Into the Mind: Mind Control

Michael Mosely, host of the BBC series Into the Mind, volunteers here as a human experimental subject—being dosed with psilocybin under carefully monitored conditions that briefly turn him into an excited nonstop talker. Although Mosely was a willing participant in chemically hotwiring his own neural circuitry, others were not so lucky, as viewers will learn in this thought-provoking documentary chronicling 20th-century attempts at mind control and behavior modification. The reasons for conducting mind control vary—from instilling societal conformity to creating weapons of war; even, in one notable case, to break up a romantic relationship of which the patient's parents disapproved (the effort failed). Gruesome old Russian footage shows Ivan Pavlov's famous demonstrations in mental conditioning on dogs and children (both species surgically altered for the purpose). B.F. Skinner's controversial theories denying the existence of free will are rather sketchily discussed, along with North Korean “brainwashing” of captured POWs and assorted techniques applied on the unwilling, poor, or socially marginalized—even by “legitimate” researchers. Glossed over in this survey are the DIY brainwashing practiced by cults and criminal gangs (a legal defense in the Patricia Hearst case) and multitudinous conspiracy theories à la The Manchurian Candidate that have arisen from this disturbing corner of science. Although Mosely concludes that the human brain is too complex for modern technology to reprogram, there's no reassurance that attempts will cease. Also newly available in the Into the Mind series are Broken Brains and Emotions. Recommended. Aud: C, P. (C. Cassady)