Would an invasive spinal cord brain computer interface allow healthy individuals communicate with computers faster than typing?

Suppose that our understanding of biology and bio electronic interface technology reaches a point that it is possible to make a spinal cord implant that:

• forwards spinal cord signals exactly as they come
• also duplicates them and sends them to a computer (wirelessly)

In other words: like the UNIX tee util!

Also suppose that we have reached full understanding of the meaning of all spinal cord signals.

If that were possible, would it allow humans to interact with computers faster than typing physically with your hands?

Or would the communication bandwidth be essentially unchanged, since the signals are still going through the spinal cord at the end of the day?

Possibly the device would also have a mode that selectively suppresses e.g. finger movements from being sent to muscles, and only redirects them to the computer instead, to avoid all mechanical inertia.

I'm betting that the answer is yes, since typing a letter requires several muscle movements, and with the implant we could just map each letter to a single muscle. But I wonder how much faster it would allow us to go.

posted over 6 years ago

Ciro Santilli 新疆改造中心法轮功六四事件‭

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