The Enlightened Mind

A dream that came to me last night, of control over the human mind. The first quasi-new article comes from a true discovery.

Theatre of the Mind

The curtain opens,

Points of light flicker

Like fireflies in a storm

Deep within the dim starlight

Of a newly awakened mind.

Article from Standford University

Summer of 2007

Scientists have recently discovered a novel new way to stimulate neurons in the brain. In a new branch of science, being dubbed optoneurology, a team at Stanford University has mated a special type of algae gene with the neurons of mice.  The grad students then used to light sensitive properties of the algae gene to cause specific neurons to fire when exposed to blue LED light. Using this technique they've been able to control the motor movements of a mouse,  causing it to run frantically in counter clockwise circles, literally at the flip of a switch. In more recent days the scientists have also been able to inhibit neurological signals, and also record their state. In essence, these young graduate students are taking a large step toward creating a world where the mind can be read from and even written to, much like a hard drive, all with mini flashes of light from an embedded microchip. This is certainly a bright day for neuroscience and anyone awaiting the advances in medicine this is sure to herald.

Lab Journal 

December 19th, 2010

Today marks a new dawn for humanity. I, along with a team of four gradutate students at Stanford University will attempt the impossible. We're about to become masters of the most complex piece of machinary ever designed, the human brain. After three years of testing, reformulating, and a sea of government paperwork, we stand upon the precipice, just hours away from the first human trials. Even now the technicians are doing the final calibration of the systems. 

It is nearly incomprehensible that this optoneurological device, merely a wafer of unremarkable etched silcon, has the power to observe, and perhaps one day control, human thought. Many find the idea of such a device deeply disturbing, bandying arounds phrases such as "violates free will" and "mark of the beast". The students jokingly call Dr. Oppenheimer, due to the many protestors who dub this marvel of engineering a simple doomsday device. Ignorant fools, soon they shall bear witness to the true might of human intellect. Those who oppose us are merely puppets of there own stupidity. Perhaps someday they will be the plaything of the intelligence of others. Either way, soon the world shall stand together in awe at the blinding star that is man's scientific progress.

Professor of Computational-Neurology, Stanford

Marcus C. Warrington Phd.

Scalding hate billows forth,

A blinding halo of atomic might

Erasing all thoughts

Over the city of new light.

The thunderheads of uncertainty

Darken the earth's horizons

Will there be a call for curtains

On opening night?

Presidential Speech

January 18th, 2011

The President of the United States:

My fellow Americans, a year ago today our country was attacked by a terrorist network calling itself the Lighted Path. A five megaton warhead was detonated near the center of New York City and the damage was been catastrophic. Hundreds of thousands of Americans were killed in the blast and many more succumbed to the devastating fallout. After a year of successful campaigns, I am proud to say that we have avenged our fallen citizens and disrupted the operations of the terrorist. Despite our victory we must never forget the lessons learned on January 18th, that which the spirit of each one of the 480,000 victims cries out for us to remember. Without constant viligence and patriotism, this country will never truly be safe.

For this reason it is imperative that we take the right action to ensure a disaster such as this never occurs again. It is my hope that with the correct amount of resolve and sacrifice history will look back on this day and remember it as a defining moment in this great nation's legacy. It is up to us now to ensure that the tragedy did not mark the defeat of this country, but of triumph as this great nation once more shows its ability to heal and to unite under a common cause of liberty. These terrorists, these so-called disciples of the Lighted Path had their eyes blinded be the darkness and tyranny of hate. I ask you now to stand with me in face the gathering darkness, and once more become the beacon of light in a world so blackened by hate.  

Fear presses strong action

Strong players take the stage.

Dive deep to clear the darkness

From masked manipulators.

To seize the strings of choice

Make marrionette the core

Of identity's virgin oak

Excerpt from the New York Times

December 21st, 2012

The President lauded members of congress today for passing New York Remembrance Act with resounding 99/100 majority vote in the Senate. This bill will require all American's upon their 18th birthday's to undergo a newly developed optoneurological procedure, code-name Overseer, which will monitor for suspicious or terrorist-like thoughts. “It is my strongest belief that this new procedure marks a new dawn for America, through the new monitoring control, SafeThought, the freedom  America a once more secure,” the President stated in a speech after the vote.

SafeThought, led by Dr. Oppenhiem the developer of the Overseer, will take over the role which Homeland Security held after the events of 9/11. The new department will be granted executive powers in times of crisis, and will have to ability to monitor and screen the thoughts of millions of Americans and act, “in a quick a decisive manner against treasonous or seditious intents, guarding against malicious terrorists before they can even take action.”  

The safety in control

Writes false lines. 

With emerging terror

The people avert their eyes

From the dancing shadow show

And see once more the light,

As the puppeteers lose their grip

Blog Entry from Democrats Today

July 4th, 2018

A crowd of over a million protestors has gathered at the gates of the Capitol Building in Washington, DC outraged outraged at the decision to hand all monitoring done by the SafeThought organization over to the Artificial Intelligence agent know as Eliza. Law makers claim the work load of monitoring 350 million American was too great for analysts, and insist the move toward AI to be the only sensible option. 

There have been allegations that SafeThought has secretly been experimenting in using it's neural monitoring network to push false thoughts of patriotism into “societal deviants”. Worse, there have been rumors that the incident last year of the mass suicide in a small Wisconsin town was the result of a failed experiment in mind control by the agency for safe thought. The enraged protestors have been engaged in minor skirmishes with local law enforcement and more recently the more heavily armed troops of SafeThought have arrived and are attempting to disperse the crowds.

The rally is thought to have been organized by the resistance group Children of Liberty, a growing faction of teenagers who are speaking out against the Overseer procedure. They alone may still meet and think in secret before they must submit to the procedure on their eighteenth birthday's. In a video released today the group's unnamed leader has proclaimed that the existence of the SafeThought agency is unconstitutional, and that true Americans should join with the Children of Liberty to cleanse its horrible affront to the freedom America was founded upon. He goes on to gesture to a large device glowing with a million points of light, which he claims to be capable of causing a simultaneous overload of the Overseer system throughout the country. He ended his pirate broadcast with this. “The fire of America is meant to guide, not control. We seek to restore the true path, and cleanse, through fire in necessary, the false lights which we, in a moment of fear, allowed to SafeThought to drip silently into our brains, until we became slaves of the shadow show. My brothers and sisters, fear no longer the light, we have come to cut the strings of this oppression!”

Personal Journal

December 21st, 2018

This has gotten out of hand. The ultimate goal of science is to raise up humanity to the level of gods, not leave it as a slave to the devil. This ELIZA, this man made intelligence, it will destroy us. We've just handed over the strings to a being which has no more empathy for humans than a pocket calculator. Science is supposed to be the light of reason, and yet now I fear by our own machinations we have plunged the world to darkness. The star of humanity is fading, even those cling to ethical ideals, like these Children of Liberty, are merely puppets to their own hatred. 

We as a species have lost something. No, not lost, I have taken it from us. Each calulation and advancement chipping it silently away. I once scoffed at the notion of free will, a notion for philosophers and religious zealots. The mind to me was never more than a machine which needed to be studied, understood, controlled. How ignorant, how short sighted.

I haven't much much time, the corrosive nano-polymers have most likely almost broken through the shielding of my lab. The Oppenheimer response teams are very reliable. Before the signal reaches this infernal chip in my head and they read these thoughts, giving the team a defacto warrent for my arrest, know that with my last breaths I sought for freedom. God, they say are experimenting with controlling people now. This device next to me, it shines with a million rays of a single promise, the promise of hope, I've wired it to denote thiry seconds from now. It took me three months to steal it back from the Children of Liberty, and yet here I sit about to detonate it anyways. It's untested, it may kill us all. God save us all. 

Professor of Computational-Neurology, Stanford

 

The strings of the act

Fall limp to the ground

As the lights in the playhouse

One by one

Flicker, and go out

-A poem found on the body Dr. Warrington, shortly after his mysterious suicide 

December 21st, 2018

Author's Note

This is a very rough draft in a new genre, please be critical and constructive.

Reviews

[sfsdfsdfsdf]

This is a great story and I would love to see more of it's kind if you were to ever work on more in this genre. I like the way that you show progression of events through entries in a diary or through articles, it is a unique storytelling method that I dont believe many have tapped into yet. The idea behind this, is rather possible, although in what degree compared to what is happening in this storyline I am unsure of. I believe that in order for us to advance humanity instead of casting it away with the unwilling control of the government, discovery in the mind should be used for advanced self control, rather than the control of others. Overall i really like this piece.

[Wez Hardyn]

We already have mind control - it's called consumerism. We confront the alienated products of our own labour every day, not as its creators but merely as consumers. This keeps us as slaves to those who own our lives through 'employment'. I love science fiction when it features political overtones like your story. Keep up the good (subversive) work.

[Joanna Maharis]

I like this story very much. It's reminiscent of George Orwell's novel 1984, in that in his story there was the Thought Police who went around arresting people who they suspected of thinking for themselves or plotting against the government organization called the Big Brother. In Orwell's story, anyone who was arrested was exterminated and wiped out of existence, as is any proof of their existence such as any documents or photos or books, etc... that held any proof of the arrested criminal's existence. In Orwell's story the Big Brother organization and Thought Police studied a person's mannerisms, facial expressions and gestures made in order to make sure no one went against the Big Brother organization. However, I like the fact that in your story the character take matters against the government to an even stronger level when it comes to thought control. You have done some beautiful work thus far. I look forward to reading more of this story soon.