Gringing/Biohacking

[UniqueMixture]

I don't know if anyone on this site would be interested, but if so there are resources available for people interested in the transhumanist movement. As some of you may know, I recently went to the Extreme Futurist Festival in LA and ran into some cool people there. One of the most interesting groups there was the Grinders who are basically people who believe in experimenting on the self in order to make enhancements to human sensory systems etc in an effort to help us evolve beyond our natural limitations.

Their main website is: http://www.grindhousewetware.com where they have their mission statement and a list of various projects that they have developed/are developing and the bottlenose, the thinking cap, and the HELEDD which augment your sensory perception, concentration/cognition, and allow you to monitor/aggregate health data for your own use respectively.

Bottlenose description:

The Bottlenose takes in a large range of data such as sonar, UV, wi-fi and thermal information and translates it to a magnetic field via induction where it interacts with an implanted magnet (usually in the finger). Grindhouse Wetwares also sells a haptic version of the Bottlenose, which does not require a magnet implant. The haptic model vibrates with varying intensity in the presence of sensory information. Any sensor can be substituted or added to the provided kit - instructions on how to do this is provided in the video below. Technical information can be found in the "Bottlenose_ARD.INO" file at the bottom of this page.

Thinking Cap:

The Thinking Cap v1.0 is the first major release of Grindhouse Wet Wares' implementation of the

tDCS (transcranial Direct Current Stimulation and CES (Cranial Electrotherapy Stimulation)

concepts. The idea is to stimulate your brain with direct current (in the case of tDCS)

or with square waves of current (in the case of CES) which can either raise or lower the

potential energy of the stimulated neurons, depending on the orientation of electrodes.

This allows them to fire more or less easily, and activates or deactivates a given region,

thus engaging certain brain states.


The code (included) is programmed to control an Arduino-compatible microcontroller to deliver

the necessary current. It comes in the form of a library, so the hacker can choose his way of

controlling the current. To create an instantiation of the ThinkingCap class, simply call the

"ThinkingCap" constructor, and then call the methods corresponding to the desired action.


The tDCS setting uses a current source and PWM to ramp up the current at the beginning, and ramp

it back down after a given stimulation time (20 minutes by default, but this setting is also

changeable). The CES setting pulls a constant square wave, with a frequency to be set by the

user.


If the component values from the schematic are used, the current pulled should be roughly 0.5 mA

or less, but by changing these values, the current level can be manipulated. However, pulling

currents in excess of 2 mA is not recommended for any use.

HELEDD:

HELEDD

This device, no larger than a bic lighter, is an implantable device that can read biomedical data and transmit it to the Internet via bluetooth. Instead of taking snapshots of your health by visiting a doctor, you can aggregate weeks or months of medical data that you can store for your personal viewing. Messages, warnings, or texts from your android phone to your HELEED implant can be displayed via LEDs through your skin.

HELEDD is currently undergoing fluid and stress testing to ensure optimal performance.

...

Version v0.1 of HELEDD will be released mid-December.

Yes, these devices are/will be for sale and:

For any Cyberware (external) device, Grindhouse Wetwares guarantees that malfunctioning devices will be replaced up to 90 days after purchase without charge. If your device malfunctions up to one year after the purchase of your device, we will ship replacement parts to you and assist you through the repair process.

Grinders are also really big on the implantable magnets to help sense electromagnetic fields and augment perception, however this does require that you cut into your finger with a scalpel and implant the magnet yourself (they can help you with the coatings you will need to protect your body from getting poisoned by the materials used, but it is to be noted that there is risk in case of injury and it will hurt unless you have access to anesthetics).

One last resource, biohack.me is a forum where you can request custom mods for yourself and there are people there who will help you if you are interested. One dude who is into the whole furry thing even wanted to be genetically modified with cat dna and while you may have difficulty getting advice on how to do something like that you will find people willing to help give you some kind of mod like the sense of smell of a cat or whatever. Anyhow, hope you find something useful here and come be a part of the future!

 

[spirilis]

Slick! I think I could get into the haptic form of biohacking. My recent dive into microcontroller work would be the perfect platform to design such things too. Tight-fitting elastic bands or whatnot with the vibration motors inside would offer some choices of wearable inputs, and attaching them to wearable microcontrollers (e.g. Sparkfun's LilyPad, Adafruit's Flora, or an MSP430-based wearable in development by a guy at 43oh.com) would drive the brain of it.

 

[sprinkles]

I just want a mnemonic device where I can store things in a way that I can easily remember.