Podcast episode with Thorsten Zander, professor at Brandenburg University of Technology and co-founder of Zander Labs. He coined the concept of passive brain-computer interfaces: devices that read brain signals to decode a user's mental state, non-invasively and without any effort on their part.
Covers:
- What non-invasive brain-computer interfaces (BCIs) can actually pick up from brain signals, and why that's very different from reading your thoughts or internal monologue
- The hardware and software breakthroughs that are finally making passive BCIs wearable and affordable
- How continuous neural feedback could dramatically improve AI training compared to current methods based on human ratings
- Why Thorsten believes passive BCIs may offer the most concrete path to solving the AI alignment problem
- The risk of social networks exploiting unconscious brain reactions to manipulate people, and why regulation alone is unlikely to be enough
