How Much Bionic is Too Much Bionic?

Now that I have a cochlear implant, I get jokes about being half robot, or half bionic.  For hearing, the label is more than worth it.  And, the ability to turn it off and on at will is awesome.

Now there is talk about bionic eyes that can help restore vision for the blind.  More on that can be found here in this article: http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=steps-towards-a-bionic-ey.

For me personally, I think I’ll wait awhile and see what else they can come up with.  I already have one gadget in my head along with dental implants.  I am hoping that scientists will come up with a way to use the real eye to restore vision.  My blind eye has nothing to lose, so it would be great if there’s a way to give it vision with stem cells or some other way that involves natural human tissue.

I am legally blind in one eye, but can see enough to function pretty normally.  i often forget about my vision loss except when I have to deal with transportation or with getting around at night.  The other eye is totally blind, which made getting a cochlear implant in the ear on that side more crucial.

The other thing about vision versus hearing is, the process of learning how to see is much more disorienting. If I get too overwhelmed with hearing, I just take the processor off.  I guess you can do the same with the camera in the eye, but I would think it would be pretty weird turning vision on and off.

If you haven’t already, I encourage you to see the movie At First Sight.  Val Kilmer’s character gets his vision restored, and has to train his brain how to make connections to what he was seeing.  The movie provides a simple illustration of what must be a long and arduous process.

With all that said, I think it is amazing that the ability to restore vision is so close to reality.  This gives the chance for people who are blind to get a new lease in life.  Like with hearing, the ability to see is worth the process.

Miracles that have always been distant dreams are much closer to reality now.  I think it is just a matter of getting the technology up to speed so that it can provide usable vision.