BY JOELLEN COLLINS
Remember when science fiction concepts seemed imaginative but impossible? For my generation, with bulky phones and shared “party” telephone lines, even the current proliferation of cellphones seemed outlandish. Who would ever imagine appearing with one’s morning face on a device that could capture a bad-hair day? I was a young mother when man landed on the moon. I remember feeling so lucky to be able to witness this milestone in human history.
About the time of Neil Armstrong’s celebration, my mother died at the age of 59 from the last of heart attacks that could not be conquered. Just a couple of years later, my aunt was one of the early patients of innovative heart surgery which, at the time, seemed unbelievable, and I remember wishing that my mother had been able to be the recipient of this kind of medical miracle.
Now we think of as normal many procedures unavailable to past generations, benefiting from surgeries once considered fatal. Even Ray Bradbury would have considered as unattainable the kind of longevity that fellow “seniors” with heart problems now experience.
As one who marvels at the inventions and progress of the current generation, I am still surprised by the almost daily news about medical innovations, the results of years of scientific research. This week’s news included a feature on the successful transplantation of a pig’s kidney into a human being. The operation, called Xeno, put a “humanized” pig kidney into a very ill patient who, so far, is accepting this novel process. Medical participants hope this might lead to the elimination of the long list of patients awaiting kidney transplants. Researchers from New York University have found a way to genetically modify the donor pig’s kidney, so it is accepted by a person. A childish thought popped into my mind at this news: “Who would have thunk?”
Shortly after learning about the kidney transplant, I found a report on another amazing medical event. A man paralyzed from his shoulders down has been a willing guinea pig (oops — another “pig” reference) in one of many attempts to restore movement in patients previously prepared to spend the rest of their lives relatively immobile. This man is photographed moving his legs up and down by telling his brain to do so. Doctors have found a way to “zap” his spinal cord so it sends a message to the brain to stimulate spinal movement. He is currently still unable to walk, but there are hopes that much of the recent research on how the human brain works holds the key to creating improved functional movement. Four patients are currently subjects of the process: they move their legs by “thinking” them to do so. Whoever would have imagined a device that restores muscle functions by brain messages?
I hope that the “science fiction” of A.I. will result in positive results. Will wonders never cease? I hope not.