Confessions of a Bionic Man

I don't think that superhuman hearing is likely, or even a good idea, because the normal human ear is already awesomely sensitive. Much more feasible, and already in development, are drugs that preserve hearing and gene technologies that restore it. And sound-enhancing gadgets can be found at any electronics store.

But there are other, much more intriguing possibilities. The human body hasn't changed in millions of years -- and that's a problem. Our bodies don't do very well with information technology. Screens are tiny and eye-straining, and keyboards injure fingers and wrists. Even people with young, nimble fingers can't type as fast as they can talk, let alone think.

This mismatch between our Pentium chips and our Paleolithic bodies could be solved by physically integrating the two, the way I have cochlear implants inside me. Much as my implants make my brain "hear" sound, more advanced implants could one day evoke sensations of sight, touch and even feelings.

Or information could go the other way. For example, researchers at Brown University are implanting electrodes into the brains of people with paralyzed limbs to let them control computers and appliances with mental commands.

Consider where such technologies might go. Imagine someday being able to dictate e-mail with your thoughts, or thinking a Google search while walking down the street and "hearing" the answer read to you. Technologies like that could trigger changes in daily life even more profound than those unleashed by e-mail and the Web over the past 15 years.

Obviously, this scenario is an extrapolation from current technologies. But consider how far cochlear implants have come since 1978, when the first experimental multi-electrode device was surgically implanted in a patient. The device was so primitive that voices were barely intelligible, and the operation took eight hours. Compare that with my first implant surgery in 2001, which took 75 minutes. The second, in 2007, took 43 minutes. With both, I was listening to audiotapes within weeks.

These days, the field of neural prosthetics is booming. Researchers at New York University are investigating the possibility of threading tiny wires into the brain through the capillary system, the way angiograms are done by threading a wire through an artery to the heart. The electrodes would be used to gather detailed data on neural activity in the brain.

Researchers elsewhere have used brain-scanning machines to investigate the neural basis of thought and perception. In 2006, researchers in the Netherlands were essentially able to tell with 65 percent accuracy whether subjects watching "Home Improvement" were seeing the character Jill Taylor on screen.

That said, decoding everyday human thought, in all its variety and complexity, is far beyond our present technology. But I'd wager that, in time, neural prosthetics will follow a trajectory similar to that of cochlear implants, going from bulky experimental devices to sleek, easily installed commercialized products. About 100,000 people worldwide now have cochlear implants.

When I got my first implant, the idea of having a computer installed in my body shook me up considerably. Science fiction is full of negative images of human-machine couplings, from Michael Crichton's thriller "The Terminal Man," in which an implant for epilepsy turns the patient into a maniac, to "Star Trek's" shambling, robotic Borg characters. In my life, I aim to create a more positive image. During the invasion of Iraq in 2003, I stuck a peace symbol on my transmitter.

I now believe that implanted technologies can make us more human, not less: more aware of the world; more connected to each other; better able to find and use the information we need. New tools challenge us to do new things that we couldn't have imagined before, let alone attempted. I have had the marvelous opportunity to play with my implants by trying out new software and settings that allow me to hear the world in different ways.

During one programming session, I asked my audiologist to turn off all the electrodes except the one that transmitted the lowest-frequency sounds. I heard a faint rattling noise. The audiologist couldn't hear it. We finally realized that I was hearing the air conditioner through the vents. With every other frequency filtered out, I was able to hear what normally hearing people couldn't.