Lie detection by EEG

An actual lie detector has been the stuff of fantasy and science fiction.  While the magic spell that detects untruth or even compels truth may never be achieved, one scientist thinks he's identified brain waves that correspond to deception.

A Seattle scientist who has developed an electronic brain test that he says could improve our ability to force criminals to reveal themselves, identify potential terrorists and free those wrongly convicted may have finally broken through the bureaucratic barriers that he believes have served to stifle adoption of the pioneering technique.

As part of this research, Farwell ran across what would become the scientific basis of brain fingerprinting. It is a type of signal in the brain known as a P300 wave, so-called because it is an involuntary response to a recognized object or piece of information that happens within 300 milliseconds.

It's been a well-known and widely accepted phenomenon within neuroscience. What Farwell did is connect it with another related electrical brain response that he dubbed a MerMer (for "memory and encoding related multifaceted electroencephalographic response") that he contends provides a foolproof method for testing an individual's knowledge -- or lack of knowledge -- of a criminal act.

"It's 100 percent reliable and has been ruled admissible in court," Farwell said.

That was in Iowa, during a court case in which a man, Terry Harrington, was found innocent of murder and in 2003 released after spending 24 years in prison. Brain fingerprinting played a role, Farwell emphasized, but was not the only reason for Harrington's exoneration. And in another case, that of Jimmy Ray Slaughter in Oklahoma, Farwell's brain fingerprint finding that Slaughter was likely innocent did not persuade the court or prevent his execution.

Of course, before it's adopted, I'd like to see a lot more testing. 

Maybe that testing's already been done, in which case, we should be able to see lots of research papers.  I'd also like to see the results of testing on known sociopaths and other people with psychiatric problems.  A technique that works on college students may not work as well on the population that turns up in police interrogation rooms.

And then, of course, there are the constitutional issues.