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Artificial Vision for the Blind
castanaveras writes "Canadian doctors implanted an artificial eye into a blind man - it performs well enough for him to be able to drive (admittedly in an empty parking lot)." We've done lots of previous stories about bionic eyes.
Actually it was done in Portugal to get around local regulations...
They weren't Canadian doctors. They were doctors from the university of St. Louis doing the procedure on a Canadian man.
I stole this Sig
"Jens and the other patients wear special sunglasses fitted with a miniature TV camera. The equipment attaches by cable to a tiny fire hydrant-like device implanted in the skull that connects to two electrodes on the surface of the part of the brain that controls sight.
In other words it connects to two electrodes on the surface of the visual cortex. Which is in the back of your skull. They have NOT implanted an artificial eye.
... http://www.artificialvision.com/vision/index.html has videos (mpeg) of the procedure and what the blind man can see (edge detect heh... good idea)
There's been a long-recognized phenomenon discovered among people who have sight restored after long periods of blindness: Motivation Crisis
http://psych.wisc.edu/vision/courses/recovery.htm
http://216.239.35.100/search?q=cache:ZD8gWmH2aEYC
Notes on this phenomenon go back to at least 1771, with the publishing of the book "L'Aveugle Qui Refiise deVoir." By 1932, there was a book "Space and Sight" that concluded that "every newly sighted adult sooner or later comes to a 'motivation crisis', and that not every patient gets through it." Fortunately for this guy though, this problem seems to be more linked to people who lost their sight early, and then regained it much later, having to radically change their lives down to the tiniest mannerisms. It might have something to do with the time limitation they are putting on him, and the scientists choice of Jans, for his positive attitude.
Definetly an interesting topic on human psychology though. Hopefully with future inventions along this line, no one will be forceably blind long enough for such depression to occur along these lines. It makes one wonder though - will more distant technology create a new sort of "Motivation Crisis" in us if perception enchancements become widely available and used.
Ryan Fenton