Liberal Talk Radio

We’re one step closer to robotic limbs:

…to actually control the hand, the researchers relied on neural activity recorded from a monkey’s brain. According to MIT’s Technology Review, that resulted in the fingers on the hand performing their intended movement about 95 percent of the time. While the system doesn’t currently work in real time, the researchers are reportedly planning a live demonstration with a monkey within the next six months.

Awesome. The fact that they were actually able to use neural impulses from the brain to control the hand’s movements is truly astonishing. The next 10 or 20 years are going to see a flurry of sci-fi-like advancement that is going to make our collective heads spin (and open up a flurry of ethical questions).

In the meantime, we’re one step closer to the day when we can all get a new hand like Luke Skywalker’s.