Full-Mental Nudity: The arrival of mind-reading machines

March 20, 2007

Years ago, Woody Allen used to joke that he’d been thrown out of college as a freshman for cheating on his metaphysics final. “I looked within the soul of the boy sitting next to me,” he confessed. Today, the joke is on us. Cameras follow your car, GPS tracks your cell phone, software monitors your Web surfing, X-rays explore your purse, and airport scanners see through your clothes. Now comes the final indignity: machines that look into your soul. (Slate)