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MIND MEDIA REVIEW
No. 12
July 1997
Edited by Bruce Ehrlich
*************
To visit our site, tune your favorite web browser to
http://www.mindmedia.com
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--+--+--+--+--
+--+--+--+--+--+
Welcome back Mind Media Review readers. Every month, we will bring you
news
and information from the cutting edge of "mindware" interactive
technologies for self-improvement and creativity.
-. . .-- ... --- ..-. - .... . .-- .. .-. . -..
* Going Beyond: Software and Human Potential
* Your Mythic Journey Summer Sale
-. . .-- ... --- ..-. - .... . .-- .. .-. . -..
-. . .-- ... --- ..-. - .... . .-- .. .-. . -..
Feature Article: Going Beyond: Software and the Mind
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Going Beyond: Software and the Mind
By Bruce Eisner
Imagine a future in which your personal computer becomes a
doorway into a world of enhanced intelligence and creativity,
emotional stability and previously unrealized personal success. In
this world, the computer has become more than just a word
processor or a web browser; it has become both an instantaneous
communication tool for contacting seminar leaders or personal
therapists and an interactive councilor that uses artificial
intelligence to provide personal coaching and wise guidance. Or
even further in the future, computer aided methods of
transformation of human consciousness.
Could that colorful screen upon which you may be reading this
become that door? This is a question that has intrigued those who
have studies the potential of the PC, and the answer may be that
this reality is closer than we realize. Before we look ahead and
examine the possibilities, let's take a brief glimpse backward at the
history if the mind/computer connection.
A Brief History of Software "Mind Tools"
The notion that computers could be tools for mental development
and transformation goes back further than the personal computer.
Mind Prober was
and is simply a computerized personality profile.
It's the descendent of tests like those you probably took in school
but never got to see the results - or the MMPI test that is used to
classify people with mental disorders. What is so remarkable about
Mind Prober and its descendents is tha by comparing answers to the test on
paper
or, in this case, in the computer program with groups
of people
with known personality attributes. The unique way that specific
personality type answers certain questions gives the personality
test program uncanny insight into what seem to be hidden
dimensions of an individual.
These early psychological programs were text-based CGA graphic
programs. But both programs proved fascinating to many people
with psychological curiosity including a graduate student named
Bruce Ehrlich, who was just about to complete a Ph.D. in
psychology and who had collected a series of programs he called
Mindware.
Ehrlich published his first collection of
mind software in the
Spring 1988 Mindware catalog. It probably is no accident that two
of the most popular programs in that catalog were a modern
version of Eliza for the PC (the first ones only ran on mainframes),
and Mindviewer, an upgrade to Mind Prober. Another popular
program was Calmpute! manufactured by Thought Technology of
Toronto, Canada - a biofeedback program that measured galvanic
skin response. A special mouse measured your GSR and displayed
the results on a computer screen. By discovering what kind of
things you did to make the display graph change, you could learn
to control your levels of stress and relaxation.
The Mindware catalog continued in its print version from 1988
until 1993 when it reached a circulation of a half million catalogs..
Programs became increasingly sophisticated and diverse. Among
the most noteworthy of the new offerings in the catalog were:
* Overcoming Depression -- A program by computer-assisted
therapy expert Professor Thomas Colby, based on his reseub which did
Eliza one better, winning the Loebner award by beating the
famous Touring Test, in which a British cybernetics expert
in the 'Fifties suggested a
test for machine intelligence
which consisted of the ability to fool people into believing
they were talking to a real human over a teletype devise.
* Idea Generator Plus - a program developed by Roy
Nierenberg, founder of based on
Gerard Nierenberg's (the founder's father), book The Art of
Creative Thinking and presents an interactive process based on
exercises from the book, for developing new ideas on the user
project of
12
July 1997
Edited by Bruce Ehrlich
*************
To visit our site, tune your favorite web browser to
http://www.mindmedia.com
+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+
Welcome back Mind Media Review readers. Every month, we will bring you
news
and information from the cutting edge of "mindware" interactive
technologies for self-improvement and creativity.
-. . .-- ... --- ..-. - .... . .-- .. .-. . -..
* Going Beyond: Software and Human Potential
* Your Mythic Journey Summer Sale
-. . .-- ... --- ..-. - .... . .-- .. .-. . -..
-. . .-- ... --- ..-. - .... . .-- .. .-. . -..
Feature Article: Going Beyond: Software and the Mind
+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+
Going Beyond: Software and the Mind
By Bruce Eisner
Imagine a future in which your personal computer becomes a
doorway into a world of enhanced intelligence and creativity,
emotional stability and previously unrealized personal success. In
this world, the computer has become more than just a word
processor or a web browser; it has become both an instantaneous
communication tool for contacting seminar leaders or personal
therapists and an interactive councilor that uses artificial
intelligence to provide personal coaching and wise guidance. Or
even further in the future, computer aided methods of
transformation of human consciousness.
Could that colorful screen upon which you may be reading this
become that door? This is a question that has intrigued those who
have studies the potential of the PC, and the answer may be that
this reality is closer than we realize. Before we look ahead and
examine the possibilities, let's take a brief glimpse backward at the
history if the mind/computer connection.
A Brief History of Software "Mind Tools"
The notion that computers could be tools for mental
With the introduction
of this CD-ROM, mind software had taken a
giant step forward, with the user finding that they can continue to
gain value through exploring their lives. A series of other CD-
ROM titles began to be released including one by John Gray, Ph.D.
based on his best-selling book, Men are from Mars, Women are
from Venus, a relationship seminar-on-a-disk and many others.
In addition to these new CD-ROM based interactive multimedia
presentations, a number of new software programs with increased
features have been released. One program, from BrainTainment
(http://www.brain.com), called ThinkFast, measures and coaches
users on increasing a variety of mental abilities including memory,
cognitive abilities and reflexes. Using a high quality graphical
interface running in the Windows environment, programs like
these and those that follow may become "mind gyms", a term that
Bruce Ehrlich of Mind Media began using around 1990 to describe
the potential of this type of mind software
(http://newciv.org/GIB/BOV/BV-488.HTML)
Another area that has taken great leaps forward since the early
Mindware catalog days is the area of computers and biofeedback.
Biofeedback first became popular in the `Sixties. Biofeedback was
invented by Professor Joe Kamiya, who first discovered that the
brain could actually control processes in the body and brain
previously thought only to be under control of the autonomic
nervous system, which was considered to be completely
unavailable to consciousness. By feeding back signals from
various body and brain processes, people could learn to control
how they felt and thought!
The earliest devices were simple ones that measured GSR or EEG
and gave a simple noise like a tone so that the user could learn to
control these body and brain functions. Because they were rather
boring to use and because they looked at only one modality of the
particular process they monitored, these biofeedback systems
quickly lost their popularity.
However biofeedback clinics continued to operate and help people
with a variety of tasks including stress reduction and control of
migraine headaches and even blood pressure control. With the
invention and increasing sophistication of the PC however, these
tools have made remarkableprogress.
Welcome back Mind Media Review readers.
Every month, we will bring you
news
and information from the cutting edge of "mindware" interactive
technologies for self-improvement and creativity.
-. . .-- ... --- ..-. - .... . .-- .. .-. . -..
* Going Beyond: Software and Human Potential
* Your Mythic Journey Summer Sale
-. . .-- ... --- ..-. - .... . .-- .. .-. . -..
-. . .-- ... --- ..-. - .... . .-- .. .-. . -..
Feature Article: Going Beyond: Software and the Mind
+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+-
Going Beyond: Software and the Mind
By Bruce Eisner
Imagine a future in which your personal computer becomes a
doorway into a world of enhanced intelligence and creativity,
emotional stability and previously unrealized personal success. In
this world, the computer has become more than just a word
processor or a web browser; it has become both an instantaneous
communication tool for contacting seminar leaders or personal
therapists and an interactive councilor that uses artificial
intelligence to provide personal coaching and wise guidance. Or
even further in the future, computer aided methods of
transformation of human consciousness.
Could that colorful screen upon which you may be reading this
become that door? This is a question that has intrigued those who
have studies the potential of the PC, and the answer may be that
this reality is closer than we realize. Before we look ahead and
examine the possibilities, let's take a brief glimpse backward at the
history if the mind/computer connection.
A Brief History of Software "Mind Tools"
The notion that computers could be tools for mental development
and transformation goes back further than the personal computer.
Joseph Weisenbaum, a professor at MIT in the 1960's developed a
program on a mainframe that he called Eliza, which imitated a
psychotherapist of the Rogerian school by rephrasing what the user
said or sometimes posing a oddball question about his or her
mother - from out of the blue. Although meant to be a kind of
joke, a comment on artificial intelligence, he was astounded to find
people having real conversations with his newly created program,
and some found that they liked talking to it better than their flesh-
and-blood "shrink."
The earliest company to harness the earliest PCs, Macs,
Commodores and Apples in the early `Eighties was Human Edge --
founded by Dr. James Johnson, a former psychology professor
from the University of Minnesota and a salesman for IBM.
Johnson's company developed a program called Mind Prober, still
the most successful mind-related software ever sold with an
amazing one-quarter million sold in the world of 1985, when there
were only perhaps only four million PC's in the entire world. This
would be the equivalent of selling five million programs in today.
Mind Prober was and is simply a computerized personality profile.
It's the descendent of tests like those you probably took in school
but never got to see the results - or the MMPI test that is used to
classify people with mental disor
MIND MEDIA REVIEW No. 12
July 1997
Edited by Bruce Ehrlich
*************
To visit our site, tune your favorite web browser to
http://www.mindmedia.com
+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+
Welcome back Mind Media Review readers. Every month, we will bring you
news
and information from the cutting edge of "mindware" interactive
technologies for self-improvement and creativity.
-. . .-- ... --- ..-. - .... . .-- .. .-. . -..
* Going Beyond: Software and Human Potential
* Your Mythic Journey Summer Sale
-. . .-- ... --- ..-. - .... . .-- .. .-. . -..
-. . .-- ... --- ..-. - .... . .-- .. .-. . -..
Feature Article: Going Beyond: Software and the Mind
+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+
Going Beyond: Software and the Mind
By Bruce Eisner
Imagine a future in which your personal computer becomes a
doorway into a world of enhanced intelligence and creativity,
emotional stability and previously unrealized personal success. In
this world, the computer has become more than just a word
processor or a web browser; it has become both an instantaneous
communication tool for contacting seminar leaders or personal
therapists and an interactive councilor that uses artificial
intelligence to provide personal coaching and wise guidance. Or
even further in the future, computer aided methods of
transformation of human consciousness.
Could that colorful screen upon which you may be reading this
become that door? This is a question that has intrigued those who
have studies the potential of the PC, and the answer may be that
this reality is closer than we realize. Before we look ahead and
examine the possibilities, let's take a brief glimpse backward at the
history if the mind/computer connection.
A Brief History of Software "Mind Tools"
The notion that computers could be tools for mental
