Category Archives: Late Scenario

2100 : brain improved pre-attentive capabilities

Author(s): Fred Vernier
Affiliation(s): LIMSI-CNRS


Abstract:

As brain-computer interaction became available it was clear people didn’t want more information gushing toward their brain liked fire-hose aimed at a teacup  (see Dilbert comic strip) but a piece of electronic plugged near the back of the brain found a much clever way to improve our capabilities : increase pre-attentive features we are able to recognize ! The processor take information flow directly at the start of our optical nerve and process all kind of computer vision processing in parallel. Results are then added to the normal flow of information our brain receive from tour eyes. If this technology was first created to give back sight to blind people it allows now to distinguish an unhappy face among 200 happy one like a red square among blue ones. Fortunately the pre-attentive processor can be switched off or be tweaked to reveal boolean combination of features (with no interference between features obviously !). Anyway anyone can now have a look at a very messy scatterplot or any hairball graph and patterns just pop up to our eyes 2.0.

2029 – The Cynical Ergonomist: A day in the life of a police intelligence analyst in 2029

Author(s): Chris Rooney
Affiliation(s): Middlesex University


Abstract:

In a popular dystopian future where life is tough for young adults, there is still street crime, and still a need for crime analysts.  There was once a time where analysts used screens no bigger than 17 inches, and visual analytic systems simply supported decisions, rather than making their own.  Let’s jump to 2029 and spend a day with police crime analyst Alex Murphy, who doesn’t always get on with modern technology, to see how things have changed.