Apps for the brain and robots beneath the skin: How humans will look in the future

IN THE future, you’ll be able to understand any language, open doors with your mind and deal with tricky situations in an instant.

In the future you will have abilities beyond your wildest dreams.

IN the not-so-distant future, we won’t just be putting make-up on our faces, we’ll be altering our chemical make-up throughout the day.

We’ll know whether we can have steak for dinner and stay within our daily cholesterol allowance, we’ll be able to translate a sign from a foreign language and we’ll have the ability to unlock doors and set alarms just by thinking about it.

Technology embedded under our skin will allow us to approach the world in a completely different way, according to a report released by business solutions firm MYOB today, The Augmented Human.

It will radically change our physical and mental performance, and streamline every aspect of our lives.

YOUR LIVE-IN DOCTOR

This new way of living is simply a step on from the current trend for wearable technology including Fitbits and Apple watches, according to the company’s chief technical officer Simon Raik-Allen.

“The next step is to have it under the skin,” he told news.com.au. “Doctors have no idea, you have to go for blood tests. Imagine if diabetics could measure their blood sugar level in real time instead of having to inject five times a day.

“Imagine knowing how much vitamin D, C or A is in your blood at any time. It’s the dawning of a new medical era.”

The technology would replace personal trainers, telling you everything you want to know about your health, from whether you‘ve eaten too much salt to whether you need to go for a 15-minute run.

Raik-Allen says this is a simple step, conceivable within just years to decades.

We already have “embeddables” such as artificial hearts and pacemakers, which are essentially computers beside the heart. Why not tiny robots cleaning the arteries, or refillable medicine holders under the skin that can be instructed on how often to release a drug by an app?

That could be your blood pressure medication, antidepressants or contraceptives. “It’s just a

different delivery method,” says Raik-Allen. “It’s a trivial change.”

BREAKING BOUNDARIES

The report also describes physical improvements to our bodies.

A computer embedded in the eye could overlay text in foreign languages with a translation — a mere baby-step on from Google Translate and Google Glass. Similarly, an app embedded in the ear could translate speech from a foreign language, technology already available today.

Police officers could use an in-eye app to direct their gaze to a certain model and colour car they are looking for in a stream of traffic.

If you need to lift something extremely heavy, your arm could control an exoskeleton, and an app could create automatic lightning-quick reflexes if your life is in danger.

In the age of collaboration, this is likely to be highly useful in the workplace. We will be able to work on the same project as a colleague at the same time, speaking to them instantaneously through an ear app, as if you were standing right beside each other.

At some point, the new human could become indistinguishable from technology itself.

‘APP STORE FOR THE BRAIN’

“The brain is the next frontier,” added Raik-Allen. “We’re close to being able to do an app store for the brain.”

That could be anything from a memory pack to knowledge on how to drive a car or fly a plane.

A neural-linked artificial intelligence could feed stock information through a store worker to a customer, or a diner could communicate their dietary requirements straight to a chef as they cook.

“The brain is very flexible,” says Raik-Allen. “We have augmented reality with things on video, why wouldn’t you want it without the phone?”

He tells the story of a totally colourblind British artist who had a camera and antenna attached to him, which could pick up colour and play a musical note corresponding to each shade. Eventually, when he heard the sound for red, he would see it in his mind’s eye.

“We’ll have the ability to make more decisions with more data. In extreme situations, we’ll be able to make decisions at the last minute.”

Apps like Siri are offering an increasingly high level of interaction, and soon that automation could be seamless.

“Obviously, there are implications for security,” admits Raik-Allen. “Our lives are at stake, just like in planes or rockets.”

Knowing us, we’ll probably take that risk.