(no subject)
The future lies in cyborg rat brains.
This is amazing. These researchers have taken a collection of rat neurons and essentially plugged them into a computer flight simulator. It's learning. It's gotten to the point where it can keep a plane flying stable and on track in most any weather conditions, from fair skies to hurricane-level winds. And this is a relatively tiny collection of brain matter.
We're definitely moving into a cybernetic future with impressive steadfastness. Last year, Duke University researchers demonstrated that the mind doesn't care what input/output devices are connected to it. Their experiment involved plugging wires into monkeys' brains and recording the signals as they controlled a robotic arm via a joystick. Eventually, the joysticks were removed and the monkeys began to realize that the same thoughts could still be applied to move the robotic arms. The robot arm became their own limb.
Similar is Phil Kennedy, an Atlanta neuroscientist, who is implanting electrodes into human patients' brains to allow them to control mouse cursors on a computer screen, freeing them to essentially communicate in what becomes a natural manner. That cursor becomes a limb.
And the brain comes to accept these things as being just as real as any physical limb one was born with. The brain simply works with what it's got, which has mind-blowing (pun?) potential written all over it, and personally, i anxiously welcome any advance science can bring us.
This is amazing. These researchers have taken a collection of rat neurons and essentially plugged them into a computer flight simulator. It's learning. It's gotten to the point where it can keep a plane flying stable and on track in most any weather conditions, from fair skies to hurricane-level winds. And this is a relatively tiny collection of brain matter.
We're definitely moving into a cybernetic future with impressive steadfastness. Last year, Duke University researchers demonstrated that the mind doesn't care what input/output devices are connected to it. Their experiment involved plugging wires into monkeys' brains and recording the signals as they controlled a robotic arm via a joystick. Eventually, the joysticks were removed and the monkeys began to realize that the same thoughts could still be applied to move the robotic arms. The robot arm became their own limb.
Similar is Phil Kennedy, an Atlanta neuroscientist, who is implanting electrodes into human patients' brains to allow them to control mouse cursors on a computer screen, freeing them to essentially communicate in what becomes a natural manner. That cursor becomes a limb.
And the brain comes to accept these things as being just as real as any physical limb one was born with. The brain simply works with what it's got, which has mind-blowing (pun?) potential written all over it, and personally, i anxiously welcome any advance science can bring us.