The Octopus Brainstorming exhibit depicted two people's brain activity into something that people could tangibly see. The project leader explained how the participants would wear helmets that looked like an octopus (shown below) which contained wires that would read the brain activity of the subject.
He explained how the wirings in the helmet would read the brain electricity of the subject. The brain activity was then recorded and shown on the screen:
If the two people have different brain electricity, then the colors do not match, as shown below:
But as people start converging on their brain electricity and eventually get on the same level, then the colors synchronize:
He talked about how the point of this project was to help the two participants get on the same brain activity. He said they were testing to see how different music could affect the participants' brain activity as well. However, we were not able to see if there were any affects because he was only able to show us a demo of the project.
I thought this exhibit tied nicely with the lecture of neuroscience and art. Similar to how synapse and the neural networks were showcased through the brainbows, the colors of the octopus legs were also able to convey the brain activity. Both projects were able to turn an abstract concepts into something people could actually see. As someone who isn't that interested in biology and neuroscience, these methods of translating brain signals definitely make me become more interested in these topics. Rather than learning about these topics in a textbook, I think these projects can really help introduce people into these fields. Having more hands on activities and making some concepts less abstract may help decrease the gap between the scientists and other artists as well. At times, the topic of science may seem a bit intimidating because of all of its formulas and nitty gritty concepts, but having these activities could take away that intimidating image.
I also thought it was amazing to see how abstract ideas (brain waves) could actually be documented like this. It made me wonder if it would be possible to map all of the abstract concepts that humans could go through: how we think, how we feel emotions, how we feel stress. It's often hard to tell others what we're feeling and sometimes it's difficult to put into words how we even feel. Thus, these type of technology could potentially help convey emotions, feelings, and experiences that people go through. One of the biggest problems between people (in my opinion) is miscommunication. Thus, maybe technology like this could help people become more transparent and help people understand one another better.
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I would recommend this exhibit to everyone. It was cool seeing how brain signals could be translated into something more tangible that people could see. The idea that people could also change their brain signals to match someone else's brain signal was cool as well. One thing that I was a bit sad about was that it wasn't a live demonstration. However, it was understandable since they were trying to recode it to a different programming language. Even if the internal functions of the project doesn't interest you, I would still recommend it because it's so visually appealing. Shown in the video below (sorry about the video orientation. not sure how to change it):
This video above depicted the stage where the participants' brain activity weren't aligned.
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