A good read

[Member22]

I stumbled over this, its quite a nice article... I'm sure Emi would be happy:

http://io9.com/5535730/portraits-in-pos ... ee-mullins

[Minister of Gloom]

Emi would be happy anyway, that's how she is. Stupid genki girls.
But yes, this is an interesting article and a good inspiration. Not long ago there was a video here of an interview with this woman, no?

[Esper]

There's a reason why you'll see mechanical or magical augmentations to the human body in so many works of fiction. It's because the human body is limited in its maximum potential. Prostheses offer much more than bone and flesh ever can.

Then again I don't intend to remove my legs for robot legs anytime soon... but for those that need the augmentation it's a wonderful thing indeed.

[ContinualNaba]

There's a reason why you'll see mechanical or magical augmentations to the human body in so many works of fiction. It's because the human body is limited in its maximum potential. Prostheses offer much more than bone and flesh ever can.

Then again I don't intend to remove my legs for robot legs anytime soon... but for those that need the augmentation it's a wonderful thing indeed.

Remember, the brain wasn't built to deal with anything more than flesh and bone. You can't just graft in an extra foot or so and expect to control it yourself.

[[LaZa]]

I'd love to have a Gunslinger. Shitty TF2 Reference.
I always liked prosthetics, arms, mostly, but prosthetics of this days aren't even near of a normal human limb, most of them (the ones that can be moved, like robotic arms, legs) are controled with a remote control, (well, actually not a remote control, but something like that), after the developers of prosthetics figure out how to connect the prosthetic to the nerves correctly one by one for each joint of the arm/leg, then they may use prosthetics for enhancing humans.

[AapoAlas]

There's a reason why you'll see mechanical or magical augmentations to the human body in so many works of fiction. It's because the human body is limited in its maximum potential. Prostheses offer much more than bone and flesh ever can.

Then again I don't intend to remove my legs for robot legs anytime soon... but for those that need the augmentation it's a wonderful thing indeed.

Remember, the brain wasn't built to deal with anything more than flesh and bone. You can't just graft in an extra foot or so and expect to control it yourself.

Not quite true, I must argue. The world has already seen it's first cyborg.
Reading about it on that page is of course the best idea, but a quick recap: Kevin Warwick has had the ability to sense objects by sonar scanning. How? They installed a device that sent out and took in sonar waves and outputted the information it gathered directly into a nerve in his arm using similar impulses as the nervous system itself uses. After two weeks of "getting used to it" the guy could sense objects relying on the sonar alone and no longer needed sight when walking around a room, for instance.
Also the guy has had his nervous system linked with his wife's left hand's nerve impulses and also with the neural system of a robot. Whenever he had wireless internet he could use, he could sense what his wife was doing with her left arm and what the robot was doing. His wife also had a pendant that changed colour according to the man's mood, accurately or so I heard. I'm presuming it measured his stress hormone levels, pulse and stuff like that.

Well, anyhow, the brain is capable of doing a lot more than just deal with flesh and bone, obviously. It works at a speed much quicker than one would expect. Some examples, other than the above one:
1) Hang someone upside down, or tie them down in a vertical position to make sure they actually live more than a couple of hours. Let them live like that for a week or two: their eyesight will "correct" the changed perspective. They will no longer actually notice that they are viewing the scenery from the "wrong" position, the brain will automatically turn the scene they see so that gravity ends up going back "down" again, in their field of view.
2) A study gathered 10-20 people who'd never ever used a computer, sat them down infront of one, opened up Google for them and told them to search for certain pieces of information using it. Their brain-waves were monitored. Of course there was another group doing the same which consisted of people who'd used computers from basically the day they were born. Their brain-waves were also monitored.
Not a big surprise: the people who'd used computers before had a certain area of their brain (in the front section, IIRC) being very active, where as the new-to-computers people had the same area having barely any activity.
Due to scarce funds the study couldn't be much longer than that one-time encounter, but they had money to do a bit extra. So they gave the new-to-computers people one week of time, only counting in weekdays though, and gave them a small job: make 2 hours worth of Google searches each day.
One week later, they redid the original test. Results were overwhelming: they new-to-computers people had the earlier mentioned area of the brain almost as active as the people who'd used computers for ages. In just one single week, the brain had adopted this new system of finding information and had reprogrammed itself to work with it.

The brain is capable of much more.

[OtakuMegane]

The human brain is capable of things that seem plain ridiculous by what we currently understand and is amazingly adaptable. We have simply not developed or learned to control the vast majority of its capacity. Even the most highly gifted individuals still don't use most of what's there. And much of the body's function is not micromanaged by the brain anyway. Usually it sends a basic command and the nerves and muscles do the rest through conditioning and natural reflex.

Don't underestimate flesh and bone either. We have some ways to go before reaching the limits of the human body. By the time the absolute flesh and bone limits are reached, considerable enhancement could be done with external augmentation like powered armor that doesn't have to be permanent.

Prostheses have wonderful potential for people who have lost, damaged beyond repair or never had some part of their body. Trying to replace perfectly healthy parts with artificial ones seems a short-sighted boost at best and utterly foolish at worst.

[Scarlet Fox]

IIRC, no computer has succeeded the mental capabilities of the human mind yet. Though they plan to exceed it soon. And by 2050 have personal computers at home exceed it. Then again, I heard that years ago, so maybe we've already passed that.

Anyway, none of this all that interesting to me unless someone can transform their hand into a gun or a cannon and shoot lasers.

[archon536]

I once saw a thing on the discovery channel that let somebody control a computer with his MIND. The guy had no arms, and they were trying to make something that would let people like him into the information age. It was still fairly simple, and they only showed him trying to draw a circle on the screen, but still it was pretty wicked. I wonder whatever happened with that?

[Smoku]

I once saw a thing on the discovery channel that let somebody control a computer with his MIND. The guy had no arms, and they were trying to make something that would let people like him into the information age. It was still fairly simple, and they only showed him trying to draw a circle on the screen, but still it was pretty wicked. I wonder whatever happened with that?

I once seen such a thing in dr House: a guy who could move, was connected to a computer. The only thing he could do though was to move a cursor up and down with his mind (Up was "yes" and down was "no", I think). Not that a tv series is a serious reference to reality, but maybe this part actually is.

Probably after we will all die, our grand grand kids will enjoy mind controlled pcs.

[cpl_crud]

About 12 years ago I did work experience in the University of Technology, Sydney.

They had two research projects running. One was to map the different brain waves that you could measure from someone, then use it as a diagnostic tool. About 6 years later I saw it used on one of my brothers.

The other cool thing they had was a light switch that you could turn on and off with your mind; something that I tried for myself. It wasn't 100% accurate, and you had to think about closing your eyes to turn the light on or off, but it was pretty amazing.
They also had a 3-axis remote control car that used similar technology, but required about an hour to wire up your brain in the right way.


Last year I was reading this: http://pinktentacle.com/2008/12/scienti ... rom-brain/
And went "Oh fucking cool" because it is.
I won't spoil the surprise, but basically the research is there.

[archon536]

About 12 years ago I did work experience in the University of Technology, Sydney.

They had two research projects running. One was to map the different brain waves that you could measure from someone, then use it as a diagnostic tool. About 6 years later I saw it used on one of my brothers.

The other cool thing they had was a light switch that you could turn on and off with your mind; something that I tried for myself. It wasn't 100% accurate, and you had to think about closing your eyes to turn the light on or off, but it was pretty amazing.
They also had a 3-axis remote control car that used similar technology, but required about an hour to wire up your brain in the right way.


Last year I was reading this: http://pinktentacle.com/2008/12/scienti ... rom-brain/
And went "Oh fucking cool" because it is.
I won't spoil the surprise, but basically the research is there.

Wow, that really is amazing. Maybe after that, they'll finally find something that can READ PEOPLE'S MINDS! O_o Imagine how that'll turn out. Rip psychology a new one. xD

[Totz the Plaid]

The world has already seen it's first cyborg.

Well, they had pacemakers and the like even before that, right? I consider that sort of thing (and cochlear implants, etc.) to be more cyborgish than what Dr. Warwick's got, though both count.

The human brain is capable of things that seem plain ridiculous by what we currently understand and is amazingly adaptable. We have simply not developed or learned to control the vast majority of its capacity. Even the most highly gifted individuals still don't use most of what's there.

That's not entirely true. While we don't use it all for conscious thought, even at rest we're using at least 30% of our brain's capacity and when fully active with thoughts, emotions, subconscious motor control, conscious motor control, a great deal of sensory stimulation, etc. our brain lights up with activity. The old belief that we "only use 10% of our brains" is based on a misunderstanding of what was meant which is that conscious thought only uses about 10% of our brain power. Still, your main point that the brain is highly adaptable and that we'll probably eventually be able to have full neural control over complex prosthetics stands.

[Mirage_GSM]

Didn't want to create a new thread, but this one seems fitting...
http://www.cracked.com/article_20653_5- ... onger.html

[Sea]

Didn't want to create a new thread, but this one seems fitting...
http://www.cracked.com/article_20653_5- ... onger.html

Damn, people are awesome.