There's an NYT article today that says two people who'd lost control of their limbs were able to move around a robot arm. WITH THEIR MINDS.
and I quote:
Two people who are virtually paralyzed from the neck down have learned to manipulate a robotic arm with just their thoughts, using it to reach out and grab objects. One of them, a woman, was able to retrieve a bottle containing coffee and drink it from a straw — the first time she’d served herself since her stroke 15 years earlier, scientists reported on Wednesday...
...Each had a tiny sensor about the size of a baby aspirin injected just below the skull, in an area of the motor cortex known to be active when people move their arms or hands. They learned to move a robotic arm, mounted at shoulder height on a dolly next to them, by watching the researchers move the arm and imagining they were actually controlling it.
Ghost in the Shell? Now a possibility, rather than a hypothetical. Dr. Octopus? Now a Possibility. Robocop?! A FUCKING POSSIBILITY. Sure, they've done things kind of like this before with artificial limbs and stuff (the article mentions they've accomplished this exact thing before with monkeys) but this is still fucking cool.
The future is now, people. Just don't go cutting off your limbs just so you can get a robot arm... yet.
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