NPR is doing a video series on merging technology with minds. This first segment talks about playing a game like Tetris via telepathy with an invention called BrainNet. This stuff is so crazy.
It’s still early days, and most ideas to upgrade human bodies and brains are in the research phase. But scientists expect that what we think of as “human” is likely to undergo a revolution in the coming decades.
“In … studies where we did [mind] control of robotic arms, in a few hours the robotic arm was being assimilated by the brain of the subjects as an extension of the sense of self, an extension of the body of these subjects,” says Duke University neuroscientist Miguel Nicolelis. “That is affecting the definition that the brain creates for our own bodies, of our own sense of self. What is the border that calls us human?”
The linked video delves into some of the ethical questions inherent in the emerging technology.