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Wired Brain
Wired Brain
Ramez Naam
mez@apexnano.com
Motive
Help the sick & injured
Means
Brain and nervous system prosthesis
Opportunity
Neural prosthesis to enhance human brains
Motives
The Deaf
~20 million hearing impaired people in US
~2 million cannot be helped by hearing aids
The Blind
1.3 million people in the US
The Paralyzed
2 million people in the US
professions of love
$40,000 bill
Normal Mood
Deep Brain Stimulator Side Effects
Uncontrolled Obsessive Compulsive Behavior
Parkinson’s 1
Motor 8
Cochlear 30
Visual 256
Enter the Electrical Engineers
55 million transistors
Opportunities
Restoring Damaged Memory?
Repairing the Hippocampus
Hippocampus Chip
“dumb” replica of the hippocampus
broccoli = good
exercise = good
ultimate addiction
hardware limitations
Beyond Memory
Frontal Cortex Chip
“working memory”
attention
reasoning
decision making
Communication
to the brain,
imagination = sensation = memory
Communication
so if we can send
images, sounds, sensations
into your brain
you can send them
out of your brain
into
a computer
or another person’s brain
Vanderbilt Experiment
Emotions?
Probably
human-to-human communication
The Hurdles
Hurdles – Brain Surgery
Risky
Expensive
New surgery for each upgrade?
Conclusion: it will never happen
What About Eye Surgery?
Risky
Expensive
May get stuck with less than 20/20 vision
Glasses are a fine alternative
Conclusion: it will never happen
sufficiently safe
sufficiently cheap
Neurovascular Surgery