Let me tell you an interesting real story that I recently came across while
studying this book named -The secrets of Brain by David Engleman.
Eric Weihenmayer (yes, the name is really hard to pronounce), is an extreme rock climber even with rare eye disease called retinoschisis which left him blind at the age of 13 years. But in 2001, he shocked the whole
world by becoming the first blind person to climb the tallest mountain of the
globe i.e Mount Everest. You might wonder, how come he climb the mountain
without even seeing? But let me clear one thing for you, your eyes do not see
the world, your brain does. He climbed with the brainport -that is a grid of
over 600 tiny electrodes in his mouth which allowed him to see with his tongue.
Moisture and chemical environment make it an excellent brain machine. Grid
translates video input into pattern of electrical pulses allowing tongue to
discern qualities usually described to vision. This apparatus surely reminds of
the fact that we see with our brain not with eyes. Application of such
apparatus allows divers to see in murky water and soldiers to have 360 degree
vision in dark. Eric, can now kick soccer ball back and forth with his
daughter. Don't get amazed, it’s something similar like learning to read
braille. As Paul Bachyrita summerized his research by concluding - "Just
give brain the information and it will figure it out."
In future we may be able to plug new sorts of data streams directly into
brain such as infrared or UV vision, weather data or stock market data. Haha
isn't it mind boggling. Recently Gerald Jacobs and Jeremy Nathans took gene of photo
pigments from human. Photo pigments are protein in retina that absorbs light of
particular wavelength. They spliced it into colorblind mice. Those experimented
colorblind mice later could differentiate between red and blue color, while other
color blind mice couldn't. All your brain perceive is the storm of signals and
nothing else. And yet you perceive the world in all shades of brightness and
colors.
0 Comments