January 06, 2009
Selling Hope
Kids with severe disabilities who have limited or no speech capabilities face tremendous obstacles in developing communication skills. Brain-computer interfaces could one day give these kids the means to express themselves and engage with the world, if the technology lives up to its promise. But while we await the real breakthroughs, small businesses and home inventors are starting to market devices that are not brain-computer interfaces, but instead rely on more generalized biofeedback. I guess I don't have a problem with that, but these devices are expensive and I wonder if their capabilities are being oversold to families who are desperately searching for anything that might allow even a trickle of communication with their loved ones. And it would be a shame to have these families become disillusioned and frustrated with these crude devices when the real advances are (hopefully) only a few years away.
Posted by wintermute2_0 at January 6, 2009 08:19 PM