forecast of the most likely developments in the next two decades. Firstly, we survey the main neuroscience technologies for both observing and influencing brain activity, which are necessary ingredients for human cognitive augmentation. We also compare and contrast such technologies, as their individual characteristics (e.g., spatio-temporal resolution, invasiveness, portability, energy requirements, and cost) influence their current and future role in human cognitive augmentation. Secondly, we chart the state of the art on neurotechnologies for human cognitive augmentation, keeping an eye both on the applications that already exist and those that are emerging or are likely to emerge in the next two decades. Particularly, we consider applications in the areas of communication, cognitive enhancement, memory, attention monitoring/enhancement, situation awareness and complex problem solving, and we look at what fraction of the population might benefit from such technologies and at the demands they impose in terms of user training. Thirdly, we briefly review the ethical issues associated with current neuroscience technologies. These are important because they may differentially influence both present and future research on (and adoption of) neurotechnologies for human cognitive augmentation: an inferior technology with no significant ethical issues may thrive while a superior technology causing widespread ethical concerns may end up being outlawed. Finally, based on the lessons learned in our analysis, using past trends and considering other related forecasts, we attempt to forecast the most likely future developments of neuroscience technology for human cognitive augmentation and provide informed recommendations for promising future research and exploitation avenues.

A Neuroergonomics Approach to Mental Workload, Engagement and Human Performance

“…However, to the authors' very best knowledge, most of the neuroadaptive experimental studies have focused on human-machine dyad situations. We believe that recent research on hyperscanning (Babiloni and Astolfi, 2014), physiological synchrony (Palumbo et al, 2017) and collaborative BCIs (Cinel et al, 2019) have opened promising prospects to improve teaming such as human-human, human(s)-machine(s) interactions. Future research should involve more complex teaming scenarios and enrich the different neuroadaptive solutions.…”

“…However, the effects of this approach on mind wandering remain unclear (Gonçalves et al, 2018). Transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) represents a technique of neuromodulation that can be used to boost executive functioning (see Callan and Perrey, 2019;Cinel et al, 2019). This portable device can be combined with EEG and fNIRS and used in the context of real-life task performance for the purpose of on-line neuromodulation (McKendrick et al, 2015;Gateau et al, 2018).…”

Assessing the Risks Posed by the Convergence of Artificial Intelligence and Biotechnology

“…There have already been numerous studies conducted researching the use of BCIs for cognitive enhancement in domains such as learning and memory, perception, attention, and risk aversion (one being able to incite riskier behavior). 43 Additionally, studies have explored the military applications of BCIs, and the field receives a bulk of its funding from US Department of Defense sources such as the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency. 44 While the commercial implementation of BCIs may not occur until well into the future, it is still valuable to consider the risks that could arise in order to highlight the need for security-by-design thinking and avoid path dependency, which could result in vulnerabilities-like those seen with current medical devices-persisting in future implementations.…”

Tracing Pilots’ Situation Assessment by Neuroadaptive Cognitive Modeling

“…More complex automation can impede the detection of divergence in the situation assessment by human operator and automated system, neither of which may adequately reflect reality (Rußwinkel et al, 2020). We believe that neurotechnologies can be used for cognitive enhancement and support of pilots in face of increased demands (Scerbo, 2006;Cinel et al, 2019). One way to achieve this is by monitoring the pilots' cognitive states and performance during flight deck operations in order to detect the onset of such divergence e.g., cognitive phenomena that may lead to out-of-the-loop situations.…”