DailyDirt: Combining Biology And Machines...

from the urls-we-dig-up dept

Thu, Dec 3rd 2015 5:00pm — Michael Ho

Nature has had a few billion years to evolve some pretty useful abilities, but people are always trying to improve upon what's already available. One of the big challenges is creating an interface between biological mechanisms and various electronic devices. Implanting electrodes into brains or having insects control robot bodies are ongoing experiments -- and there are a few other projects combining biology and machines that could be even more cutting edge.

Cyborg roses have been grown with electrically-conducting wires in the flower's xylem -- its vascular system that usually transports water throughout the plant. This could be an important first step towards making plants that can be controlled or used as sensors. Or it could start some kind of cross between The Happening and Terminator. [url]
Phil Kennedy has developed brain-computer interfaces since the 1980s, but he took his research to an extreme by getting his own brain implant. It was getting difficult to find healthy people to volunteer for a brain surgery to implant electrodes, so Kennedy paid a surgeon to do it to himself. Complications forced him to remove the implants after about a month, but he gathered some data during his time as a cyborg that might help further brain research in speech decoding. Still, it's not exactly the best way to conduct brain research when there are concerns about safety and reproducibility. [url]
Ray Kurzweil predicts a lot of far out stuff, and he thinks nanobots will connect our brains directly to external computers -- allowing us to access information and ideas at a faster and broader scale than ever before. Kurzweil says our abilities will become "godlike" -- but it depends on which gods we become like, really. (e.g., tormented gods or jealous ones or...) [url]

After you've finished checking out those links, check out this holiday gift guide for some awesome deals at the Techdirt deals store.

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Filed Under: brain computer interface, brain research, cyborg, hmi, implants, nanobots, phil kennedy, plants, ray kurzweil

8 Comments

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Anonymous Coward, 3 Dec 2015 @ 6:48pm

Tongue input
My personal wished for device would allow me to use my tongue to control my phone or computer just like a mouse. Tongue control would free people to use heads up displays without touching anything. The response time is also much faster so fighter pilots and astronauts could use it and keep their hands free for other uses. If it was going to happen in the next year, I would get mine split to give myself effectively two finger input.
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- Anonymous Coward, 3 Dec 2015 @ 9:40pm
  
  Re: Tongue input
  Driving with your tongue would be great, since you could flip off two different people at the same time. Ooh, wait... it'd be hard to yell "Learn to drive, asshole!" without swerving into oncoming traffic. Two steps forward, one step back.
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Anonymous Coward, 3 Dec 2015 @ 7:19pm

Human experimentation should always require the researchers to be the first to be experimented on. Then they would have first hand experience of the human experience of their testing methods.
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Lawrence D’Oliveiro, 3 Dec 2015 @ 8:16pm

Important Difference
Nature = blind evolution.

Human = intelligent design.
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- Lawrence D’Oliveiro, 3 Dec 2015 @ 8:17pm
  
  Re: Important Difference
  Just to be clear that I am referring to the activities carried out by same.
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Anonymous Coward, 3 Dec 2015 @ 9:50pm

We could hurry the coming apocalypse along if we machine-enhanced one of these.

(http://www.cracked.com/article_23158_the-spiky-fern-that-eats-sheep-5-evil-plants.html.)
OK, yeah, sometimes I read Cracked. It's occasionally insightful. This article (http://www.cracked.com/blog/6-ways-china-hollywood-are-teaming-up-to-ruin-movies/) has a lot of relevance to arguments about piracy 'destroying' the movie industry. Plus dick jokes.
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JoeCool (profile), 4 Dec 2015 @ 10:29am

Godlike
Kurzweil says our abilities will become "godlike"

He plans to call the nanobots "midichlorians". ;)
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Anonymous Coward, 7 Dec 2015 @ 2:55am

mouse, keyboard interface to the brain = fastest hacker in the world

hm, THAT could be DANGEROUS
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