Programmed To Kill

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IN THE MANCHURIAN CANDIDATE A COMPUTER CHIP HIDDEN IN THE BRAIN OF A POLITICIAN TURNS HIM INTO A PUPPET FOR KILLERS. BUT IN THE REAL WORLD STIMULATING THE BRAIN LIKE THIS WOULD HAVE TO BE DONE BY WIRES STICKING OUT OF THE SKULL - PROBABLY A WARNING SIGN TO POTENTIAL TARGETS.
PHOTO FROM PARAMOUNT PICTURES, THE MANCHURIAN CANDIDATE

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Audiences of The Manchurian Candidate watched in horror as the stars of the film were turned into murdering puppets by high-tech devices implanted in their bodies and brains.

What fans didn't realize was that the inspiration for remaking the 1962 Frank Sinatra classic are new, but very real, technologies already in use.

The scenes of Denzel Washington cutting tiny computer chips out of his body and brain implants controlling politicians are not so far from the truth.

As you read this article, top Mexican government officials are being tracked by tiny micro-chips beneath their skin. But unlike Denzel Washington’s character they were never kidnapped by conspirators.

Mexico's Attorney General Rafael Macedo de la Concha and 160 other Mexican law enforcement officials volunteered to be implanted with a device called the VeriChip partly in the hope it will one day insure their safe return in case of kidnapping.

The VeriChip is a micro-chip the size of a grain of rice that is injected under the skin in a procedure known as “chipping.” Encased in silicon to prevent rejection, the tiny pill-shaped gadget holds a micro-chip and antenna.

“Implanting takes about two minutes,” explains Keith Bolton, president of VeriChip Corporation based in Delray Beach, Florida. “The chip sits in the head of a needle. Inject the needle and the chip stays in the body right under the skin.”

The VeriChip lies asleep until scanned using radio frequency identification, or RFID. The micro-chip then begins transmitting its encrypted data. Only the right scanner can decode the signal and display the results.

Until recently, the VeriChip had only been implanted in animals – over four million pets have been ‘chipped.’ Explains Bolton, “Lost animals are scanned by veterinarians and their owner is called. It has become standard procedure.”

After the September 11th terrorist attacks, the company decided the world was ready to implant humans. “We recognize we are vulnerable,” says Bolton. “After 9-ll the VeriChip doesn’t seem so wild.”

Keith Bolton says the human applications are limitless, any kind of sensitive data could be stored. “It is safe and hidden in the body forever.”

VeriChip Corporation wants the chip to hold complete medical records, allowing hospital patients to be treated in seconds without any paperwork. The tiny chips could also be a secure form of credit card or ID.

So far, most human implantations are for security. In Mexico only officials with the VeriChip can access the new federal anti-crime information center.

Mexico’s biggest law enforcement problem has been corrupt officials selling information. With the VeriChip the Mexican government precisely monitors who is accessing sensitive files.

But the Mexicans planned next step will take us much closer to The Manchurian Candidate.

“Our Latin American dealers want the technology to track someone who has been abducted,” says Bolton. “With GPS we could monitor them anywhere on Earth.”

Bolton plans to use the chip coupled with a small GPS transmitter hidden in a watch or belt. If the person is kidnapped, GPS satellites will tell searchers their exact location.

“We see a billion dollar market place in Latin American countries,” says Bolton. “We’re doing it there first because there are no regulations or privacy groups.”

But in countries with stricter privacy laws the tiny 12mm chip has created huge controversy.

With the first human implantations, privacy groups charged it was the beginning of Big Brother. "This just simply goes way too far outside the realm of what we believe in as a society," commented Randall Marshall, of the American Civil Liberties Union.

The VeriChip seems to evoke a fundamental human aversion to violating the bounds of our body. Even more disturbing would be an invasion of our minds.

The Manchurian Candidate plays on both fears.

And just as the computer chips Denzel Washington finds hidden in his body are based on the real-life VeriChip, the mind control scenes are also loosely based on real technologies.

Can brain implants really make someone a puppet? It has already been done. But, the minds being controlled are not human.

Every day Dr. John K. Chapin and Dr. Sanjiv Talwar control their victims using sophisticated technology surgically implanted into their brains.

But the scientists are not using their mind control skills to manipulate politicians. Their victims are furry lab rats.

It all began when a team of international scientists began experimenting at the State University of New York to see if computers could speak directly to the brain. They implanted devices into living rat brains that would make the rats feel they were being touched on either the right or left whisker.

They also put an implant into the pleasure center of the rat’s brain. When the rat moved in the direction it felt it was touched, the scientists gave it a shot of pure pleasure. The rats became addicted and were soon trained to move on command.

This is exactly the way the mind control in The Manchurian Candidate works. A conspirator signals the brain implant of U.S. Vice Presidential candidate Raymond Shaw to make waves of ecstasy. After a few moments the now docile and vacantly smiling politician will follow any commands without question.

According to the SUNY researchers, the movie is quite accurate in what an implant into the pleasure centers of the brain feels like. “The few times it was tried with humans they experienced intense euphoria and well being,” says Dr. Chapin. “It is the same area of the brain stimulated by addictive drugs like cocaine.”

But the pleasure does not come easy. Even for mice, only a few top brain surgeons can manage it.

Under anesthesia, super small, hair thin wires are driven into specific areas of the rat’s brain. The wires deliver electricity from a battery into the rat’s brain.

A small camera helmet on the rat’s head allows scientists to see what the rat sees. The now completed “Robo-Rat” looks like something out of a Disney movie.

The rat is given a tiny backpack receiver that allows scientists to control the animal by joystick like a toy car. Moving the joystick right or left sends a signal to the backpack providing a tiny shock into the rat’s brain.

The rodent feels it is being touched on one whisker or the other. When it moves in the direction of the touch, it is rewarded with a jolt to the pleasure center of its brain. Soon the rat is eager to go wherever directed.”

The plan was to use the Robo-Rats as the ultimate search and rescue tool. “We realized rats could be guided into places where humans or dogs could never go,” says Chapin.

And while it takes years to train dogs, the rats are ready in days. “We program the rats rather than train them,” explains Sanjiv Talwar.

The project was well underway until they discovered that electronics need to catch up to nature. “The animal works,” says Chapin, “we just need to know the technology works. That is ninety percent of our concern right now.”

The biggest problem was communicating with the rat once it went underground. It is like trying to use a cell phone in a tunnel. “The equipment needed weighs ten pounds, too much for the rat,” says Chapin.


But could this technology be adapted to control human beings? Could we really have a Manchurian Candidate scenario?

The surprising answer is that it could really happen. As far back as the 1950’s Spanish scientist Jose Delgado used brain implants to control violence in animals.

In his most famous experiment, Delgado implanted electrodes into the brain of a bull and set it loose in the arena to charge a matador. With a flick of a switch Delgado would send electricity into the bull’s brain that would stop it dead in its tracks. The docile bull would wander around until the signal was cut off and then instantly resume his attack.

Delgado also demonstrated how the technology could be used to evoke violence rather than suppress it. House cats were implanted with the electrodes and put in a room with a mice. The cats were fed before the experiment and showed no interest in the mice.

Then the Spanish scientist switched on the electricity to their implants. Suddenly, the cats savagely attacked the mice in a killing frenzy.

It is unknown how powerful this kind of stimulation to the brain’s ‘kill center’ would be in a human being. There is little doubt that the urge to attack would be very strong, but it unknown if thinking people would be able to resist it better than animals.

Also, the feelings would be powerful violent urges rather than complicated directions like, “shoot the president.”

The Manchurian Candidate shows mind control victims calmly carrying out complex plans in a kind of trance.

It would be more likely that someone with this kind of violence implant would be triggered into a murderous rage to attack everyone within reach – a kind of mechanically induced temporary insanity, a true walking time bomb.

Another method of mind control would be pleasure instead of rage. Someone with implants into the brain’s pleasure center would very quickly become addicted worse than any drug addict.

Cocaine and heroine use chemicals, but the implants are far more direct. No drug user could ever survive a dose large enough to reach the level of ecstasy that goes with direct stimulation of the brain’s pleasure center.

Just as crack addicts will rob stores or steal from their families to get more of the drug, a brain implant junkie might become desperate enough to do anything to experience the sensation again – even kill.

The nightmare is that terrorists could use brain implants to hopelessly addict and control someone with access to nuclear weapons or deadly diseases.

But while not impossible, the chances are remote. Only a few of the world’s top brain surgeons are even capable of performing this kind of operation and anyone walking around with wires sticking out of their head would probably have a hard time getting close enough to do a lot damage.

For the time being we are probably safe from mind control killers – but the technology is advancing every day.

– The End –
By Lance Laytner
Copyright 2007
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