Page 179 of The Secret of Secrets

“The future will be controlled by those who develop the first true human-to-machine interface,” Finch began. “Effortless communication between people and technology. No typing, dictating, viewing…just thinking. The financial ramifications alone are enough to create a new world superpower, but the practical applications, particularly in the field of intelligence work…are unimaginable.”

Langdon suspected a viable H2M technology, in the wrong hands, could make the worst Orwellian nightmare look like an amusing daydream.

“For this reason,” Finch continued, “the CIA had been working tirelessly to keep pace with the biotech behemoths—Neuralink, Kernal, Synchron, and the rest—all of whom have bottomless war chests and the same quest to be the first brain implant capable of true high-speed, human-to-machine communication. Fortunately for us, they’ve all faced the same hurdle.”

“The interface,” Katherine said. “How to create artificial neurons.”

Finch nodded. “Neuralink has had moderate success, but nothing on the scale of what’s necessary. The missing piece turns out to be a design that the CIA has been fortunate enough to be developing for two decades now.”

“Taken from Katherine’s patent,” Langdon said.

“To repeat, Dr. Solomon holds no patent. And if she had, we would have taken it over in the name of national security. The challenge with exercising eminent domain is that the process can be contentious and public, often revealing precisely what the agency is interested in keeping secret.”

“What are you doing with my design?” Katherine demanded. “What is Threshold?”

Finch removed his glasses with his free hand and slowly rolled out his neck. “Dr. Solomon, perhaps you recall when Caltech built an implant that tapped into the brain’s visual cortex and could effectively ‘see’ whatever the host was seeing through his or her eyes.”

“Certainly I remember,” Katherine said. “The implant captured optical signals passing through the optic nerve, translated them, and broadcasted them out as live video.”

Langdon was not familiar with the technology, but it sounded essentially like an internal GoPro camera—a way to look through someone else’s eyes. Is Threshold monitoring what subjects are seeing? If so, it was an entirely new kind of surveillance. Langdon looked up at the video screens encircling the dome and imagined point-of-view broadcasts from people moving about their daily lives. But then why the pods?

“The agency has been working on something similar,” Finch said, “a far superior version of that implant—one that can monitor what is being experienced not by the eyes…but rather by the mind’s eye.”

For Langdon, the phrase “mind’s eye” conjured images of the colorful bindi dot worn between the eyebrows to represent the gateway to spiritual wisdom, also called the Third Eye.

“Your mind’s eye, Professor,” Finch said, apparently sensing Langdon’s uncertainty, “is the mechanism by which your brain sees without your eyes. When you close your eyes and picture your childhood home, a vivid image appears. That is your mind’s eye. Your brain does not require visual input to conjure detailed images. Your brain continuously views memories, fantasies, daydreams, imaginations. Even when you sleep, your brain conjures images in the forms of dreams and nightmares.”

“You can’t really have built…” Katherine trailed off, looking for the right words.

“We did,” Finch replied with a hint of pride. “Threshold has created an implant that can view the content of the mind’s eye. We can now monitor the full spectrum of images a brain conjures…seeing it unfold in real time, in full detail.”

From the stupefied look on Katherine’s face, Langdon sensed this was an astonishing feat in the field of brain science. He was aware that a scientist at Kyoto University had recently announced a technology that recorded dreams and played them back as a rough movie, although his process sounded rudimentary—using AI to translate MRI dream data into approximated images. What Finch was describing sounded like a quantum leap.

Can Threshold spy on the imagination?

Langdon wondered if this technology related somehow to Katherine’s notion of the brain as a receiver. After all, if an implant could see an image that materialized in the brain, maybe the implant could also tell where the image came from. Was it stored inside the physical memory, as materialists claimed? Or was it flowing in from the outside, as Katherine believed in her model of nonlocal consciousness?

“This implant…actually works?” Katherine asked, finding her voice. “A technology like that could have enormous implications for consciousness research…”

“So I imagine,” Finch said. “But Threshold is focused solely on national security.”

Langdon saw Katherine go slightly pale as she turned and surveyed the sleek EPR pods fanned out beneath the dome. “Suspended animation…” she whispered, turning fearfully back to Finch. “Are you placing subjects on the edge of death…and watching what they see? You’re monitoring near-death experiences?”

“In a sense, yes, of course,” Finch replied. “As you well know, the delicate ‘threshold’ between life and death is a mystical place.”

Finch paused, as if to let the words soak in.

Threshold.

Langdon hadn’t thought of the term that way until now.

“Those hovering on the brink of death will see things, know things, understand things normally beyond our reach,” Finch continued. “The agency has been running psychic research for nearly half a century—aimed at harnessing the untapped power of the human mind for the purpose of intelligence gathering. We’ve hired psychics, mediums, clairvoyants, remote viewers, precognition specialists, and even lucid dreamers. But the world’s most gifted minds cannot come close to achieving what can be achieved in the altered state that accompanies death.”

This is exactly what Katherine wrote about…Langdon realized, recalling her theory about the chemistry of death: as we die, GABA levels plummet, our brain filters dissolve, and we receive a vastly wider bandwidth of reality. Langdon couldn’t help but feel that if enhanced perception were truly the mystical gift accompanying death, then harnessing it for military intelligence work was somehow…sacrilegious.

“The challenge,” Finch said, “is that near-death experiences are fleeting and confusing. When you emerge and try to recall them, it’s a bit like trying to remember a dream in the morning; the images are fuzzy and dissolve quickly.”

“And now you can record the experience?” Katherine said, looking astonished.