Prompted Post 6: Analyze an Argument

For the first of this week’s post, I found an article that talk about electrical interfaces that can send electrical signals to neurons and communicate with sensory neurons. However, the author makes a claim that there are huge amounts of improvement that can be made down the road of this technology. The author of this article describes multiple modern day neural interface electrodes during the bulk of the article. At the end he begins to talk about the cutting edge technology relating back to his into section of the article. (Grill).

To me it seems that this is a pretty easy argument to back up. Of course we can improve new electronic technology. This tech is already cutting edge but there are lots of possibilities in the future. People have known about the wheel for long enough to where there is not much we can do to make it better. A device that can communicate with the nervous system is being held back by so much at this point in time. Because scientists still know so little about how the brain works, there are very definite limits to what a device like this can do. There are a lot of great things that can happen with this technology. It is being tested that such an anural device could restore a neural connection to parts of the body that have been cut off from the brain restoring their functionality. This technology could save lives and make many lives that much better. Down the road, albeit a long way, perhaps we could make computers that can think like people. Given we know enough about the functioning of the brain and have the technological capabilities, there is almost no limit to what could happen with this technology.

Work cited

Grill, Warren M. "Neural interfaces: communicating with the nervous system through implanted devices requires engineering solutions to biomedical problems." American Scientist 98.1 (2010): 48+. General OneFile. Web. 11 Oct. 2013.