Arthur C. Clarke once wrote, “Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.”
Before I go any further, let me ask you a question. How many thumbs would I need to have for you to think I was magic?
One? No, that’s just a band saw accident.
Two? (checks notes) Nope, that’s the regular amount.
How about three? Now we’re talking.
In 2022, researchers at Cambridge University developed a robotic extra thumb that can be worn next to the pinky finger of your dominant hand. Using sensors attached to your big toes, you can manipulate this “Third Thumb” up and down, back and forth.
It sounds kooky, but 600 people tried the device. Only four could not successfully use the extra thumb.
The scientists demonstrated several potential applications of the invention, mostly related to productivity. Complex tasks like soldering circuits, practicing surgery, or performing other fine motor skills became significantly easier. Musicians and artists discovered remarkable new possibilities. And heck, lots of people simply enjoyed picking up more stuff with one hand than they could before.
Now, listen. It’s important for you to know that I am not here to sell robotic extra thumbs. These things aren’t commercially available yet, anyway. But we do need to take stock of new technology, both for its potential benefits and to prepare ourselves for change.
You may not want an extra thumb. In Cold War sci-fi, extra thumbs were not welcome — usually the effects of nuclear fallout or interstellar inbreeding. I can already picture the awkward cocktail party in which a loving couple drapes themselves across a sofa. “Our marriage reached new heights after we got these extra thumbs.” So, yes, I understand your reluctance very well.
But extra thumbs are strange enough to our senses to perhaps awaken us to the technological changes we’ve already accepted in our lives.
For instance, most of us carry a device that changes how we think. It’s in our pockets, sometimes on our wrists or even attached to our ears. And even though a lot of people complain about cell phones, and a few have successfully avoided using them, there’s no going back to a time before they existed.
Our phones show us cute babies, funny cats, war crimes and anything or anyone that makes us mad. Cute! Funny! Grrr! The kids these days! The politics! We’re primed up like race dogs, chasing a fake rabbit around a track for the financial benefit of an industry we, like dogs, don’t understand.
But that’s not all. Technology isn’t just shaping our emotions and motivations, it’s literally rewiring our brains. We now use the internet as part of our working memory. My kids don’t know any phone numbers, other than their own. It’s not necessary to learn numbers anymore. They’re in the phone. So are the Roman emperors, state capitals and the periodic table of elements.
Phones can carry so much more specific information than our brains, so it’s easy to see how this happens. But our minds are just a little less full as a result. Colleges now welcome the first generation of lifelong smart phone users. These students are just as smart as older people, but their brains were developed in a technological science experiment.
So, does a person need a third thumb? No, but it might come in handy.
Ha!
But seriously, at least the things we can do with extra thumbs get us out of our heads and off our screens. I’m not saying I’ll use one, but I remember saying that about smart phones a few years back, and the internet a couple decades prior.
A hand with an extra robot thumb renders the best judgement on this topic: one thumb up, one thumb down. It leaves a whole other hand to scroll for answers to a paradox.
Aaron J. Brown is an author and college instructor from northern Minnesota’s Iron Range. He writes the blog MinnesotaBrown.com and co-hosts the podcast “Power in the Wilderness” on Northern Community Radio. This piece first appeared in the Saturday, Sept. 14, 2024 edition of the Mesabi Tribune.
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