[HN Gopher] DARPA developing new cognitive science tool to ident...
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DARPA developing new cognitive science tool to identify those at
risk of suicide
Author : hdivider
Score : 24 points
Date : 2022-03-10 20:39 UTC (2 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (federallabs.org)
(TXT) w3m dump (federallabs.org)
| 79843758 wrote:
| That's horrifying.
| giantg2 wrote:
| As along as identifying them as at-risk doesn't equate to
| labeling/condemning them as at-risk or suicidal without
| protections and more traditional steps/measures (not that those
| are fool proof either).
| cf141q5325 wrote:
| As likely to be used for suicide prevention in the end as older
| drone projects were for "delivering aid during disaster
| scenarios" with the required capability to identify individuals.
| I would say the road to hell is paved with good intentions, but
| it turns out giving research some transparent lie to tell
| themselves is more then enough.
| jodrellblank wrote:
| https://knowledge.insead.edu/blog/insead-blog/africas-drone-...
|
| >" _In Africa, doctors are also placing orders remotely, but
| for a rather different kind of sustenance: blood._ "
|
| > " _The plasma is delivered by drones to far-flung communities
| in Rwanda and Ghana within minutes of the order being placed by
| text message, often in a context of life-and-death like
| childbirth gone wrong. They are the world's first national-
| scale solution for the healthcare and emergency needs of people
| living in places not served or hard to reach by land transport.
| What started with blood supplies and vaccines now also includes
| medicine, contraceptives and personal protective equipment
| (PPE)._ "
|
| ZipLine have been doing this since 2016, and are now doing it
| in the USA too.
| zigzaggy wrote:
| I think this is a valuable contribution to this conversation.
| You have shown how drones are definitely being used in
| critical situations. I can't see why you're being downvoted.
| I always try to support comments that are being downvoted for
| the wrong reasons (in terms of the HN rules).
| kube-system wrote:
| Maybe not for directly delivering aid, but drones have been
| pretty successful in being useful for search/rescue/mapping
| disaster areas.
|
| Sometimes technology isn't immediately useful in the exact way
| we think it will be.
|
| Sent from my DARPA nuclear-war tolerant communication terminal.
| wnkrshm wrote:
| You mean like using the tool to systematically identify the
| small changes in suicide likelihood due to parameter variation
| of a subject's interactions/environment and then maximizing the
| likelihood? A suicide inductor.
| ChrisKnott wrote:
| Where are you quoting from? Why would DARPA have any need to
| conceal that it's research had a military purpose?
|
| I can't find anything that says drone projects were originally
| pitched for aid delivery.
| kjgkjhfkjf wrote:
| "NEAT would identify psychological and behavioral changes
| before they impact military readiness."
|
| I think the idea is to identify soldiers and other personnel
| who are at risk of becoming suicidal during a military
| operation. This seems like a good idea to me, given the extent
| that the safety of soldiers depends on the mental acuity of
| their colleagues.
| after_care wrote:
| This is such a moonshot. Right now, give all warning signs we
| know if, if you could identified the 100 most likely people in
| America to attempt suicide in the next 24 hours that haven't had
| a previous suicide attempt or previously announced intentions of
| self harming you might successfully identify 5 people. Answering
| the question "who will attempt suicide" is a lot like "who will
| have a fatal car accident ". There's a handful of obvious warning
| signs (drunk drivers), but even those aren't strong enough to
| allow any certainty.
| polski-g wrote:
| Suicidality is 47% heritable. So just get the blood of people
| who have committed suicide & do some GWAS studies. Then you can
| look for predictive genetic markers in 23andme data.
| badrabbit wrote:
| Ugh.. that's none of their damn business? If a person needs help
| they can reach out and you can make remove any barriers
| preventing them but having your mental disorder identified
| against your will sounds horrific. Ends don't justify means!
| cscurmudgeon wrote:
| Where does it say it will be against someone's will?
| unfocussed_mike wrote:
| *sigh* HN comments are entirely predictable.
|
| _Tools_ that help understand and detect suicidal behaviour
| could also help refine an understanding that _people_ can use
| to spot potentially pre-suicidal behaviour in the people they
| love.
|
| You know that suicidal people often don't, can't or won't reach
| out for help at all, right? And may in the days before their
| suicide appear to be dramatically better, serene, even
| peaceful?
|
| There are likely other common patterns of pre-suicidal
| behaviour (unusual secrecy for example), and a tool that can
| help clarify what the reliable indicators are, really might
| stop people killing themselves. We want this, don't we?
|
| In DARPA's case, if those people are in the service, it _is_
| their damn business; they have a duty of care.
|
| Away from DARPA, better processes might have stopped a horrific
| airline disaster in recent years. There are some people in
| highly significant, routinely stressful roles who are regularly
| psych-screened anyway. Those screenings need better tools to be
| more useful.
| newaccount2021 wrote:
| api wrote:
| DARPA (war department) works on life-saving applications of AI,
| while private social media works on addictive engagement
| algorithms to make people miserable and enslave them to dopamine
| loops.
|
| This strike anyone as a bit off?
| Impassionata wrote:
| Starlevel001 wrote:
| Now this cuts out the annoying governmental process of having to
| find your future suicide bombers. You can just look them up in a
| database and assign an agent immediately!
| kahrl wrote:
| This 2022 remake of Minority Report is really a snooze.
| oneplane wrote:
| But then what? Ditch the people to avoid responsibility? Jail
| them to prevent suicide? (and with that, avoid responsibility) Or
| actually get to the root cause and fix that, even if the root
| cause is society in one way or another...?
| chomp wrote:
| Military readiness is organizing and preparing the military for
| success in the field. If members are unwell, then they need to
| be identified, and then treated.
|
| Suicides are a big problem affecting unit readiness at the
| moment, as depression not only lowers the effectiveness of
| individual people, but the suicide also affects unit morale.
|
| Not everyone is comfortable with seeking help, especially in
| the armed forces (due to a variety of reasons such as culture),
| so if there are more tools to visibly see these issues (like we
| would with standard medical issues), then that makes it much
| easier to open up dialogue with our soldiers, and begin
| treatment.
| mschuster91 wrote:
| > Not everyone is comfortable with seeking help, especially
| in the armed forces (due to a variety of reasons such as
| culture), so if there are more tools to visibly see these
| issues (like we would with standard medical issues), then
| that makes it much easier to open up dialogue with our
| soldiers, and begin treatment.
|
| And once again, we're seeing technology being attempted to
| use as a band-aid instead of fixing the _actual_ problems -
| the culture of toxic masculinity that is not just in the
| mindset of the soldiers but also in almost all
| advertisements, the fact that many seek to join the military
| not out of their own will (e.g. to defend the homeland) but
| to escape poverty, or the fact that many get sent to the
| military by their parents either because of "tradition" or
| because they are seen as "rebellious" and the military should
| "fix them".
|
| Humans aren't cogs in a machine, and projects such as this
| are only one thing: another layer to make sure the cogs
| perform as required. Dehumanizing.
| oneplane wrote:
| But if the culture makes it hard, technology is hardly going
| to fix that, right? Culture is a human problem, not a
| technology problem. Technology is just a tool, and perhaps a
| force multiplier, but a change in culture?
| kelseyfrog wrote:
| That's where the real fun of it lies. Imagine you have at
| your disposal every tool to modify individual behavior, but
| no tools to modify social systems? What second-order
| effects result from solely relying on individual
| interventions? If there are ways that make people feel ok
| with the soul-crushing weight to social ills, is it right
| to employ them?
| SllX wrote:
| Correct; but that doesn't mean there isn't any utility in
| new technology for improving our culture so long as the
| people using it want to do so.
| jimbob45 wrote:
| Ideally you use the predictive technology to enhance and check
| the work of humans. In reality, I agree that people usually
| just get ditched in favor of the technology that works most of
| the time...but not all (self-driving comes to mind).
| JasonFruit wrote:
| "If it saves even one life, it will be worth it!"
|
| Even if it means preemptive curtailment of their liberty,
| privacy, and choice, whether or not they would actually have
| committed suicide if left unmolested.
| zwkrt wrote:
| I can imagine the dystopian sci-fi work now, of someone who has
| been tagged in the governmental credit check system as being 'at
| risk of suicide'. They are systematically denied access, othered,
| and subtly offered help for mental health problems (which they
| did not perceive themselves as having previously before being
| suggested) causing them to be pushed to the edge of sanity.
| aserdf wrote:
| worse yet - that individual has incurred healthcare costs at a
| greater rate than their "peer group" and the nudges turn away
| from mental health assistance to subtle suicide encouragement
| for the "common good" (lowering aggregate healthcare costs).
| jcadam wrote:
| Or you find yourself repeatedly thrown in the looney bin for a
| 72 hour suicide watch. And sent the bill (see Baker Act and
| other constitutionally-dubious state laws).
| bumby wrote:
| If I'm understanding this correctly, it essentially tries to tell
| if someone agrees with a statement ("I want to end my life") by
| looking at "preconscious" brain signals, regardless of what the
| interviewee answers consciously. So is it like an MRI for lie
| detectors? I wonder how it compares to the faults of traditional
| lie detectors.
|
| Besides the weird "precog" minority report vibes, it makes for an
| interesting validation problem.
| jrapdx3 wrote:
| From the brief overview provided by DARPA it's not entirely clear
| what methods or system is envisioned to do the "preconscious"
| screening. Presumably some kind of measurement of brain waves,
| but that seems way ahead of where the science is at.
|
| In any case I wonder if this approach is really the right target.
| It's true, the suicide rate in military (active duty and veteran)
| is tragic, but also elevated in the general population. I'd
| venture a guess that the issue with suicide reflects a tremendous
| stigma attached to behavioral disorders such that sufferers are
| dissuaded from seeking evaluation and treatment until conditions
| reach disabling proportions or maybe not even then.
|
| I have serious doubt that technological methodologies alone will
| be an adequate solution. Of course it's possible that new tools
| will move the ball downfield and play a role in extinguishing
| long-standing prejudices but it remains to be seen if that will
| happen.
| bumby wrote:
| I hate to be a cynic, but my feeling is that it's more
| applicable to lie detection and the suicide prevention is a
| good application (but probably far from the main goal). Cut out
| all the suicide-specific wording, and it sounds like generic
| lie detection that military or law enforcement would have a lot
| of interest in.
|
| _" The screening process envisioned could involve presenting
| various statement stimuli...or intentions (e.g., I want to [do
| this bad thing]) to measure preconscious responses. "_
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