or at least they will be able to soon enough. This is what
researchers from NYU are trying to accomplish and, by the looks of it, they
might be able to pull it off. Well to be fair, it will not be the camera itself
that will be capable of such a feat; it is software that will be installed
within the camera and that has been under development under the watchful eye of
sponsors such as the Pentagon.
Now you might ask, “What is the point of that?” Well, the US
Military thinks that developing software that can read emotions will play a key
role in avoiding tragedies like the Boston Marathon Bombing. In fact, although
today’s video analytics software can determine if a person is concealing a
weapon or identify suspicious behavioral patterns, it is only able to do so
after the fact.
However, imagine if a camera could detect suspicious behavior live
and send out the appropriate alert or warning. This is what the team of
researchers is currently working now and, according to them, they can already
identify positive emotions and next on their list are negative/aggressive
emotions. This has been useful mainly for marketing purposes, in order to
detect the type of responses crowds come-up with when exposed to different stimuli.
Nonetheless, although the theory seems to be relatively straightforward,
such software will have to be ‘trained’. What is meant by that is that it will
have to be loaded with data form people paid to analyze and tag video footage
based on what they are shown on their screens. Researchers then take this data
and upload it into a computer neural network that analyzes the relationship
between the data, thus allowing the software to do so on its own.
Lets hope these guys can pull it off because, from what I have
read, it seems that such technology will really be able to prevent or at least
mitigate the impact of such events in the future.
References:
http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/observations/2013/04/18/httpblogs-scientificamerican-comobservationswp-adminpost-new-phppost_typepost/
References:
http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/observations/2013/04/18/httpblogs-scientificamerican-comobservationswp-adminpost-new-phppost_typepost/
I think that if there is a camera which can see through object installed the software in article, we can perfectly prevent tragedies like the Boston Marathon Bombing. I know invasion of privacy can be issue if the technology is really comes out. But many places that could be target of terrorist need complete monitoring a lot by machine or people.
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