Intel Corp. has introduced software that analyzes functional MRI scans to determine what parts of a person's brain are being activated as he or she thinks. it has 90 percent accuracy in guesses about which of two words a person was thinking about. Eventually, the technology could help the severely physically disabled to communicate.
The system works best when a person is first scanned while thinking of dozens of different concrete nouns - words like "bear" or "hammer." When test subjects are then asked to pick one of two new terms and think about it, the software uses the earlier results as a baseline to determine what the person is thinking. Very cool stuff.