The reason I have chosen these two examples is that both technologies allow people to communicate and give commands to the outer world without any physical movement or a bit of it (scrunching his right cheek) in the Stephen Hawking’s case.
Brainloop mental machine allows people to operate devices merely by imagining specific motor commands, in other words only thinking. In brief, imagination of movements such as “move left hand”, “move right hand” or “move feet” become non-muscular communication and control signals that convey messages and commands to the external world without any actual movement. In the following video you will see how the subject is able to navigate a Google Earth powered terrain and compose soundtracks by this technology.
Stephen Hawking’s computer is also interesting and deserves mentioning about it. I have included the information about this computer from Wikipedia as an excerpt here. It is interesting that it is always renewed by Intel after some periods of around two years to give Stephen Hawking more comfort and possibilities in communication and tracking information flow.
The computer system attached to his wheelchair is operated by Hawking via an infra-red ‘blink switch’ clipped onto his glasses. By scrunching his right cheek up, he is able to talk, compose speeches and research papers, browse the Internet, and write e-mails. The system also uses radio transmission to provide control over doors in his home and office. His computer was created by an American engineer. He once joked that his computer “had an American accent.”
Hawking receives a new computer every 18-24 months donated by Intel. The latest computer was donated in June of 2007 and is based on the Centrino chipset. It consists of two pieces, a rear chassis which houses a single 300 watt hour battery, a laptop computer, and various external peripherals, and a front chassis, which houses a touchscreen LCD and speakers which project his hardware-synthesized voice. The two chassis are connected via a custom-designed umbilical cable which allows power and electrical signals to travel back and forth. Hawking’s computer can run for up to 7 hours without needing a recharge, or be switched to run directly from his wheelchair battery when needed.
The computer utilizes a wireless data card that runs on mobile phone networks. This allows Hawking to check his email and browse the web while away from a wireless LAN. Hawking can also make and receive voice phone calls via a mobile phone with an external microphone in front of his computer speakers.
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