but then the chauffer said, that question so elementary that even my chauffer here can answer it for you. [laughter] [applause] thank you very much. you've been a great audience. [applause] thank you very much. [applause] >> host: right now we're pleased to be joined by michio kaku. "the future of the mind" is his most recent book.hi here the cover.he now, dr. kaku, you write that we'v e learned more about the human mind in the past 15 years than in all of history. why is that? >> guest: because of advances in civics. why is that? >> advancements in physics, the thinking brain, thoughts ricochet like a ping-pong ball right inside the mind. realize we are entering the golden age of science. things that were once considered impossible, even preposterous, we can now do.

telepathy, telekinesis, recording the maris, perhaps even photographed in a gene, controlling computers with the mind, controlling robots with the mind. we have done it. we have done this, we have done all these things in the laboratory. >> how did this occur in the last 15 years? >> guest: the brain is a black box. we didn't know what was inside the brain. 49 technology local look at blood flow with an our eye scans, blood flow pushing around the brain and we can look all the old wives' tales, the theories of sigmund freud. some of his furies were correct, some was incorrect. we can use computers to deciphers the blood flow to create a picture of what you are

thinking about. this is amazing. if you think about the mona lisa, we can put your head in an mri scan, have a computer look at all the blood flow and reconstruct a picture of the month of lisa. when you fall asleep, the machine keeps plugging away and prints out your dreams. one day we will wake up in the morning and see the dream we had the previous night. >> host: m r is are relatively old technology, isn't it? >> yes but now we can have snapshots of the brain almost like a motion picture. we couldn't do that before. the first mri machines we got still pictures. interesting pictures, it is the human brain but nothing much happening. now we can see the blood show our electrical activity. realize your brain uses 20 watts of power.

it would take a super computer the size of a city block to reproduce what your brain does. the complement -- >> host: michio kaku is our guest on booktv. numbers are up on screen if you would like to dial in, 585-388 zero. if you live in the eastern time zones, 585-3991. bill and violin. if you can't get through the phone lines and ask a question or make a comment you can do so at twitter, twitter.com/booktv or make a comment on our face book page, facebook.com/booktv. his most recent book, "the future of the mind: the scientific quest to understand, enhance, and empower the mind". we think of science fiction and some of the things they do in science fiction. i they possible today? >> yes. the internet could be a brain

that for memories, sensations, feeling on the internet, not just to perfect a messages. these will go crazy. the memories on the brain that of the future. they can now do that with animals. we can record a memory. train a mouse to do a certain thing, record the impulses across the hippocampus, reinsert it back in and the mouse remembers. we have a brain peacemaker for alzheimer's patients. people with memory problems will push a brain pacemaker and remember and now the pentagon just last week announced a new initiative, brain injuries, we not only control mechanical arms and legs but also have memory enhancement for those people injured in iraq and afghanistan.

>> host: what is the actual technology that can remember a memorial recording memories? >> guest: when you remember a task your hippocampus at the center of the brain which is about that big has electrical activity that records the memory. put two electrodes at both ends of the hippocampus and record what goes back and forth. we don't know what it means. after the mouse forgets, we read insert that memory into the mouse or another mouse and being go and the mouse remembers. primates are now going to have them recorded very soon and after that a brain pacemaker for alzheimer's patients and in the future perhaps up load the memory of a vacation we never had. >> host: one of those things you write about in "the future of the mind: the scientific quest to understand, enhance, and empower the mind" is something that has become in the popular lexicon because of the big paying pherae, the de , the de,e

cat theorem. election could be spent upper spin theory, the dead cat live theorem. election could be spent upper spin down. are we really alive? you make the observation, the cat is neither dead nor all live. in this quantum zone called quantum consciousness. it takes a conscious being to determine whether you are dead or alive by looking at you. at this point if you think i am crazy by saying you can be neither dead nor live realize einstein thought this was ridiculous but einstein was wrong. we measured every day with electrons. when you do to humans you get a

headache. >> host: someone -- kevin calling from michigan. where are you calling from? go ahead with your question for michio kaku. >> caller: i was wondering if you heard any thing on fukushima, seemed they were having problems with horses dying on the california coastline recently, nobody could pinpoint what was causing the problem. >> guest: i am not sure of that. >> host: you are talking about porpoises dined on the california coast? >> caller: marine horses. >> guest: i am not familiar with that. >> host: sorry about that. michael in florida, this is booktv and you are on with

michio kaku. michael in florida. we will move on to john in illinois. where in illinois are you calling from? >> in the east. the study of remote healing. >> host: please go and with your question or comment. i think we lost him. we will try that again. 2025853890. 585391 for those in the mountain and pacific time zones. michio kaku, what does this pretend for mental illnesses, something else you write about? >> guest: when they have spent

$1 billion to map the human brain what is the pay off? the payout is to understand and cure mental illness, realize there are tens of millions of americans at any given time suffer some form of mental illness and we don't know why. schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, alzheimer's, parkinson's, children are beginning to understand schizophrenia but if you hear voices, part of your brain lights up when you generate voices. we talked to ourselves. these people are unaware of the fact the left part of the brain is generating the voices. the conscious brain but not understand what the left part of the brain is generating and that is what we call madness. we can now quantify what madness is. different parts of the brain don't talk to each other in the

brain generates imaginary voices. >> host: you talk about the fact that your mother suffered from alzheimer's. >> my mother dying of alzheimer's disease, now we have the ability to record memories and that is what the pentagon is looking at this very seriously because of a brain injured veteran, the wounded warriors in afghanistan and even set a timetable, four years. there has to be some kind of device from memory enhancement and this was once considered science fiction. only last year the first animal tests were done on mice recording memories but this could also open up a can of worms. it can implant false memories into a mouse. this was done a few months ago. if you can imagine in the future criminals may have false memories and the innocent people

think they pulled the trigger or committed a murder or actually didn't. we have to be careful monitoring of this one falls memories become available. not just the vacation you didn't have but the crime you didn't commit. >> host: how far away are we from all this? >> guest: within five years of human trials. very close. big business and the military have got wind of this. the soccer games, world cup games, the person who started the world cup first of all was paralyzed. he was a quadriplegic with mechanical arms and legs generated by impulses from the brain designed act. university and makes possible iron man. right out of obama comic book, is possible today. we can also make robots that are controlled by the human mind. just like in the movie avatar. things that once considered way

into the future we already do in the lab. >> host: let's take a call from harry in delaware. you are on with michio kaku. please go ahead. >> caller: my question is we were looking at the earth and trying to to determine if -- do we have the technology to go and we're looking at the moon or would it appear as one planet? >> host: do we have the technology -- >> caller: would we be able to determine the mass of the earth and realize there was also a moon or would it appear as one planet? >> host: could we determine the mass of the earth and the moon? >> guest: yes. isaac newton centuries ago worked out the laws of gravity to calculate the mass of the

sun, the mass of stars in our space. we can measure the mass of terrestrial bodies. because we know the rate of rotation of the earth around the sun we can use that information to calculate the mass of the earth and the mass of the sun. the dynamics of the solar system which nasa uses everyday actually was not devised by einstein but isaac newton several centuries ago. >> host: patrick in philadelphia, good afternoon. go ahead with your question or comment. >> caller: i want to ask the doctor about all these breakthroughs could be weapon highest and what are the downfalls of this new technology? >> can these technologies the weapon is? >> guest: any technology can be weapon eyes. hammer for example, we can build buildings out of it but it can

be, stored or missile launcher. the cia back in the 1950s and 60s instituted m k alter. we fought the russians were using hypnosis and drugs and mind altering fame is so the u.s. military spent millions of dollars funding universities on lsd and have nazism, mind control, psychics and all kinds of talk of maybe things. fortune and nothing came out of it. not a single piece of usable information came out of this multimillion-dollar secret plan called mk all for which you can read about on the internet now. however this technology-talking about is for real. we are not talking about psychics or charlatans, we are not talking about hocus polkas. we are talking about reproducible experiments in the laboratory and yes, i think at some point we have to have an oversight to make sure people

don't try to use this technology for something like mind control. >> where are we when it comes to artificial intelligence? what does that mean and where are we in the science of it? >> guest: you think we have terminator robot around the corner, not so. we have made enormous breakthroughs in terms of connecting the mind to a computer, having completed computerized mind turned out to be much more difficult than we thought. armas said vance robots today have the intelligence of a cockroach. a retarded lobotomize cockroach. you have to realize our most did vance robots did they have the intelligence of an insect. hollywood robots there is a man inside. there is computer animation. is not a genuine robot. don't expect to have a robot maid or butler any time soon.

>> host: of retarded cockroach. >> guest: it can barely recognize where is moving, barely understand, can't hide, can't look for food. basically having trouble understanding up or down or left or right. the united states pentagon was testing robots to see if they could repair a nuclear power plant. it failed. robots were incapable of making the simplest repairs at fukushima said the military has now created a challenge to create a robot that can make simple repairs, turn screwdrivers, turn valves, that is how primitive we are to create an artificial mind. >> host: thelma from potomac,

md.. >> caller: what technology can be used in stroke victims with memory loss and physical loss? >> the question is what kind of technology will we use for people, stroke victims? my daughter is a neurologist and she handles stroke victims on a daily basis. the first thing we do when somebody comes in and seems to have the characteristics of a stroke is to the standard diagnostic test and mri scan. we can actually see the location where bleeding is taking place right inside the brain. however in terms of the queue work we are very far away from that. sorry to say at the present time is the best way to deal with a stroke victim is to immediately put the person in the hospital as soon as they show signs of a stroke, gatt and mri scan, given the proper drugs and at that point we have to cross our

fingers. we do not yet have the ability to cure these illnesses. however diseases like parkinson's, caused by brain cells, we can put electrodes directly into the brain to neutralize these overexcited neurons and the tremors stop immediately. certain forms of parkinsons' we can actually cure. as some form of a deep depression can be cured in the same way. cluster of neurons are overactive, by inserting a life roads into the brain when to neutralize those overactive neurons and the depression is lifted almost immediately. this is not for everyone but in the laboratories we demonstrated the usefulness of the >> host: "the future of the mind: the scientific quest to understand, enhance, and empower the mind" is the name of the book. the next caller is carry in california.

>> caller: i was curious to hear michio kaku's opinion on brain chemistry experiments at the university of wisconsin in evolving baby monkeys who are suffering in their mothers at birth and several months later are killed in their brain chemistry is analyzed to determine the neurochemical reaction to stress. >> guest: i am not familiar with an experiment but let me say at a number of universities they look at the relationship between stress kamel hormones and brain activity. this was not possible years ago but now with mri scans, lots of snapshots of the brain and you can see where stress is concentrated and by looking at the blood you can analyze the hormone content as well.

so there are ways to look at stress, when is mri scans and which types of the brain are excited. the cammed the above would handle fear so we know fear is concentrated in the amygdala. to identify parts of the brain associated with different kinds of the motions, then we have chemicals to analyze the 0 hormone level land look for visible signs of stress. putting these things together, we now have a pretty good idea of how stress is related especially to young children. >> host: kenny in portland, ore. you are on with michio kaku. >> caller: hello. i read a lot of rudolf steiner. don't know if you are familiar with him. i was wondering about the third

eye, the pineal gland. and so now they call it the third i and another thing is about the brain, the physical brain, what is your view on where did it come from? does the brain seek thought or decides come from the self and the brain act like a receiver? thank you. >> guest: the pineal gland which is a part of the inner part of the brain, people once thought was the seat of consciousness. there are many philosophers who wrote about the pineal gland where thinking came from. now we have mri scans, we can see the blood flow. if you are concentrating on something or fear for have the motions you can see where the blood concentrates and we realize the pineal gland is not where the action is. in some since freud was not

totally wrong. behind your forehead is your ego. your consciousness is sitting right behind your forehead and you're guilty conscience call your superego is right behind the eyeball. that is where you feel guilty and you're libya no, your pleasure center which sigmund freud wrote about is located dead center inside flight human brain. even though freud had some, the many ideas he wasn't totally wrong. there is a conscious brain and there are three categories of thought that you can localized in the brain, where the ego, the superego and the it on >> host: in "the future of the mind: the scientific quest to understand, enhance, and empower the mind" you write the left brain and the right lane sometimes don't agree or know what each other is doing. >> guest: they are connected,

they can cut an epileptic to prevent seizures and when you cut a few connections, consciousness begins to emerge and separate. in one epileptic the left brain was a believer in god and the right brain is an atheist so when he dies will he go to heaven or only half his brain go to heaven? one day we will find an epileptic his left brain is republican and right brain is democrat and when he goes into the polling booth and has to push the trigger to have his vote counted there will be a struggle between the left arm and right arm over whether he will vote republican or democrat. >> host: what is the significance of knowing the two has of the brain don't communicate? >> guest: there's a theory that bipolar disorder, many hollywood movies, great painters and

musicians, as that it is an imbalance between the left and the right. a little pessimistic, one is more optimistic and they check each other. .. >> caller: hello, my question is regarding the particles and whether not finding any spin on

the particle concludes string cleary and what your thoughts on that might be. >> guest: string theory is what i do for a living. it is a theory of everything and the theory that created the universe itself. we think particles gave birth to the modern day universe we see today. we are all children of this particle. but it predicts a new generation that are super particles and we hope to find them with the colli collider. the first great mystery of the unionverse is the creation but the second great mystery is the

creation of the mind. these are the two great front r frontiers in all of science. where did the universe come from and where did the mind come from with the two most important questions asked today. albert died without finishing his greatest theory. they realized his great theory was the theory of everything. we wanted an equation no more than one inch long that would explain the entire universe and i said that is for me. this is greater than any murderer mystery.

i want to complete his dream of everything. we have stream theory and it is the leading and only candidate for the theory that explains the universe, stars, people, and mave even love. >> host: it is provable? >> guest: we found the particles but if we find sparticals that nail it to the wall. we hope the next generation are the particles that bring about an answer. >> host: go ahead with your

question. >> caller: thank you for hearing my call. through your wonderful research what would be the practical application of your scientific research that we could use in an educational setting for children that are suffering from the adhd and dyslexia? is there any practical application we can use sooner rather than later to help these children. >> guest: you mention education. i think in the coming decades we will have a library of not just books of people that died a long time ago but a library of memories, expressions, histories, sensation of people that died. one day we will go to the library and talk to within like

winston churchhill because his experiences are there. that is down the line. so closer we have to confront the fath we don't know what autism is were example. now we are seeing how the disorder occurs in the brain. looking at blood flow of the brain of the autisics we can see why this sump haening but there is not a cure yet. we are entering the golden age of neuro science but the applications for children is not ready yet. >> host: tom in springfield, missouri. go ahead with your question or

comment. >> caller: i would like to ask in 2011 i read an ibm scientist saying 2020 they would produce a computer that can mimic had functionality of the human cortex. what does that mean in a layman's understanding? thank you very much for all of your writings. >> guest: it turns out computers are getting more powerful all of the time. we have a law that says the power doubles every 18 months. the largest computers based in a laboratory in california where we design hydrogen warheads, the largest computers can mimic the brain of a mouse for a minute. mimic thinking abilities for animals for a minute or so. but it is only a matter of time

before it is as a rabbit and then a dog or cat and then perhaps after that a human. but to mimic the complete thinking process of the human mind, i think is going to be many deck apadecades ago. by 2020, i think we will be able to mimic part of the brain but the full brain is decaddecades that. don't think a robot is going do replace us any to me but by the end of the century we may have robots half as smart as us and i think we should put a chip in their brain to shut them off if they are murderous thoughts. >> host: is the fact watson won jeopardy a big deal?

>> guest: there is a computer that beat two people on jeopardy but it is an adding machine and has no consciousness. you cannot slap it on the back and say congrats, you just beat two humans because the computer doesn't know what it did. it isn't aware of itself. we don't have self aware robots like in the movie "her" many people saw. don't think you will be able to take out a computer for a date tonight. >> host: chris in silver springs, maryland. hi, chris. chris, you with us? chris is not -- >> caller: has been attributed to schizophrenia and parapsites

you know that can cause problems. >> host: chris, you will have to repeat that? chris i apologize too garbled. we will leave it there. thank you for being with us. if you are watching c-span we are covering the science pavilion here. and you will >> is this a nonfiction author or book you'd like to see featured on booktv? send us an e-mail to booktv it's c-span.org, tweet us @booktv, or post on our wall, facebook.com/booktv. >> and you're watching booktv on c-span2. here's our prime time lineup for tonight. up next, new york senator kirsten gillibrand. she talks about her life in politics is and encourages women to make a difference in the world. at 7:45, a debate on foreign

policy featuring dinesh d'souza. on "after words" at 9 p.m., ken silverstein looking at corruption in the international oil industry. edward baptist contends that slavery drove the united states' transformation into a global economic force at 10 p.m. eastern. and we wrap up tonight's prime time programming at 11 p.m. with two operation iraqi freedom veterans discussing the current state of iraq. that all happens next on c-span2's booktv. >> senator kirsten gillibrand talks about her life in politics and calls for women to rise up and make a difference in the world. this is about 45 minutes. ms. . [applause] >> it's just such a pleasure for me to introduce two extraordinary women tonight and two extraordinary voices in our

nation's public life. our guest of honor is the mother of two, a wife, a lawyer, a sunday schoolteacher, community volunteer, former democratic representative from the 20th district of new york and, of course, now united states senator from new york in her second term. but that's not all. as of two days ago, senator kirsten gillibrand has added a new title to her resumé, author. senator gillibrand's new book is called "off the sidelines: raise your voice, change the world." it's part memoir, part call to action, part inspirational guidebook for women doing the great balancing act -- and, by the way, it's a great book for men too. the title comes in part from the wonderful online book group that senator gillibrand has convened in which women across the country join together to discuss a book every few months and share ideas about how they can use their voices to affect change in their communities and beyond. "off the sidelines," the book,