Headband Gives Wearer "Sixth-Sense" 234
An anonymous reader writes "New Scientist reports on a headband developed at the University of Tokyo that allows the wearer to feel their surroundings at a distance — as if they had cats whiskers. Infrared sensors positioned around the headband vibrate to signal when and where an object is close. There are also a few great videos of people using it to dodge stuff while blindfolded."
Augmentation of senses (Score:5, Informative)
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I don't know why this hasn't been thought of before...perhaps it has been, but not that i've heard of.
Re:Augmentation of senses (Score:5, Insightful)
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Then this sensory aid should be mounted on the shins, set to observe forward\downward slope.
In anecdotal evidence (as well as my own experience) contactless "feel" of objects in total darkness is most desirable in your hands and fingertips, or there goes the flask, glass, lamp, heavy loose objects leaned on the wall...with lots of noise in the middle of the night, of course. After all in the dark we do wave hands in front of us to explore surroun
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Re:Augmentation of senses (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Augmentation of senses (Score:4, Insightful)
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Forward looking IR, FLIR is for generating video output. I'm sure you meant infrared sensors pointing ahead.
Otherwise you might as well be using night vision or thermal imaging goggles, and at eye level no less.
Re:Augmentation of senses (Score:5, Insightful)
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Does it come with a red suit and little horns?
-Chris
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Daredevil in Real Life (Score:3, Informative)
Here's a kid who does it without any technological aids!
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2006/07/19/earlyshow/main1817689.shtml [cbsnews.com]
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Re:Augmentation of senses (Score:5, Funny)
It would also go a long way to debunking the claims of the so-called "Jedi Knights", whose powers on closer inspection, always turn out to be parlor tricks. For example, the captain of a small, private interstellar cruiser has been circulating a video where some kids puts on a blast shield helmet -- the kind that makes it so you can't see anything, and he's none the less able to block a few randomly fired shots from a floating probe.
Now, it's not very impressive to begin with (he fails to block the first two shots!), but this device can help explain why he was able to sense the shots even while he was blinded.
Re:Augmentation of senses (Score:5, Funny)
Sixth Sense? (Score:5, Funny)
To do that, you just need (Score:5, Funny)
This post is a waste of reading: undoing a mod (Score:3, Funny)
Fallout 2 (Score:3, Funny)
Re:To do that, you just need (Score:5, Funny)
A Big-Ass Afro (Score:2, Funny)
http://www.afrosamurai.com/ [afrosamurai.com]
Re:Augmentation of senses (Score:5, Interesting)
Wild.
Re:Augmentation of senses (Score:5, Insightful)
It took moments to begin, but nearly 10 years or so to rewire my brain, but its pretty good at both cars and motorcycles now. Whens the last time you really had to think about it? I don't think "Ok 4k RPMs, lets toss it into the next gear". No, I press the gas, the car speeds up and I just do it.... information comes in via my senses (vibration being a real key, more than most) and I do the right thing, the same thing, over and over.
Even if I spin out, its not like I think "ok, I am sliding, what do I do in a slide, steer into it..." no. the car starts to slide, and I just react, do the right thing, and continue on my way. The adrenalin doesn't even hit anymore. My brain has done it, learned it, and is ready to do it again as needed.
Its no different from mastering any skill. Think how well your brain is wired to use a mouse, a keyboard. Ever seen someone sit down for the first time and see how unskilled they are with the mouse?
I am not really surprized, but I do think that realizing this explicitly and looking at how we can use these aspects of our minds is quite a neat area of research. I hope we see a lot more of this sort of thing.
how about heat vision? sensor to track where the eyes are focused, take a surface temp reading, and use some sort of vibrational or sensational output so you can feel the temperature. No longer would hot glass look like cold glass, you would cast your eyes upon them and know. Could be useful with peoples body heat too. Liars? Sexual arousal? Illness? so many uses!
-Steve
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Yes great! I can use one on my girlfriend to find out if it's worth going to bed or instead stay up playing xbox.
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Actually, this reminds me of a system I have seen construction workers use. But they went the Japanese one better by transferring the senses of one person to another person. For instance, the construction workers, without mechanical aids, were able to transfer the visual sense of one worker to the auditory sense of another worker who was effectively blinded.
One day, I saw this truck driver trying to back a truck through a very narrow garage door. This other worker would stand there and yell things lik
Interesting new verb (Score:5, Funny)
How do I go about http://www.k2.t.u-tokyo.ac.jp/perception/HapticRadar/index-e.htmldodging [u-tokyo.ac.jp] stuff?
Re:Interesting new verb (Score:4, Funny)
Fixed link (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Fixed link (Score:5, Informative)
Already have that (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Already have that (Score:5, Funny)
No, the sixth sense is when you think you're alive, but you've really been dead the whole time.
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No, that's called something else (Score:2)
Proprioreception (Score:2)
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"Because it doesn't sense the outside world" is the obvious answer, but of course, the sense of balance does sense something in the outside world--namely the gravitational field. The other big "internal" sense is proprioception, which is your intuitive sense of how your body parts are positioned relative to each other. You know that test where you stand up straight and bring your fingertip to your nose with your eyes closed to prove you're not drunk? You do that through proprioception. Another tip--bringing
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Actually, the gag reflex and the full bladder signal aren't senses, they're sensory reflexes/responses, triggered by the pressure sense. As the GP noted, "touch" is actually a collection of pressure and pain senses. Nausea is more interesting, as it is caused by a combination of a memo
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There's no skin there, though. Where you draw the distinction depends on what you're trying to do anyway.
And more (Score:5, Interesting)
You may be surprised to learn there are more than four tastes, too. Besides the sour, salty, sweet, and bitter we're all familiar with, there's a fifth type of taste bud that detects glutamate, a flavor known as'umami' [wikipedia.org] and characterized as 'savory' or 'meaty.'
Re:Already have that (Score:5, Informative)
For the Blind (Score:2)
i learned it from uncle ben (Score:2)
Absolutely. But don't forget.. for a "spider-sense" like this, with great power comes great responsibility.
My sixth sense (Score:2)
Incredibly useful for construction (Score:5, Funny)
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QUIET, numbskulls. Curly and Shemp only worked together in one Stooges short. That was after Curly had his stroke. It was not a construction scene. It was on a train.
Check out my user id for proof that I know what I'm talking about. Then, pick two...
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You're doing it wrong (Score:5, Funny)
Wonderful! (Score:5, Funny)
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Re:Wonderful! (Score:5, Funny)
*grabs calculator*
That'll be... six million dollars, sir.
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They already have these: standard gold crowns with a porcelain veneer. They cost about $500-800 each (installed). They are much harder than your real teeth, so much so that to make fine occlusion adjustments, the dentist needs to grind away the enamel on the opposing tooth.
And for God's sake, use a toothbrush and toothpaste. Fine grit polishing compound? What about your horrible halitosis? (is there any other kind
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Missing the real question? (Score:5, Funny)
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Not to be outdone, I heard that a bandanna version will be produced by a company based in the Carribean very shortly.
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The article states that one use of the headband could "augmentation of spatial awareness in hazardous working environments." Then they have a nice diagram of a man wearing a hardhat and a large iron beam swinging towards his back.
That's all well and good, though using one of these might result in increased carelessness about one's working environment. Then there are other issues...
Boss: How are those new headbands working out?
Foreman: Pretty good! Watch this...
(Foreman picks up bottle and throws it at a
Made the same thing at Towson University (Score:5, Insightful)
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Youtube Link (Score:5, Informative)
Misleading Title (Score:4, Funny)
Swi
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Depends if you use it for something critical, and it malfunctions. Then someone will need a 6th sense to see you.
You might not see dead people... (Score:4, Funny)
Obligatory (Score:2)
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wow same idea at the same time and only 4 digits off each others slashdot id number.
Your not my lost twin that looks like Arnold or something are you?
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My spider sense is tingling (Score:2)
Damn handicap people take all the good parking spots & the super powers & don't even use them.
I love this stuff (Score:2)
Ever since reading the wired article about the guy with the vibrating compass belt(http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/15.04/esp.html [wired.com] ) I've always wanted to build one. Now it looks like I'll have to add infra red vision too...
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Arghh! (Score:2)
Previously on Slashdot! (Score:2, Informative)
http://hardware.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=07/05/02/1551207 [slashdot.org]
--
X's and O's for all my foes.
Well, almost good enough (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Well, almost good enough (Score:5, Funny)
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I've always known this.
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Nature does it in its own way (Score:2)
Synesthesia [wikipedia.org] is one of the most fascinating subjects I have ever read about. Basically, it's a neuro condition where your senses get cross-wired. For example, you would "taste" words (taste and hearing are cross-wired). Every word you hear would have a distinctive taste on your tongue. Or, you would "hear" in color (hearing and vision are cross-wired). Everything you hear produces different colors in your brain.
Yes, I know. It sound like BS. But i
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But, your brain only understands how to process he senses you currently have.
What you're talking about would require new structures in the brain, wouldn't it? I mean, the nerves are hooked up to structures that can process their inputs. It's not like a PCI bus that you can hook arbitrary components into it.
Che
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Re:Well, almost good enough (Score:5, Funny)
I tried one... (Score:2)
Don't need a headband for this. (Score:3, Interesting)
With practice you can "image" enough of your environment to get around just from echoes of your own body's sounds or other ambient noises of suitable waveshape. (This is how you get the "closing in" feeling in tight spaces.)
There are reports of a totally blind kid using this effect to ride a bicycle and avoid obstacles. (He made clicking sounds with his mouth to provide a controlled, sharp (low-distance-error) sound, effectively emulating one mode of a bat's sonar.)
"Chirps" (single tones rapidly "swept" at a constant change of frequency per unit time) are potentially far better for imaging and ranging than "clicks" (impulses or short sound bursts that approximate them). But it's not clear that the human brain and vocal system has the necessary structures for generating and processing them correctly.
= = = =
Of course the headband might be much more effective than training up your own sound-generating and sensory systems - which (unlike a bat's or a cetacean's) aren't optimized for this service.
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One young test subject... (Score:2)
The researchers, upon having been thus reminded of an M Night Shyamalan movie, threw themselves out the nearest window to end their grief.
It's true what they say... (Score:2)
"If you can dodge a wrench, you can dodge a ball."
Maaaan I sure could've used this (Score:2)
Or, even, when exploring steam tunnels in the dark and there are cross-pipes in the way. And you have to run through the tunnels in darkness, with
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My Sixth Sense or 'Just Weird'? (Score:2)
Quite some time ago, I realised that when I approach my ear 'hole' with a pointed object I get a perceptible rumble in that ear (especially the right side) when the tip is around 1-1.5 inches from the opening - there's no physical contact at that time and so I have often wondered whether this is down to subtle changes in air pressure, magne
Welcome to the world of tomorrow (Score:2)