Hey Elon, what about the body?

How BMIs might affect the physical understanding of our bodies and what we should consider. A comment. 

Imagine you want to share an idea to someone, and you don’t have to say a single word. Your mouth stays closed, you even do not have to address the person visually. Your messages leaves your brain and enters the other one. It doesn’t matter if both of you are in the same room or on the other half of the planet.

This scenario isn't creepy Science Fiction, but the new idea, which one of the most efficient and productive investors of our times - Elon Musk - proposes. Neuralink wants to develop "ultra high bandwidth brain-machine interfaces to connect humans and computers." (official website) The result: we will be able to enter a completely new stadium of communication, which doesn't need words to share thoughts, but is able to send emotions, thoughts and perception directly from one brain to another. For those who want to learn more about the company, click here! (if you are already lost by now it makes sense to follow the link and dig a bit deeper into the material.) 

Connecting brain to brain, nice! But - what about the body? 

A connection between brain and brain to ensure a more precise and efficient communication, that is the initial plan. Information, which jumps from brain A to brain B, without losing any content. Anyways, looking down on us, we recognize that there is something additional to all neurons inside our brain: a body! A system using all it’s force to ensure walking, digestion, perception and further more – connection. We use our hands to communicate, we smile in order to attract people, we nod to share a feedback. According to Musk all these processes result from the lack of possibilities to connect our brains automatically to each other. Language is just a metaphor for our thoughts and we need interpretation and experience to decode the message we receive. That might be true and as a result a proper brain to brain communication seems useful. Nevertheless, we should spend some thoughts about the question: what happens to our body, if we don’t have to use it anymore to communicate?

As a dancer, I experimented with the possibilities of peripheral vision. Peripheral vision means, you focus another person from all angles you can use. Sometimes it might look like someone stands nearly behind you, but from an angle of your vision you perceive that the person is still there. We experimented to communicate using this kind of perception. Witnessing two people who interact with each other without looking at each other created an imagine of distance. Thus, we all use phones and WIFI, direct communication still requires direct interaction for some reasons.

Reflecting our evolutionary roots, direct interaction is something all humans have experienced from their first day of life. Parents looking down on us to understand our needs taught us early how to attract people with looks and smiles. Young children learn very early how to share a social smile, which invites people to create a positive relationship. All we do is developing a roadmap towards positive affections. First we smile, we focus our opposite with your eyes, we smile again and then we physically approach the other person. BMIs would shorten this process by sending a brain message saying I like you. Sounds very pragmatic, but what it loosens is all the magic beyond creating a relationship to someone. And what also remains on the way is the aspect of time.

If we think about the social structures of the world in 2017 we already can observe some small developments and their results in these directions. Using dating apps allows us to send messages I like you without considering a specific time frame for an adequate approach. Sexuality is everywhere, easy to obtain and available for everyone. Nevertheless, when I ask people if they are happy about these options, most use them for a short duration, but then come back to the “real connection”, they feel more safe and friendly about. People tend to draw a linear line (meeting, talking, interacting sexuality) between each other, instead of an exponential one (texting, having sex).

Nonverbal communication also supports our physicality in general. If we need our body, we are more likely to think about it very often. We receive physical feedback, which invites us to consider our health, our charisma and the way we present ourselves to the world. Direct communicati

“Yes, but since the stone age, the human body has always changed, why is that bad?”

Our front head grew and we lost much hair, while our muscles and teeth are weaker than before. As we invented a proper medical system, we are able to cope with many diseases and clothes keep us warm. Contrary we leak many things older generations were more positive about. Studies show that our grandparents were more sexually active than my generation. We suffer more from diseases like cancer or psychological disorders, such as depression and anxiety. The world we live in, the fast growing and technological development also causes fear, insecurity and dangers for the body.

“Should we stop it and go back to stone age?”

Of course not, but we should be wise and reflect every invention we are planning. What can be the benefits from our curiosity? And what should be considered as difficult? If we are smart enough to build brain machine interfaces, we also should be able to find some motivated people who think about their failures and develop some strategies to prevent us. Years of technological development and industrialization should work as an example for how to do this.

I interpret the possibility to look into someone’s brain as a pathway towards empathy and understanding. Seeing the world through someone else’s eyes. That is a beautiful idea. We can understand the perception of a baby, we might know how old people feel and improve technology supporting them.

But BMIs could also create disorders, we do not have to deal with today. What happens, if someone doesn’t focus on the perception of someone else and ignores his own sensations. Can we develop an identity disorder by ignoring the signals from our own body? And would it be possible that people in the future forget how to read and interpret their own physical feedback? Thinking about many disorders such as anorexia or obesity, we can identify these processes already.

Another aspect I want to add is motivation: Once we do not have to read a book anymore as it is displayed to our brain, we will never increase the motivation to learn or read any more. What motivates us is the underlying process of learning, not the achievement itself. Reading, as an example, teaches us multiple aspects: it allows us to gather knowledge, but additionally to that, it requires concentration and invites us to experience joy and curiosity. We can’t read faster than a certain timeframe allows us to. The idea of “not knowing yet”, the desire we experience fosters imagination and creativity. What we can learn is patience, listening and waiting. If all knowledge is transmitted to our brains, all the joy and desire expires. Einstein said, that imagination is what drives research, not intelligence or knowledge.

According to current researches, future inventions are viewed as the most complex and perfect built machines, which might eliminate us due to its perfection. Nevertheless, we should not forget that yet we possess the strongest weapon of all humanity: physical intuition. Neurons merging in your stomach and expressing the feeling of fear. Pheromones signaling attraction. A smile allowing connectivity. What I want to foster is: whatever happens, we should stay aware!

visions on virtual worlds

some thoughts&perspectives on Virtual Reality and how technology could inspire humanity.

My first experience in virtual reality happened on an open day of my former working place – the German Aerospace Center. One of the departments had built up a VR-installation for simulation trainings in extreme environments. I was supposed to explore a human habitat on a Martian surface through the glasses of an Oculus Rift. I ended up completely fascinated by turning around my head in a 360degress perspective, but also motion sick due to the lack of coordination between my vision and my actual movements. 

VEMES experiment/astronaut training (c)OeWF

 

From there on, the technology infrequently popped up in my life. During a Mars simulation we trained our astronauts using VR and I remember reveling an intense discussion with a colleague about reality and augmentation. Another time a friend of mine visited me with his VR-glasses and I ended up crashing into my desk because I tried to catch a donut in my virtual environment.

Some time ago, I randomly read an article about Virtual Reality saying that the first glasses for private use will be on sale soon. I started wondering if this technology will become as usual as the usage of my smartphone – and I am certain, it will be.

testing VR in extreme environments (c) OeWF

New technologies shape a high diversity of perspectives – in good and in bad ways. I could name some of the associations I have regarding VR: gaming, sensory stimulation, addiction, augmented sports events, astronauts calling home, flow, architecture, flight simulations, porn, isolation and shared environments. 

blocks and chairs

Sometimes current VR-software reminds me of the computer my parents used to have when I was a child. I could sit for hours in front our screen sparkled with small stars and follow a perception my brain was not used to. Today’s VR-tools somehow show us the same applications – just using blocks. Many scenarios include a short duration and easy tasks – such as jumping, flying, running away or just watching. Nevertheless, excitement arises once we start using it!

I am lucky to be part of a university project investigating the effects of virtual reality on people, who have never experienced any of it yet. In our project we research how VR influences physical and self-perception and how the feeling or immersion changes if we can impact our virtual environment.

into immersion

physicality in VR

Immersion – a term which will be a part of our future in virtual worlds. The word describes the feeling of transit from ones real reality into the virtual one.

I remember one day in our lab, where my colleague gave me the glasses including a Leap Motion Controller, which allows me to impact my environment by using my hands. I could form small or bigger blocks and build towers. Therefore the movement of my hands would be transmitted via an infrared camera, causing the result that my embodied perspective opened the door towards an immersive experience. I stopped listening to my colleagues’ conversation surrounding me and lost track of the time. What I would now call ‘reality’ contained about twenty different grey cubes, which I would nudge around the space. 

including impact

What supported my perception of virtuality as reality was that I did not only experience an embodied perspective, in which my body would walk around in a new environment. Being active and obtaining the possibility to impact my environment created the illusion of being embedded in this world. 

During my education as a body therapist I learned that these two aspects – being embedded and embodied – describe the core possibilities of interaction humans can experience. If either the feeling of a healthy embodiment or the need to belong is inhibited or destroyed, mental diseases might occur. Virtual Reality produces a stadium of embeddedness into any kind of environment. This can support illusionary concepts, but also allow learning and fulfilling desire.     

Blocks//LeapMotion

future steps towards the ancient

Changing our environment allows us to change our perspective. We might be able to enter spaces we usually would not reach using our capacities. One is – to enter another human body. How would it feel to be taller, smaller, bigger, thinner, male, female, in between? How would it feel if I would be you? And if I would learn to walk in your physical shoes – would I be able to learn about your feelings and thoughts? The theories behind the concept of ‘Embodiment’ state that during our lifespan we incorporate all our experiences, which shapes our way of physically entering this world. Would incorporation support understanding of each other?

Humans already change their perspectives in a mental way – this is what we call ‘empathy’. Empathy allows us to feel what another person feels and opens the door towards a compassionate reaction, if we choose to do so. Among Buddhism concepts mindfulness and compassion are described as one of the core concepts towards a common humanity. Could Virtual Reality be used to increase these effects and support understanding and empathy among humans?

what inspires me is to combine thousand year old Buddhism concepts of mindfulness and compassion with future technologies such as Virtual Reality.

impacting environments via LeapMotion

I am not the first person to share these thoughts. The performance artists BeAnotherLab invented an installation called ‘the machine to be another’ to investigate the same concept. Two people face each other using VR-glasses while receiving the video feed of the other person. In their performances the artists ask the people to synchronize their movements and apply all kind of tasks to their test subjects. The result is an astonishing performance supporting the idea of shaping empathy through virtual worlds.  

Synchronization and rhythm always played an important role in human interactions. Tribal dances occur all over the world, cultures share songs and languages (which can also be viewed as synchronized movement as well). In my movement classes I love to use synchronization as a method to build up teams and increase group cohesion. Virtual Reality would allow me to leave the physical space and connect people all over the planet.

I could use the technology to communicate between lovers, cultures or coworkers. I could use the technology to make people on earth understand how astronauts feel in space. I could use the technology to show German children how to people in Africa live. I could use the technology to leave my own physical body and enter another one. And I would use the technology to inspire our basic need for belonging and understanding we all share.

worth reading

•   FUCHS, T. (2010). Der Schein des Anderen. Zur Phänomenologie virtueller Realitäten. BOHRER, CLEMENS & SCHWARZ-BOENNEKE, BERNADETTE (HG.): Identität und virtuelle Beziehungen im Computerspiel. München (KoPaed), 59-73.

• Falconer, C. J., Slater, M., Rovira, A., King, J. A., Gilbert, P., Antley, A., & Brewin, C. R. (2014). Embodying compassion: a virtual reality paradigm for overcoming excessive self-criticism. PloS one, 9(11), e111933.

worth surfing 

• BeAnotherLab – the machine to be another - www.themachinetobeanother.org

• TedTalk by Chris Milk “the ultimate empathy machine” https://www.ted.com/talks/chris_milk_how_virtual_reality_can_create_the_ultimate_empathy_machine?language=de

•  HyperReality – how the world could end up using VR (very pessimistic!) - www.hyper-reality.co

• EVENTlab//MelSlater (check the publication list!) - www.event-lab.org

gold for group awareness

why to change sports education in schools 

One day in school my teacher discovered that I am quite good at running. And I loved to run. So it was obvious to send me to a junior sports club for athletics and train my skills.  I only must have been 11 years old, when I entered the training hall and met the trainer of that club. And still – I will never forget our first interaction we had: he asked me about my name – and about my results in running. My results? I had no idea what to answer on that question. My results in running so far were: running after somebody on the playground and trying to catch him. My results in jumping were: getting over the fence or not. My results in climbing a tree were: being on the top of the tree or falling down. My result in dancing was: enjoying the music or finding another one. I had no idea, that there might be other results I should care about. 

My trainer asked me to run around the gym in one circle. When I came back he said: 2:34 minutes. I had no idea how to process this information. It was irrelevant for me. But from there on I learned, that sports in our world is supposed to be about numbers: meters you can jump, distances you can run, minutes you spend swimming, points you receive for dancing. 

And the problem is: if you do not achieve a certain result, you are judged as “not sporty”, “bad” and “not enough”. It’s not the same as when you do not succeed in calculating math. Math is just a concept, it doesn’t belong to you and it’s not a part of your identity. 

The problem about judging people’s physicality is: when being judged in movement, your body is judged, and when your body is judged, then you are judged. And nobody wants to receive the stamp “not enough” for his own identity.

We define ourselves through our body. And the definition other people find for our body impacts our psychological status. Have you realized that people being good at sports very seldom get bullied at school? It makes sense: being sporty symbolizes health, power and courage. We do not confront those who show confidence and act strong. In terms of sports it means: being fast, coordinated and physically great.

Another point is: movement is mostly taught by those, who are selected as high achievers in our system: those who participated at contests, who passed the entry test for sports university and who have always been valued and encouraged in sports. What they miss is empathy for those, who sit on the other side of the river. People who have problems catching a ball or swimming in three different styles. 

Movement in our world is quantitative. Not qualitative. Qualitative would be: how do you like it? Why do you do it? How do you behave, when moving?

Imagine we would exchange our definitions on sports and use other words for it: cooperative, imaginative, passionate. 

The moment I realized that our concepts of movement can’t be useful happened during a long and cold winter day. Out of boredom I decided to have a run outside in the forest. I took my running shoes and left the house. There was no time, no limit, no estimated arrival and no judgment. It was the first time I realized how my breathing changed through the stages of running. I observed every tree passing by while my feet where floating on the ground. I let my thoughts travel and come back and started to understand what people mean, if they associate running with freedom. 

In this particular moment I learned a lesson, which I believe is crucial for the understanding of teaching movement: Nobody is allowed to tell my body how to move. My body knows it already. Once we implement this aspect in our system of sports education we draw a completely new picture of what we do.

School is the ideal environment to start developing a society wide culture of change. We should not play games which divide children into winners and losers. Instead, we should motivate children to create their own exercises and teach them to their classmates. We should build playgrounds out of wood and ask every child to find at least five different ways of crossing a parkour made of blankets. Children’s results in sports should not correlate with their achievements in running, but with their behavior and creativity during sports class: how much do they help children, who are not that fit? How well do they integrate in the group?

Some might say, children need a goal to reach or something to conquer about. That might be true. But – who said, that time and range is at the top of all triumphs? It’s about us, teachers, to set up values and concepts. 

Our world needs more patience, acceptance and valuation in movement. No pressure and no goals. Our world is already packed with stress, achievements, hate and disgust. The relation to our body and the way we communicate physicality between each other could be a microwave towards a bigger movement which impacts society, politics and ideals we have. So we should start it, while running around a gym hall.

teach me how to fail

a statement for teachers who don't call themselves teacher

It’s more than ten years that I am into movement research. The first steps towards my passion of analyzing dance happened to be my own experiences of a young dancer in a theatre company. I remember hours of intense training, guided by the motivation to become a perfect copy of my former idols, such as Pina Bausch. 

 

Reflecting my thoughts and my expectations at the age of 15, I can sum it up like this: my goals differed from what I would try to achieve today. At the age of 15, my major aim was to look good on stage, to receive admiration for my physical skills and express myself through this. I was bored by analytic and slow methods, such as Alexander technique – instead I wanted to push myself towards my physical limits and shock the public with amazing choreographies. 

 

At that time, we were all rebels, physical revolutionists and body lovers at the same time. I thought, I will be a good dancer, once I dance well – even though I didn’t know what that “well”-thing would be about.

Today I consider myself to be a researcher in movement. Even though I love dynamic and acrobatic movements, I use to integrate more and more moments of stillness and patience into my dance. My drive to move is influenced by an internal curiosity to explore the movement from the inside, instead of showing it to the outside. Sometimes, when I think back to my theatre times, I start to understand the deeper meaning of several exercises and the purpose of complex and slow techniques.

One might say I grew up ‘physical mature’. This is a process; many dancers have lived through as well. 

Sometimes I attend classes hosting beginners and professionals. There I often observe an interesting phenomenon, which can be transferred into many other systems of education – the lack of empathy for this “process of beginning”. 

Teachers usually have experienced stages of development during their own process, which leads them to the point where they can label themselves a teacher. Often they try to show us the world from their current point of view- forgetting, that this perspective is not accessible for a beginner yet. In order to understand a certain practice, it is important to live through all the failures and achievements a process might offer you. People, who learned to dance beautiful ballet, might end up with minimalistic contemporary movements. Performers who used to jump and scream around during improvisation classes develop the courage to enjoy stillness and silence on stage. 

But - in order to realize the positive aspects of stillness or reduced movement, you have to try the opposite before. Teacher should not teach us to jump over a certain level, but guide us through it. A good teacher teaches us how to fail. 

This idea of teaching people how to fail, allows us another thought: once I fail during a process, I have to think about solutions on my own, which enquiries my creativity and offers the possibility to find new ways of exploring. 

If you are a teacher, take your time and reflect your first days of a beginner. Maybe you remember your first unconfident tryouts and your questions, your curiosity and your hesitation. 

Once I heard a nice quote, I want to share with you: “I would never consider myself to be a professional in any way – because I aim to keep the awareness and the openness of a beginner.”