Implantable everything is right around the corner, there is no stopping it
"But thou, O Daniel, shut up the words, and seal the book,even to the time of the end: many shall run to and fro, and knowledge shall be increased." Daniel 12:4
"And
he causeth all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and bond, to
receive a mark in their right hand, or in their foreheads: And that no
man might buy or sell, save he that had the mark, or the name of the
beast, or the number of his name." Revelation 13:16,17
The
world we live in is finally starting to catch up with the King James
Bible, at least a little bit. Thousands of years ago, God declared
through His prophets that in the last days there would be an explosion
of knowledge, and that the sealed books given to Daniel would be opened.
He also said that as this was happening, a man of dark countenance
would rise and deceive the whole world. As you read this, we stand
poised on the razor's edge of prophetical history. One group, the
blood-bought redeemed of the Lord Jesus Christ, wait in anticipation of the Blessed Hope found in Titus 2:13. Everyone else is unwittingly waiting for the Man of Sin to step out of the shadows and onto the world stage.
Our question to you is this - which group are you in?
Wearables will have their moment in the sun, but they're simply a transition technology.
Technology will move from existing outside our bodies to residing
inside us. That's the next big frontier. Here are nine signs that
implantable tech is here now, growing rapidly, and that it will be part
of your life (and your body) in the near future.
1. Implantable smartphones
Sure,
we're virtual connected to our phones 24/7 now, but what if we were
actually connected to our phones? That's already starting to happen.
Last year, for instance, artist Anthony Antonellis had an RFID chip embedded in his arm that could store and transfer art to his handheld smartphone.
But
what takes the place of the screen if the phone is inside you? Techs at
Autodesk are experimenting with a system that can display images
through artificial skin. Or the images may appear in your eye implants.
Researchers are experimenting with embedded sensors that turn human bone into living speakers.
Other scientists are working on eye implants that let an image be
captured with a blink and transmitted to any local storage (such as that
arm-borne RFID chip).
2. Healing chips
Right
now, patients are using cyber-implants that tie directly to smartphone
apps to monitor and treat diseases. A new bionic pancreas being tested
at America’s Boston University, for instance, has a tiny sensor on an
implantable needle that talks directly to a smartphone app to monitor
blood-sugar levels for diabetics.
Scientists
in London are developing swallowable capsule-sized circuits that
monitor fat levels in obese patients and generate genetic material that
makes them feel "full". It has potential as an alternative to current
surgery or other invasive ways to handle gross obesity.
Dozens of other medical issues from heart murmurs to anxiety have implant/phone initiatives under way.
3. Cyber pills that talk to your doctor
Implantables
won’t just communicate with your phone; they’ll chat up your doctor,
too. In a project named Proteus, after the eensy body-navigating vessel
in the film Fantastic Voyage, a British research team is developing
cyber-pills with microprocessors in them that can text doctors directly
from inside your body.
The
pills can share (literally) inside info to help doctors know if you are
taking your medication properly and if it is having the desired effect.
4. Bill Gates' implantable birth control
The Gates Foundation is supporting an MIT project to create an implantable female compu-contraceptive controlled by an external remote control. The tiny chip generates small amounts of contraceptive hormone from within the woman's body for up to 16 years.
Implantation
is no more invasive than a tattoo. And, "The ability to turn the device
on and off provides a certain convenience factor for those who are
planning their family.", said Dr Robert Farra of MIT.
Gives losing the remote a whole new meaning.
5. Smart tattoos
Tattoos
are hip and seemingly ubiquitous, so why not smart, digital tattoos
that not only look cool, but can also perform useful tasks, like
unlocking your car or entering mobile phone codes with a
finger-point?Researchers at the University of Illinois have crafted an
implantable skin mesh of computer fibers thinner than a human hair that
can monitor your body's inner workings from the surface.
A company called Dangerous Things has an NFC chip that can be embedded in a finger through a tattoo-like process,
letting you unlock things or enter codes simply by pointing. A Texas
research group has developed microparticles that can be injected just
under the skin, like tattoo ink, and can track body processes.
All of these are much wiser choices than the name of a soon-to-be-ex.
6. Brain-computer interface
Having the human brain linked directly to computers
is the dream (or nightmare) of sci-fi. But now, a team at Brown
University called BrainGate is at the forefront of the real-world
movement to link human brains directly to computers for a host of uses.
As
the BrainGate website says, "using a baby aspirin-sized array of
electrodes implanted into the brain, early research from the BrainGate
team has shown that the neural signals can be ‘decoded' by a computer in
real-time and used to operate external devices."
Chip
maker Intel predicts practical computer-brain interfaces by 2020. Intel
scientist Dean Pomerleau said in a recent article, "Eventually people
may be willing to be more committed to brain implants."
"Imagine being able to surf the Web with the power of your thoughts."
7. Meltable bio-batteries
One
of the challenges for implantable tech has been how to get power to
devices tethered inside or floating around in human bodies. You can't
plug them in. You can't easily take them out to replace a battery.
A
team at Draper Laboratory in Cambridge, Massachusetts, is working on
biodegradable batteries. They generate power inside the body, transfer
it wirelessly where needed, and then simply melt away. Another project
is looking at how to use the body’s own glucose to generate power for
implantables.
Think the potato battery of grammar school science, but smaller and much more advanced.
8. Smart dust
Perhaps
the most startling of current implantable innovations is smart dust,
arrays of full computers with antennas, each much smaller than a grain
of sand, that can organize themselves inside the body into as-needed
networks to power a whole range of complex internal processes.
Imagine
swarms of these nano-devices, called motes, attacking early cancer or
bringing pain relief to a wound or even storing critical personal
information in a manner that is deeply encrypted and hard to hack.
With
smart dust, doctors will be able to act inside your body without
opening you up, and information could be stored inside you, deeply
encrypted, until you unlocked it from your very personal nano network.
9. The verified self
Implantables
hammer against social norms. They raise privacy issues and even point
to a larger potential dystopia. This technology could be used to ID
every single human being, for example.
Already,
the US military has serious programs afoot to equip soldiers with
implanted RFID chips, so keeping track of troops becomes automatic and
worldwide. Many social critics believe the expansion of this kind of ID
is inevitable.
Some
see it as a positive: improved crime fighting, universal secure
elections, a positive revolution in medical information and response,
and never a lost child again. Others see the perfect Orwellian society: a
Big Brother who, knowing all and seeing all, can control all.
And some see the first big, fatal step toward the Singularity, that moment when humanity turns its future over to software.
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