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Comments: 185 + - Games: Scientists Use Quake 2 To Study the Brains of Mice on Thursday October 15 2009, @02:10PM
Posted
by
Soulskill
on Thursday October 15 2009, @02:10PM
from the god-help-us-if-they-learn-how-to-rocket-jump dept.
from the god-help-us-if-they-learn-how-to-rocket-jump dept.
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An anonymous reader writes "In this week's issue of Nature, scientists from Princeton University trained mice to navigate around a virtual environment using a setup that resembles a combination of a giant trackball and a mini-iMax theater displaying a virtual world rendered using a modified version of the Quake 2 open source game engine. (Here's the academic paper, subscription required.) They hold the mouse's head still atop a giant trackball, which the mouse turns by running. The scientists use the rotations to move the mouse around in the virtual environment, and when he reaches certain places, he gets a reward. Because they are able to hold the head still, they can stick microscopic glass electrodes into individual neurons in the hippocampus of this mouse as it 'navigates.' They find the neural activity that resembles activity during real life navigation, and learned new things about the inputs and computations that are going on inside these neurons, which weren't known before. No word as of yet whether the scientists plan on giving the mice control of the gun. Wonder whether John Carmack ever envisioned this when he opened up the Quake code?"
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Submission: Scientists use Quake 2 to study the brains of mice by Anonymous Coward
You will be married within a year.
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FP (Score:5, Funny)
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
Yo Dawg, I heard you liked idiot replies, so here's an idiot reply for your idiot reply!
Quake Fit? (Score:5, Funny)
If only we could do this with gamers who need exercise. They get a better immersive experience AND get fit at the same time.
OK, so the open-brain surgery thing is going to be controversial, but...
Re:Quake Fit? (Score:5, Funny)
Parent
Re:Quake Fit? (Score:4, Funny)
You mean just like going outside and taking a walk in real life? But why would I want to do that?
Parent
Re:Quake Fit? (Score:5, Funny)
I can see numerous advantages to a virtual walk:
1) Not impacted by weather
2) Not possible to get run over by a virtual truck
3) Few financially losses from being virtually mugged
4) Fewer possibilities for disease when you virtually hook up with that virtually hottie you met on your virtual walk
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
You can.
See here: http://www.virtusphere.com/ [virtusphere.com]
DO WANT.
Online play (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Online play (Score:4, Funny)
If I ever get fragged by a mouse, I hope no one ever tells me.
PRO TIP: Don't use cheese yellow colors for your model skins!
Parent
Damn! (Score:3, Funny)
Fragged by a rodent! Damned thing was camping, too, the bastard.
Re:Damn! (Score:4, Interesting)
Parent
Re: (Score:2)
I was thinking something along the same sort of lines; there's no force feedback (tactile feeback/negative feedback) for when he runs into stuff. I would like to see how the neuro-map for a mouse just being placed into the simulator looks compared to a mouse who spent his whole life "on the ball". I bet my brain's neuro-map looks a lot different when I'm playing TF2 compared to when I'm mountain biking or paintballing.
Re:Damn! (Score:5, Funny)
Parent
Re:Damn! (Score:5, Funny)
Um... Squeak?
Parent
Re:Damn! (Score:4, Funny)
Parent
Re:Damn! (Score:4, Interesting)
Hmm, yeah, and they should train the mouse to fire the gun by rewarding it – first, make it find a target and operate the "gun firing" switch (whatever that is). Then train it to find a person and target them and "fire". Finally, put it up against armed opponents, give negative feedback if the mouse gets shot, and see what happens. Will the mouse go for positive feedback (by shooting opponents), will it hide/flee from the opponents (to escape the negative feedback it learns to associate with being shot by them), or will it be intelligent enough to create a new self-defense mechanism whereby it learns that by shooting the opponents before they can shoot it, it can both avoid the negative feedback and at the same time get positive feedback?
Parent
Re:Damn! (Score:5, Interesting)
I suspect learning to use the in-game offense/defense mechanisms would tax the mouse's brain far beyond its capacity already without adding the complexity of choosing between different weapons.
Although that does make me think of another interesting thing. Mice are more of a foraging creature... they look for food and hide from predators, fighting back only when cornered. A FPS, on the other hand, lends itself to predatory tactics... seeking your prey and killing them without being killed by their defensive tactics. Is it even possible for a mouse to learn to exhibit predatory behavior using a reward system, if their prey tendencies to flee or hide are being simultaneously triggered as their target fights back? If a bunch of mice were put into such a simulation, would they all hide from each other? Would they actively seek and kill each other? Or would there be some of both, where some mice tended to behave in a predatory manner (aggressive personalities?) while others hid (passive/survival)?
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
The implication is that cats would be better FPS players than mice. The problem of course is that cats are sit-and-wait predators, sitting quietly and waiting for their prey to move before suddenly striking. In other words, campers. So playing on a server against a bunch of cats would probably suck. Dogs, which are pursuit predat
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
That's the key, though... what you described is exactly a "foraging" tactic. Find the lever, hit the lever, get the cheese.
When the toon is able to interact with the mouse in a negative way (unpleasant) in addition to a positive way (pleasant), it's no longer just a maze or puzzle to solve. That's what would be so fascinating: would the mouse have the intelligence to plan and attempt to get the positive stimuli (reward) while avoiding the negative stimuli. (What you mentioned – the "target" is moving
270 FOV (Score:2)
How many roads must a man walk down? (Score:2, Funny)
Great. Now I have to worry about getting pwned by Frankie and Benjy.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
mice or men (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Naw, they'll be too busy raiding the cheese shop in Stormwind.
Re:mice or men (Score:4, Funny)
If it was virtual cheese they were after, they'd need look no farther than these jokes, I think.
Parent
Oh great (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Oh great (Score:5, Funny)
Catching mice that get in my house is enough of a pain
Christ, now even my cat is posting on slashdot.
Parent
Open Source Helping Humanity (Score:5, Interesting)
This is a great example of open source really helping humanity learn new and interesting things.
It's great to see that the tools provided by open software can really help speed up research.
I wonder what would happen if old versions of adobe photoshop, 3ds max, or cubase were left to open source for research purposes. What kind of discoveries would scientists make with programs like these?
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Open Source Helping Humanity (Score:4, Funny)
Seriously, what did they really learn from this?
They learned about brain structure and relationships between cognition and motor control.
You may not think that's worth it, but we've done a lot worse to mice than non-lethal brain surgery in order to learn a lot less.
I wouldn't let anyone involved in this kind of experiment date my sister.
*puts down bouquet of flowers, scalpel, and bundle of electrodes*
Man, you're no fun.
Parent
Free information (Score:5, Insightful)
Someone is likely to say it, so I will:
This is what happens when you have a free flow of information. Carmack got well paid for Quake 2 then opened the source up (eventually). If more people/institutions/corps did this it seems there would not only be more hearts and flowers (for all the open source hippies) but there would be MORE technology we could patent! The ability to make MORE money!
If I have 2 innovative products and I decide to open them up to general use, and at least 1 new idea comes from that, someone out there will create something with it and hopefully create a net gain for the system as a whole in the long run.
I know people are selfish, but for Science's sake, open up your information already! The economy is dying a slow, painful death (though the market might refute that this week), wouldn't the SOLUTION in The States be to repeal some copyright laws and let information flow freely so as to foster innovation like this? Even if it's a mouse on a ball in a hall at the mall, I have to believe only good could come from opening things up a bit more.
What are we going to do today, Brain? (Score:4, Informative)
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
I was thinking something different -
4. Pay per view!
or maybe -
4. UMFC (Ultimate Mouse Fighting Championship)
Re:What are we going to do today, Brain? (Score:4, Funny)
Parent
Further evidence FPS are best played with a mouse (Score:5, Funny)
Frame rate? (Score:3, Interesting)
So what was the frame rate on the mouse's brain? Could it run crysis/linux?
Don't kid yourselves... (Score:2)
Mice vs. Managers (Score:4, Funny)
ZORT! NARF! ZOWIEE! (Score:5, Funny)
"Are you pondering what I am pondering, Pinky?"
"I think so Brain, but how can I bunny-hop over the lava when I'm a mouse?"
Ideas (Score:3, Informative)
No word as of yet whether the scientists plan on giving the mice control of the gun.
Just whisper this when you say it. Rodents have unnaturally good hearing.
They're waiting for you. In the TEST CHAMBER. (Score:5, Funny)
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Half-Life did use the Q2 engine.
It actually used the Quake engine which was modified with some parts of the Quake2 codebase. The modified Quake engine was known as Quakeworld.
http://developer.valvesoftware.com/wiki/Quake_Engine_Hierarchy [valvesoftware.com]
Rats (Score:5, Funny)
Just thought I'd point out that
despite all my rage, I am still just a rat in a cage.
Acknowledgements (Score:3, Interesting)
If anyone is wondering, the authors did thank Carmack and id software:
Acknowledgements We thank E. Chaffin for help with mouse behaviour,
J. Carmack and id Software for providing the Quake2 code
New definition (Score:3, Interesting)
Gives you a new definition for a head mounted display.
Explains a lot (Score:4, Funny)
I wondered why the last arena I logged in to had the quad damage replaced by a wheel of cheese, and why the rocket pickups were shaped like little smudges of peanut butter.
forget Virtual Reality... (Score:3, Interesting)
Let the mice steer the beetles!
Upcoming arcade game... (Score:3, Funny)
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)