(0:01) Narrador: March 16, 2018. The U.S.

Government's Defense Advanced Research Projects

Agency, commonly known as DARPA, announces a bold initiative to develop what they call next
generation Nonsurgical Neural Technology. It is designed to allow the human brain to directly
interface with machines.

(0:28) Hombre: We know that DARPA is exploring human machine interfaces that include direct
connections between the brain and outside systems. that's been from the beginning of DARPA's
information technology mission and it continues to this day. DARPA has created some of the most
influential technologies of all time. Things that we use and take for granted every day, including
the project that became the internet. They've created self-driving cars, stealth technology, GPS
that fits in your pocket. That's DARPA's specialty, to imagine the future and create it.

(1:13) Hombre: A new technology that is actually very much on the verge of being a reality that is
being filtered is we could have a sensor, maybe on the surface of our over our head or maybe
implanted somewhere in our body in our brain or something that allows us to interact directly
with our communications gear, our processing, gear our weapon systems, and so on. But now
imagine we take that technology and we can control robots at a distance with it, even fly drones.
You put this sensor on and you think the right way and you can increase the speed of the fan by
thinking and controlling that thought, with direct to mind or mind machine interfacing. With that
type of capability you could control all sorts of buttons and mechanisms in equipment.

(2:01) Narrador: Mind machine interfaces will have many applications in both civilian and military
life. But there are those who believe that this same technology could also be used by DARPA as a
new form of mind control. Like their counterparts at the CIA, DARPA funded researchers have
spent decades investigating how the human mind can be altered. In 1965, DARPA launched Project
Pandora, which studied the possibility of using microwave radiation to control human behavior.
The project reportedly ended in 1969, but DARPA's investigation of how machines can affect and
possibly control the brain continues to this day.

(2:52) Hombre: There are explicit programs of DARPA to read and write to human brains, whether
it's through direct implants within the brain or wearing some kind of cap. So these things are being
worked on and we know that.

(3:09) Hombre: So, what's the next step? Maybe the next step is we can send instructions and
information to an actual person from a distance with this kind of technology, to let another person
control their actions, but that could be something that could be malicious.
(3:29) Hombre: If there's some way to do it from a distance, a much greater distance than
something that you can wear on your scalp, that would be the ultimate technological achievement
that would fall into this realm of mind control and direct human machine interface that DARPA
may well want to keep secret.

(3:47) Narrador: In the near future, DARPA may possess the technology to remotely control the
human mind. But as concerning as that may be, according to some scientists, a more permanent
kind of mind control technology is looming and it involves modifying the human brain by altering
the human body's DNA.

(4:12) Hombre: The future of mind control and the future being right now, because these
experiments are being done is using gene editing tolos. One of them would be CRISPR. The way it
works is take the CRISPR, which are these short alternating repeats of DNA, you put that together
with an enzyme called “Cass”. So you take the CRISPR that you want to use and you put these
pieces together that can be injected and insert this DNA to certain areas of the brain, so that we
can change brain cells and turn you into something you wouldn't otherwise be. So, in this way,
gene editing technologies like CRISPR really form a definite basis for future mind control.

(5:02) Hombre: These are things that DARPA has investigated. Every technology has potential for
good or evil. And who defines what's good and what's evil? And who uses it for what purpose?
These are all questions that have been asked about everything from rockets to self-driving
vehicles. We still don't have a good handle on the ethics of various technologies that we use. The
technologists tend not to be so concerned with the ethics, that seems to be the domain of other
people. Policymakers, for example. Academics. People like this. There needs to be a hand-in-hand
interaction with people creating technology and those who are considering the ethics of that
technology. (5:45)