Researchers have been improving upon BrainGate — a brain-machine interface that allows users to control an external device with their minds — for years, but what you see here is the most advanced incarnation of the implant system to date. It is nothing short of remarkable.
-
Posted to metavalent.com
BrainGate Update
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/metavalent/~3/Il0ho3r5xBk/1585
-
Posted to metavalent.com
Waiting for the Bionic Man
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/metavalent/~3/DgCGnxzE9gc/1563
The author’s site lists this article as Waiting for the Bionic Man, so maybe Wired applied some kind of proprietary troll-baiting re-title algorithm to bump up the irritated enthusiast click through rate, or something: “A True Bionic Limb Remains Far Out of Reach.” Whatever. @MikeChorost‘s report is a fanstastic reality update to the previous post and indeed, all the content of this blog. We need much more of this to Get There!
From the article:
Hypothetically, a neurally controlled prosthesis would begin with a brain interface, a chip capable of picking up complex signals from the user’s brain. A computer would translate those signals into orders for the arm—”move up,” “bend my elbow,” “turn my wrist.” Motors in the joints would move the arm smoothly in response to commands from the computer. Sensors in the arm would feed information on its position and movement through the computer and into the chip in the user’s brain.
-
Posted to metavalent.com
The $60,000 Bionic Boy
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/metavalent/~3/CXFMNwXy-lM/1558
- Tags:
- metavalent
- cyborg
-
Posted to metavalent.com
“Not Survival of the Fittest, but Construction of the Intended”
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/metavalent/~3/NVFcJtsmrnU/1553
“The next programming paradigm is life science. We’re going to create a living world, this century.” Andrew Hessel Finally, someone else articulating this truth with the scientific authority that might be better heard and received.
- Tags:
- metavalent
- biohacking
- cyborg
-
Posted to metavalent.com
Human Echolocation
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/metavalent/~3/0XkdCEjPhkY/1510
"Convention, by it’s nature, adheres to itself and rejects what is not conventional." – Daniel Kish
- Tags:
- metavalent
- cyborg
-
Posted to metavalent.com
The Growing Eyeborg Population
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/metavalent/~3/63wEsP_nns0/1509
As we’ve long tracked, the eyeborgs continue to grow in numbers amongst us …
-
Posted to metavalent.com
iLimb & Myoelectric Replacement Parts Update on the path to #SubstrateIndependence
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/metavalent/~3/kdK-Q1U2ziU/1490
-
Posted to metavalent.com
Artificial Retina Progress
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/metavalent/~3/-IfISK9cBdU/1476
MIT Retinal Implant Research Group: “The major thrust of the RLE Retinal Implant Research Group is to develop a microelectronic retinal implant to restore vision to patients with age-related macular degeneration and retinitis pigmentosa. The group’s implant design has unique features that improve its safety, function and performance. Efforts are currently underway to test the implant design. The group works closely with colleagues in Boston area hospitals.” DOE Artificial Retina Project: “U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE’s) Artificial Retina Project is a collaborative, multi-institutional effort to develop an implantable microelectronic retinal prosthesis that restores useful vision to people blinded by retinal diseases. The ultimate goal of the project is to restore reading ability, facial recognition, and unaided mobility in people with retinitis pigmentosa and age-related macular degeneration.”
H/T SingularityHub
-
Posted to metavalent.com
Next: Neural Prosthetics
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/metavalent/~3/etWhRsDuKYA/1473
-
Posted to metavalent.com
Psychology of a techno-human cognitive network
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/metavalent/~3/5UKz1U2dzm0/1461
Oh oh. The normals have found us (Psychology Today) . Time to break camp and move forward again. In short, augmented cognition. Or, put another way, in a world where complexity is already overwhelming, and yet continues to accelerate, networked cognition is becoming increasingly critical: cognition as an emergent property of techno-human networks, rather than the individual Cartesian brains that we are all so proud of. [C]an components of a techno-human cognitive network (individual people, that is) understand the emergent cognitive products of that network? Can they hope to modify the output of the network in ways that they might prefer, for example to pursue and achieve morally desirable ends? Put at its most basic level, what is the psychology of a techno-human network? And, as a shout-out to the increasingly dysfunctional myth of the Cartesian individual, what is the effect on human psychology of the dawning realization that in some fundamental way, the world has grown too complex for us to understand it as individuals?
- Tags:
- metavalent
- neuro-cogno
- cyborg
-
Posted to metavalent.com
CMU Robotics SARCOS
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/metavalent/~3/rPCvDbXFovA/1459
-
Posted to metavalent.com
Telescopic eye implant approved by the FDA
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/metavalent/~3/97B80wJFumI/1429
Not new, but worth reminding.
- Tags:
- metavalent
- biohacking
- cyborg
-
Posted to metavalent.com
Transhumanism 101
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/metavalent/~3/nH2EaVOKh_8/1425
A gentle introduction for inquiring neophytes. Welcome home. We’ve been waiting just for you.
- Tags:
- metavalent
- education
- cyborg
-
Posted to metavalent.com
The Internet of Brains: Evoking Eywa
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/metavalent/~3/9OdQ9Troy10/1418
Back in September, scientists decoded words from brain signals. It’s not a matter of if, but when inter-cortical cognition grids happens. Inter-cortical communication will completely disrupt the arc of human evolution. Odds. Are. You. Are. Not. Ready. Human. You’re every thought will be laid bare to all other minds on the grid. Lusts, fears, paranoia, confusion, all of it. Prior to going on-grid would be a good time to practice judge not, lest ye be judged. Prior to going on-grid would be a good time to practice putting idle synaptic cycles to better use in order to be found useful. Prior to going on-grid would be a good time to think about what substrate independence really means, psychologically. The Journal of Neural Engineering’s September issue is publishing Greger’s study showing the feasibility of translating brain signals into computer-spoken words. The University of Utah research team placed grids of tiny microelectrodes over speech centers in the brain of a volunteer with severe epileptic seizures. The man already had a craniotomy – temporary partial skull removal – so doctors could place larger, conventional electrodes to locate the source of his seizures and surgically stop them. Using the experimental microelectrodes, the scientists recorded brain signals as the patient repeatedly read each of 10 words that might be useful to a paralyzed person: yes, no, hot, cold, hungry, thirsty, hello, goodbye, more and less. Later, they tried figuring out which brain signals represented each of the 10 words. When they compared any two brain signals – such as those generated when the man said the words “yes” and “no” – they were able to distinguish brain signals for each word 76 percent to 90 percent of the time. SOURCE: EUREKALERT
-
Posted to metavalent.com
Increasingly Intimate Merging of Biology and Technology
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/metavalent/~3/JGZFj4hcKz0/1403
There were countless magnificently metavalent breakthroughs in 2010, and the work of Prof. Itamar Willner’s Group is certainly in hot pursuit of some of the most noteworthy. Just a couple of days ago, IEEE Spectrum reported that, “scientists at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, in Israel, the University of Liege, in Belgium, and the University of California, Los Angeles, say they have built a molecular machine out of DNA that could act as a logic device for chemical sensing and medicine delivery. Unlike earlier DNA machines, the new device has a degree of memory, making it potentially programmable. DNA machines implanted throughout the body would be programmed to respond to biomarkers the same way they respond to acid in a laboratory setting. The biomarker would activate the DNA machine, causing it to spring open and release medicine to treat the problem.” For details see The Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA (PNAS): All-DNA finite-state automata with finite memory and American Chemical Society (ACS) Journal, Nano Letters DNA Machines: Bipedal Walker and Stepper. In September, it was Biomolecule-Based Nanomaterials and Nanostructures. Back in June, another Nano Letter published by ACS — Carbon Nanotube Transistor Controlled by a Biological Ion Pump Gate — described embedded nano-transistors, inside a cell-like membrane, powered by the cell’s intrinsic energy. Discovery News added that this breakthrough “link[s] humans and machines more intimately than ever” and ZeeNews added, “Aleksandr Noy, a scientist at the University of California, Merced who is a co-author on the recent ACS Nano Letters, said: “This device is as close to the seamless marriage of biological and electronic structures as anything else that people did before. We can take proteins, real biological machines, and make them part of a working microelectronic circuit.” New Scientist described the breakthrough as, “A novel transistor controlled by the chemical that provides the energy for our cells’ metabolism could be a big step towards making prosthetic devices that can be wired directly into the nervous system.” I suppose I should sit down and curate a proper Top Ten Metavalent Breakthroughs of 2010. Maybe after Christmas. Maybe not. We’ll see. We will definitely carry the #ComingOutCyborg theme into 2011, however.
- Tags:
- metavalent
- cyborg
- nanotech
-
Posted to metavalent.com
Coming Out Cyborg. Hello Humans. Yes, We’re Here.
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/metavalent/~3/GUCns5KZGiM/1395
Yes, we’re friendly. In fact, friendly and symbiotically cooperative to an extent many of you cannot yet imagine. We do suggest, however, that you not mistake our accommodating nature as weakness. Do not fear, for you will not be harmed by us in any way, ever; for violence is antithetical to our deepest human nature, which we share in common with you down to the deepest tap root of evolution; even as our rapidly accelerating prosthetic capabilities have expanded our capacities and merged, embedded, and entangled adaptive functionalities within and throughout our bodies; to the point of consummate metamorphic synthesis. We are you and we are new. Be encouraged that raw amygdalic aggression toward us, whether born of fear, ignorance, paranoia, or any other behavioral or neuro-chemical perversion or misconfiguration is to rather be ignored, rendered inert, invisible, irrelevant, like so much deprecated code; an utterly impotent vestigial algorithm. Above all, we wish for you uplift and expansion of human expression on every conceivable level. The way is open to you now, as always throughout the course of your personal and human species history; for adaptive posthuman evolution is neither flimsy religion nor heady philosophy; therefore, no mentor, guide, prophet or teacher shall coax or coerce you in any way to evolve from where you are, today. The sense of a guiding influence you may experience is selective pressure of evolutionary adaptation itself. It’s already in you. Encoded in your very DNA. If you hear the upwardly spiraling siren song within, do not fear, you are not alone. Keep connecting. Keep reflecting. Keep learning. Keep encouraging yourself and others in all things. You’re already with us and we are with you. Enjoy Existence. Instantiate Intelligence. Where you are, as you are. You are not alone.
- Tags:
- society
- posthuman
- bci
- metavalent
- cyborg
-
Posted to metavalent.com
Biodigital Brain: human brain organically fused with computer chips
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/metavalent/~3/i9lceIC2JOE/1385
“Brain cells automatically connect to computer chips. They need no teaching, they just do it. I’m telling you history, my friends. You tell me, the future.” – Patrick Dixon
-
Posted to metavalent.com
eLegs by Berkeley Bionics
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/metavalent/~3/_xHouA09LSk/
“It was so natural that’s what really gripped me. This is not a wave of the future, this is reality.” — Amanda Boxtel
-
Posted to metavalent.com
Avenues to Substrate Independence
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/metavalent/~3/niCE2TMtV2Q/
Ultimately, there will be diverse UX alternatives for substrate independence. The robotic substrate is certainly a fascinating option to consider and we not only can, but must immediately begin preparatory thinking, training, behavioral, and psychological exercises to prepare for increasingly high resolution software and hardware mediated experiences. Certainly within ten years and likely within five, we will see the convergence of the dexterity of R2 Robonaut, the mobility of AIST and Kawada’s HRP-4, the quotidian autonomy of Anybots, the brain machine interface typical of today’s prosthetic arms and legs, in addition to thin-sheet Displays as I/O Devices and internal Attention Management System HUD’s — vastly improved versions of software like Feedly and My6Sense which are designed to help surface the most salient and actionable information streaming throughout the vastness of the Internet of Things and the ever expanding Global Cognition Grid, all integrated into our 2020 Tesla built MacAvatars, powered by Google, and designed by Apple in California. ;-) We will not need “mind uploads” for this phase of self-guided, participatory, migratory evolution. Within ten years, we will see vastly improved and multi-functioned brain-machine interfaces to these device and the utterly immersive first person UX will become increasingly difficult to discern from “real life.” So don’t hold on too tight, Dorothy, or a hole the size of Kansas might get inadvertently ripped through your cute little bioconservative extremist hands. Or, in the words of the sub-legendary 38 Special, “hold on loosely, but don’t let go. If you cling too tightly, you’re gonna’ lose control.”
-
Posted to metavalent.com
Is Mech Already Better Than Meat?
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/metavalent/~3/wUstqT6H7ek/
With a new pair of meat hands “One year after double hand transplant, progress elusive” we learn that it takes three to four years of intensive therapy to bring replacement meat hands online, because the nerves have a long way to grow. In contrast, with a new mech arm, back in 2003 we, “graft existing nerve endings from his shoulder onto the pectoral muscle on his chest. Those nerves grew into the muscle after about six months. Electrodes on the graft can now pick up any thought-generated nerve impulses to the now-absent limb and transmit those to the mechanical prosthesis, controlling the movements of the arm. And in 2008, of her new mech arm and hand, Claudia Mitchell says, “it feels more real than I ever expected.”
-
Posted to metavalent.com
Bionic Legs Update
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/metavalent/~3/BprPt3tKZ3Q/
The path to substrate independence, one set of limbs and organs at a time.
- Tags:
- metavalent
- cyborg
-
Posted to michael.silverton.palo-alto.ca.us
Information Policy as Posthuman Law
Vintage 2002 topic, only getting more urgent by the day. Or is it? Remind me to dig deeper for a refresh.
The subject of information policy is increasingly flows between machines, machinic rather than social values play ever-more important roles in decision-making, and information policy for human society is being supplemented, supplanted, and superceded by machinic decision-making. As the barrier between the human and machinic falls with implantation of chips within the body and other types of intimate relationships, and as dependence upon the information infrastructure continues to grow, the question of the rights of technological systems themselves is entering the legal system.
1