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Brain Cells Fused with Computer Chips
valamaldoran writes "Looks like organic computers aren't too far off. Live Science has an interesting article about fusing brain neurons with silicon chips. From the article: 'The achievement could one day enable the creation of sophisticated neural prostheses to treat neurological disorders or the development of organic computers that crunch numbers using living neurons.'"
Some might remember this statement. It was said when they started decyphering the human genome.
Just because we can "read" the letters doesn't mean we know what's written. Just because we can pump electricity into nerve cells doesn't mean we understand how they "think". It's still a long, long road to cyberpunk.
Well, at least the technology aspect of this flavor of SciFi. The social aspect is almost achived.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Looks like the ride toward the singularity just picked up its pace.
Any technology distinguishable from magic is insufficiently advanced.
I don't doubt that; but there's a huge step from BMI-based prosthetics to the kind of science fiction being alluded to in Zonk's "dibs on a datajack" comment.
the layman's guide to computer science
You're right in that this does not come close to having the number of neurons needed to help in disseminated diseases like Alzheimers. Where it might have promise sooner is in cases of severe locallized injury, such as spinal damage strokes from a small clot, or damaged nerves in an amputation/partial amputation type injury.
We have yet to succeed except in a few lab experiments in regrowing neural tissue. Stem cells might help, but then again might not. Any means to reconnect damaged neurons could have profound impacts on the treatment of some types of injury. This is especially true since this particular method would avoid much of the moral/ethical wrangling involved in the use of stem cells.
Using plain ol' text since 1968
I can, even without a computer, predict that the planets will still revolve around the sun in a few 1000 years, and you can rather easily calculate how much mass they should gain/lose by impact of meteors. It's a game of probability.
On a smaller scale, you're far harder pressed. Weather is pretty well predictable on a large scale. It's still near impossible on small scales. How is the weather going to be in Hicksville in 15 days? It's near impossible to tell that, while it's easy to say that within the next $years years a huge $desaster is going to wash over $continent.
Same with brains. Yes, you can tell that certain areas are responsible for certain activities. Yes, you can "stimulate" them to gain some effect. More or less reliably. It is MUCH harder to stimulate certain cells to get a very specific effect. That kind of research is still at the very beginning, and as much as I'd like to see computers controlled by brains, it's not going to happen soon.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
What you say is true, but there limits. Somethings just can't be learned because the underlying hardware and control structures do not exist. Your ability to learn new facial movements may be impressive, but it may be that you have a particular genetic predisposition to do that.
Simply put, if the nerves from the brain to allow a muscle to do a specific movement do not exist, no amount of practice is going to help let you make that movement.
Rolling tongues, as a concrete example, is something that some people can do and others cannot, and it's controlled by genes.
Lynch mobs? WTF are you smoking?
20 years ago the RIAA coerced the government into taxing blank tapes, because that was the most sophisticated copy protection they had at their disposal. No one rioted. There were no "lynchings" to speak of. People bent over and took it. Some even said it was fair (not me.)
2X years later, more sophisticated tech in "experiencing" music leads to a higher bar of tolerance by the average person in accepting these copy-protection methods. DRM gets implemented, most people bend over and take it. Some even say it is fair (not me.)
You're suffering from a misguided delusion that people in the REAGAN ERA were somehow less docile than people today. I'm guessing that 20 years ago, you were in diapers.
It helps no one to argue that we need to revert back to a time that never existed.