We’re one step away from becoming cyborgs. We already use technology on the outside of our bodies to assist us with tasks ranging from checking our heart rate to giving directions to remembering phone numbers. When was the last time you memorized a number other than your own or your parents’? When was the last time you used a paper map to find your way around a city? And it’s not just our smartphones that are enhancing our brains.
Our move to an augmented and brain enhanced world is taking on different forms, from implants to headsets to exoskeletons. These augmentations have implications for our work and personal lives.
In the new book by the founder of Emotiv brain wear Tan Le, The Neuro Generation, she outlines just how science and business are augmenting our brain so we can perform better and learn faster. Here are three things you can use now.
Implanted RFID Devices
Did you ever want to wave a wand and have something happen? It’s not Harry Potter. It’s RFID. We use RFID like magic wands for many conveniences. These small radio transmitting devices pop open our car doors, send bank information to cashiers for payments, and automatically update product inventory. But until now, all these conveniences have required holding some sort of external device.
Now in places like Sweden, people are implanting RFID devices in their bodies to pay for public transportation. In Wisconsin, employees in the business Third Square Market use a small chip, about the size of a grain of rice, implanted between their thumb and forefinger to enter the office building, get food from vending machines, and log on to computers all without lifting a finger.
Brain Zapping Headphones
Ever want to learn faster and more easily like Neo in The Matrix? In that movie, Neo (played by Keanu Reeves) gets lessons for martial arts zapped into his brain so he can instantly pick up on a necessary new skill. While Matrix technology hasn’t been invented yet, you can still learn faster and better by using headphones that zap your brain with transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS).
These headphones by Halo have been used by Olympic athletes to train more effectively and for musicians to learn music faster. Neurostimulation combined with high-quality training or instruction have helped snowboarders boost their propulsion and control and also allowed musicians to gain more accuracy and better technique.
Exoskeletons and Assisted-Moving Devices
Wouldn’t it be cool if you could lift more and move faster? In the movie Aliens, Sigourney Weaver’s character Ripley wears a huge exoskeleton to move objects and to fight a dangerous and much larger alien. Now Ford Motor Company is using a scaled-down version of that exoskeleton to reduce worker injuries in fifteen factories worldwide.
Their upper-body exoskeleton device won’t make you superhuman or able to fight aliens (yet), but it will make you an enhanced human, able to work with less fatigue and strain on your body. The device produces a lift assist up to 5-15 pounds of weight per arm. When you’re lifting heavy auto parts up all day or working with your arms over your head on the undersides of cars, that small assist can make the difference between an easy and hard day at work.
The future is no longer just fiction like The Matrix or Aliens. It’s here. Technology is augmenting our brains and bodies to make our learning and work easier, faster, and better. If you’re not using these technologies yet, you might want to invest in them before your competition does.