Melding of Mind and Computer May Transform Our Lives

Melding Of Mind And Computer May Transform Our Lives

A team of Doctors wired the brains of lab rats directly to a computer, giving the animals an ability unknown to human beings. When the rats got thirsty, they would use a robotic arm to bring them water. That kind of task has become almost second nature to lab rats, but these particular animals did it with flair. They operated the device with their minds alone, moving it merely by thinking about it.

By psysically linking a living brain to a computer and then allowing the two to communicate, an important barrier has been broken down between the animate and inanimate worlds. In a step that sounds like something out of science fiction, the Doctors have given a living mind the power to directly affect the outside-world without having to use the body in which it is housed.

Their research represents a looming revolution, the next-world-changing generation in computer science. It promises to produce computers that seem much more human and lifelike, and less like machines. It also will transform the relationship between human beings and computers. They won't be tools that we operate with our hands, as we do a hammer or car. Instead they will become almost a part of us, intimately liked to our minds and bodies and greatly augmenting human abilities to think and communicate.

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