Major Breakthrough in Direct Neural Interface 308
jd writes "In a major breakthrough, neurologists are reporting that they can decypher neurological impulses into speech with an 80% accuracy. A paralyzed man who is incapable of speech has electrodes implanted in his brain which detect the electrical pulses in the brain relating to speech. These signals are then fed into computers which covert these pulses into signals suitable for speech synthesis. As a biotech marvel, this is astonishing. Depending on the rate of development it is possible to imagine Professor Hawking migrating to this, as it would be immune to any further loss of body movement and would vastly accelerate his ability to talk. On the flip-side, direct brain I/O is also a major step towards William Gibson's Neuromancer and other cyberpunk dark futures."
Really accurate? (Score:1, Insightful)
How do they know they're accurately converting the signals to sound, if they're basing this off a man who has no ability to speak?
Maybe telling him "try to say X" or something, or having him write down what he's trying to say.
But the article leaves off a little bit as to where they pull 80% from.
Re:Really accurate? (Score:5, Insightful)
Wait-- they haven't actually done this yet (Score:5, Insightful)
In the next few weeks, a computer will start the task of translating his thoughts into sounds.
"We hope it will be a breakthrough," says Joe Wright of Neural Signals, which has helped develop the technology.
Mr. Gibson's dark future is a human failure ... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Sadly more likely... (Score:5, Insightful)
Your wife's recovery and you staying with her, through all of that, is the most poignant thing I have read on Slashdot, ever.
A story like yours deserves to be told, and demands that we listen.
May the winds always be at your back.
Mmmmyeeaaah, but ... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:More info (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:I'm skeptical at best. (Score:4, Insightful)
Not be be callous, but I'm pretty sure they can find time in their busy eating, sleeping, and bedpan changing schedules in order to regain the ability to communicate with the world.
Re:Sadly more likely... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Really accurate? (Score:3, Insightful)
And, amazingly enough, he can somehow still get his mojo on if you beam him down to the right planet.
I'll raise the BS flag on that (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Slashdot. (Score:5, Insightful)
The majority of Western values do not trace their roots to any of the Middle Eastern religions. They come from other places, such as Greek philosophers.
In fact, the philosophical foundations of the US are in many ways opposite to the so-called Christian values. Cruel and unusual punishment, for example, is condoned--actually commanded--by the Christian god. Slavery, and the belief that all men are NOT created equal, is a common theme in the Bible.
The statesmen/philosophers who founded this country may have been Christian, but the documents they wrote to found this country were quite the opposite.
Re:Really accurate? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Sadly more likely... (Score:2, Insightful)
What I find saddest about your post, however, is the replies that express surprise that you actually looked after your wife. Anglo-Saxon culture is depressing. My family is a mixture of Spanish and Asian, and I'd be a pariah among everyone I'd ever known if I did anything but provide the utmost care to my partner under those circumstances. Thank goodness the proportion of doctors India is exporting is comparable to the number America is producing for its own shores; then we'll see a better spirit of care and fewer ridiculous prognoses like your wife's, so far from what happened that you felt the need to discuss her recovery in terms of "impossible goals" keeping her going, to imply that she got of our her wheelchair "because it frustrated her". All the drivel of an evangelist, falling just short of appeal to deity. Bring Aristotle back to Western classrooms, please!
Posting AC because I'm writing this in a horribly unprofessional manner out of sheer frustration; I'm across the hall from a geriatric consultant who would kill me if he saw me writing like this. But I hope the underlying message is clear. Really, I am glad your wife got better, but it's almost certainly because neurological damage was not nearly as bad as claimed, and very little to do with her attitude (though this will have helped accelerate recovery). Sorry.
Re:Slashdot. (Score:4, Insightful)
Actually, most of the founding fathers were Deist [wikipedia.org], not Christian.
And yet... (Score:3, Insightful)
Those are 2 basic advanced tasks I would expect to be perfected at some point, and until they are I take all these great human-machine interface "breakthroughs" with huge grains of salt.
Who's doing the work (Score:4, Insightful)
One has to wonder who is doing the work. Is the paralyzed man adapting to the computer or is the computer learning the brain signals. Either way, it's good work, but I would bet that the way to perfect this type of technology is to "teach" the human to control his neurological impulses. I doubt the technology is directly eavesdropping on his speech.