DEFIANT: Intel is working on a system that will use physicist Stephen Hawking’s cheek twitch as well as mouth and eyebrow movements to provide signals to his computer. Hawking is looking to prevent the further deterioration of his ability to communicate.
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Renowned physicist Stephen Hawking has long relied on technology to help him connect with the outside world despite the degenerative motor neuron disease he has battled for the past 50 years. Whereas Hawking’s condition has deteriorated over time, a highly respected computer scientist indicated at last week’s International Consumer Electronics Show (CES) that he and his team may be close to a breakthrough that could boost the rate at which the physicist communicates, which has fallen to a mere one word per minute in recent years.
For the past decade Hawking has used a voluntary twitch of his cheek muscle to compose words and sentences one letter at a time that are expressed through a speech-generation device connected to his computer. Each tweak stops a cursor that continuously scans text on a screen facing the scientist.
At CES, Intel chief technology officer Justin Rattner noted that Hawking can actually make a number of other facial expressions as well that might also be used to speed up the rate at which the physicist conveys his thoughts. Even providing Hawking with two inputs would give him the ability to communicate using Morse code, “which would be a great improvement,” said Rattner, who is also director of Intel Labs.
Intel has since the late 1990s supplied Hawking with technology to help the scientist express himself. The latest chapter in their work together began in late 2011 when Hawking reached out to Gordon Moore, informing the Intel co-founder and father of Moore’s law that the physicist’s ability to compose text was slowing and inquiring whether Intel could help.
Rattner met with Hawking early last year around the time of the latter’s 70th birthday celebration in Cambridge, where the Intel CTO was one of the speakers. After meeting with Hawking, Rattner said he wondered whether his company’s processor technology could restore the scientist’s ability to communicate at five words per minute, or even increase that rate to 10. “Up to now, these technologies didn't work well enough to satisfy someone like Stephen, who wants to produce a lot of information,” Rattner said.
Intel is now working on a system that can use Hawking’s cheek twitch as well as mouth and eyebrow movements to provide signals to his computer. “We've built a new, character-driven interface in modern terms that includes a better word predictor,” Rattner said. The company is also exploring the use of facial-recognition software to create a new user interface for Hawking that would be quicker than selecting individual letters or words.
Hawking’s current setup includes a tablet PC with a forward-facing Webcam that he can use to place Skype calls. A black box beneath his wheelchair contains an audio amplifier, voltage regulators and a USB hardware key that receives the input from an infrared sensor on Hawking’s eyeglasses, which detects changes in light as he twitches his cheek. A hardware voice synthesizer sits in another black box on the back of the chair and receives commands from the computer via a USB-based serial port.
Intel’s work with Hawking is part of the company’s broader research into smart gadgets as well as assistive technologies for the elderly. The key to advancing smart devices—which have been at a plateau over the past five or six years—is context awareness, Rattner said. Devices will really get to know us the way a friend would, understanding how our facial expressions reflect our mood, he added.
Intel’s plan for identifying personal context requires a combination of hardware sensors—camera, accelerometer, microphone, thermometer and others—with software that can check one’s personal calendar, social networks and Internet browsing habits, to name a few. “We use this [information] to reason your current context and what's important at any given time [and deliver] pervasive assistance,” Rattner said. One approach to “pervasive assistance” is the Magic Carpet, a rug that Intel and GE developed with embedded sensors and accelerometers that can record a person’s normal routine and even their gait, sounding an alert when deviations are detected.
Such assistance will anticipate our needs, letting us know when we are supposed to be at an appointment and even reminding us to carry enough cash when running certain errands, according to Rattner, who added, “We’ll be emotionally connected with our devices in a few years.”
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31 Comments
Add CommentMan, this dude has some real health insurance! Anyone in the US taking notice?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI'm surprised no mention was made concerning input via thought control. Work is being done in this field, and it seems to me that someone in his condition would benefit from a transition away from devices that rely on muscle movements.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe major problem with connecting to the human brain, is that the human brain has NO interface for such a connection. And the only way a valid one would arise is for it to evolve. We would have to over a period of generations develop such an interface which links directly to the brain.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAnd then there is the problem of how to actually talk to the brain, what type of data would we send to do what we want to do.
So brain/computer interfaces are a long way away, but not impossible.
Dude's an atheist. Save your prayers..
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thishe should get one of those brain implants that they put in that paralyzed woman's brain that allowed her to move a robotic arm. Then he could type with it. Or they could make it so that when he thinks about certain thing it types certain letter.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisDude... he's one of the smartest people to have ever lived, and has an assload of money from the books he's written...
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisNo, that robotic arm you're talking about isn't nearly dexterous enough to type anything, plus it requires immense concentration, which in Hawkings case is clearly better spent thinking.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI'm sure a neural interface has been considered for use moving a cursor around a screen and typing on a virtual keyboard. It would seem to be a logical choice. Perhaps there are medical reasons why not, or Hawking doesn't like the idea. I'm inclined to believe the former, as the nature of his condition lies in the brain. Still, hopefully in the future, neural interfaces can be developed for patients suffering from degenerative motor neuron disease.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisBut he EARNED his and is still productive. You see the difference? If your mind was that cognitively gifted as his, then you can have the same.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisScientific Americans Di and Ted, he's a Physicist!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWhat about Ray Kurzweil's Google project which learns and predicts your choices through semantics and language use?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisFor now wouldn't a very personalised vocabulary and phrase table let him make bigger steps?
Robert
This is a brilliant human being who has overcome a devasting disability that would have reduced someone of lesser intelligence to a vegetable. For 50 years he has persisted despite all ords to help us understand our universe better. To state loudly, everything about him and his life has contributed to a better understanding of our place in the universe and the technology that is now being developed to assist him will help others too and advance computer technology. I am ashamed on behalf of the human race, about those simple-minded, lazy windbags people who continue to make silly comments about the money he earns from his books. The human species will become extinct like the Neanderthals if our consciousness shifts way down to your level.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisFaith in Technology has got him well beyond what anyone would have dreamed of in the early days of his communication problem.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI have serious doubts about Prayer.
Does anyone have information about how often Prayers get postive results?
From what I remember reading, praying seems to have as good a track record as a placebo ( around 50%), which makes sense because it soothes the mind of the person praying, as any kind of meditation does, even cursing; however, statistically, it has shown a poor track record when it came to assessing the medical success rates.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisSo, let's keep fingers crossed (yes we can) on behalf of our dearly beloved Stephen, who is truly a secular Hero 'Saint' of Physics, having given us a true Revelation of the Book of the Universe, despite the shackles of his own physicality.
( and let any saintlier-than-thou tunnelled-vision hypocrites roast in hell-should they dare to show the slightest hint of 'Schadenfreude'over his personal plight- because he has proved Evolution as the ultimate moving factor of all things- terrestrial AND celestial!)
We don't have to wait for this capability to evolve within the brain. It can be organically grown. I have spent a lot of time detailing this technology...in fiction form of course:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thishttp://www.amazon.com/After-Delphi-Yorick-Von-Fortinbras/dp/1438276435/ref=sr_1_7?ie=UTF8&qid=1358958492&sr=8-7&keywords=yorick+von+fortinbras
The development of such a chip is a tribute to the physical sciences, and a source of shame for the biological sciences. Recent reports show that most of what is published in our field (biology) is incorrect or fraudulent. We should be able to help him and heal him, and all like him. That we cannot is disgusting. Perhaps if we (biologists) gave less emphasis to "significant" and more emphasis to "significant and dramatic" we could resume progress?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisCompared to the US? Yes. Compared to the rest of the first world? No. The work on recognition software will, in the end, benefit more than Hawkings.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI don't think "Brain implant" means what you think it means.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisEven in such a worsening condition Hawkings is useful and helping the humans desire in the developments in Science and Technology. But not through playing with his brains with knife and scissors. I am sure somebody will have already formed a team of biologists, physicists and Electronics men to study how brain signals can be received and recorded and interpreted. Good luck to them. But on prayer side: it is so clear to all of us that if he had taken time out for prayers he would not have time to do what he did in his last 50 years. So let us keep the prayers aside. On money making: Even if he made money, it must not have been his life's ambition and priority no. 1. It nust have been a by-product of his principal contribution to the humanity. It is not surprising to see such comments as money making for such a great man.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisexactly
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisexactly
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisexactly
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisexactly
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIn ref. to: 4.woldenbow
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"Dude's an atheist. Save your prayers.."
Dear Sir/Madam,
This world-renowned physicist may well be an atheist, but would definitely possess what many of us would call an immortal soul. As such, the second sentence in your above comment could have been better worded as: "Say a prayer for him," as God awaits this prodigal son, too. to return to His eternal fold, and thereby spearhead to evangelize the rest of the generally atheistic science community with his magnificent and God-given brain.
In the interim, I would be eternally grateful if the good professor would care to comment on this e-mail I sent him over three years ago: http://www.sittampalam.net/Perimeter.pdf.
Thank you all. and Cheers!
www.toe.tv
I am sure they are trying eye movement...
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe human pineal gland is supposed to interface with an internet . It is likely the target of fluoridation.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisMr. H. gets thousands of letters or messages in other forms every year. At one word a minute he doesn't have time to even start to respond to any of them and still be remotely useful to the world in general. Get over yourself.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisInterfacing with-in our brains, is only our own deciphering thought ability, (in innovations, or healing ourselves)
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisMaybe we are not far enough in time and space, to judge.
@Eugene Sittampalam, Hawkings has the opportunity to speak with the greatest minds of the day why in the world would he speak to a religious nut with one of the weakest minds of the day? You have the intellectual equivalent of ALS, what in the world do you think you have to offer him?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this@Eugene Sittampalam: Your comment seems to opine that you have something of value to say to Stephen Hawking.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI managed, with some difficulty, to open the message to which you've provided a link. I found nothing but various opinions of yours on a variety of issues, which you have sent to a sizable mailing list of eminent people (mainly physicists, I presume). I observe that you've offered $ 25,000 as an inducement (fee?/reward?/bribe?) for them to pronounce on your opinions, that you seem to be claiming is, more or less, a 'theory of everything'.
In fact, there seems to be little or nothing there to indicate that your opinion has anything that could be of interest to even poor me, let alone Stephen Hawking, who has to expend ENORMOUS resources to write/utter even a single word, let alone pronounce on your opinions/ 'theories'. The editors at the magazine 'Nature' seem to have indicated their lack of interest. Some others - whose credentials I do not know - seem to have given you encouragement of some kind (which might have been the stimulus that launched you on your quest). In my opinion, your quest is quixotic. All of the above in this para is, however, only my opinion (which may be in error): it is NOT an evaluation of your 'theory of everything'. Any such evaluation you will have to do for yourself.
If you are interested in actually checking out the validity/ utility of your opinion/'theory', I suggest that you may like to look at the 'One Page Management System' (OPMS) as a practical means to do an honest (and realistic) evaluation for yourself. There will be a small amount of learning required, along with a sizable amount of 'unlearning': if you're capable of doing that, you will save considerable financial and other resources - and you will come out with a realistic evaluation of your 'theory of everything' - and possibly even an Action Plan on how to proceed. For more information about the OPMS, write to me at gs (underscore) chandy (at) yahoo (dot) com; I presume you are smart enough to convert that into an email id - no fee for such information.
- GSC
You are right, it would be an amazing thing to move toward the thought control but maybe it is not so immediate to be used for such short term
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