It is amazing what we can do with mind-computer-body interfaces these days. I have read the stories about people moving a cursor on a computer screen using only the power of their thoughts. I have edited stories about modern prosthetic arms that move when the wearer thinks about moving, and the re-wiring of nerves so the user can regain ‘feeling’ from their lost limb. I know, intellectually, about all these things. But I’d never seen a video of someone miraculously regaining movement from a lost or deadened limb. Suddenly now it seems simultaneously more real, and more like science fiction, than it did before.

In today’s session on “smart prosthetics” (the latter part of the same session Sarah wrote about here) we were shown video clips of paraplegics opening peanut butter jars, blow drying their hair, and even walking down the aisle at their own wedding, thanks to implanted devices that, when turned on by a radio-transmitting external switch, stimulate a predetermined bunch of nerves. Simply press a button to activate the hips, knees, leg and back muscles of a woman with no control over her legs, and she can stand up. Turn the switch off and a man sitting upright crumples like a puppet with cut strings.

Electronics can be used to bypass a break in the spinal cord, helping the brain to talk to the muscles, a wheelchair, or a computer cursor. As long as the mind still functions, it seems, its connection to the body can be repaired – or simply bypassed altogether (see John Donoghue’s lab for more info on how the brain turns thought into action, and Hunter Peckham’s lab on controlling muscles externally).

There is obviously a long way yet to go, and we do not have the fine control that can turn complex thoughts, above and beyond ‘clench hand’ or ‘bend knee’ into complex actions. But we’re getting there. The researchers in this room dream of allowing a paraplegic to play Rachmaninoff on the piano, without the watcher ever knowing they were once disabled. We’re not there yet, but after seeing these films, I’m willing to join in with the dream.

It is amazing what we can do with mind-computer-body interfaces these days. I have read the stories about people moving a cursor on a computer screen using only the power of their thoughts. I have edited stories about modern prosthetic arms that move when the wearer thinks about moving, and the re-wiring of nerves so the user can regain ‘feeling’ from their lost limb. I know, intellectually, about all these things. But I’d never seen a video of someone miraculously regaining movement from a lost or deadened limb. Suddenly now it seems simultaneously more real, and more like science fiction, than it did before.

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