
The third thumb - fanf2
http://www.daniclodedesign.com/thethirdthumb
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brathouz
The Verge has an article about The Third Thumb where they state "[...] the aim
is to re-imagine what we think of as a prosthetic — something that adds
capabilities, rather than just replacing those lost."

So much effort is put towards getting people back to baseline, and rightfully
so. But it's the creativity of extending ourselves past baseline that gives me
a child-like excitement for the future.

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exclusiv
Good perspective. That started for me with the Nintendo Power Glove even
though I never owned one. :)

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zokier
The guitar playing example feels like stretching the believability a bit. I'm
not a guitar player, but I imagine that having precise feedback from the
strings and frets would be kinda important for playing. And then there is of
course the question of latency.

In terms of practicality otherwise, the exposed actuating wire looks like it
would cause trouble (getting caught in places etc).

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djaychela
Yeah, I'd think it is really a non-starter. I've been playing for 30 years,
and can't imagine using something like that; reason being that I had
reconstructive surgery on my left wrist about 15 years ago, and having had my
hand in plaster for 3 months while the ligaments healed led me to a lengthy
period where my hand 'wasn't mine', making it very difficult to play. And that
was with a hand which was in truth functioning fully, just stiff and in need
of physio. Without the feedback that you get from a real digit, I can't see it
working other than as a makeshift slide to play with.

Not to say that it won't happen in the future, but I don't think this is it.

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e40
One of my cofounders has a daughter that had a 6th finger surgically removed
(as an adult). It was fully functional, but she got really weary of people
talking about it and being grossed out by it. It wasn't a thumb, but it seems
relevant...

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Animats
Somebody (Ross-Heim?) built a symmetrical robot hand with two thumbs and two
non-thumb fingers in the 1980s. They gave the outer fingers another degree of
freedom, so the outer fingers can rotate inward from the base. Back then,
nobody had good control algorithms for robot hands, and it didn't work well as
a waldo because humans can't do that. Worth looking at again.

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piyh
When I was a kid, I dreamed of having a functional third arm, this seems like
the first step in that direction.

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gumby
My dad cured me of that by pointing out that if I had that third arm there
would always be a project where I'd want a fourth anyway. It's the same
argument that Danny Hillis gave me for the 1-bit ALU in the original
connection machine design: "well, what number is correct? This way you can
build any size you want" which was almost true.

However the second thumb is a great idea. I have long though that if there
were some sort of god it must have been quite mean to choose _five_ as the
number of digits. _Six_ , with an extra opposable thumb on the opposite side,
would have been much much better (and even the same architecture but with a
total of four would have been superior to the current setup).

Also annoying was turning the knobs for pi and e to irrational values.

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eridius
Just because there are scenarios where you'd want a fourth doesn't invalidate
the desire to want a third. There are more situations where a third arm would
be helpful than where a fourth would be. The more arms, the fewer situations
apply.

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gumby
Well two is a good optimization: it gives you a portable opposition point
(with one arm you spend a lot of time pushing something against a wall or
something like that -- try living with your arm in a cast) vs needing enough
musculature to make the arms worth operating yet not make it heavy.

Plus there's a path dependency issue (the world is set up with chair backs,
shirts, whatever assuming bilateral symmetry). But evolutionarily (reimagining
the evolution of humans rather than adding an auxiliary arm) the path
dependency is not meaningful.

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joemi
I'm surprised there was no mention of Stelarc's Third Hand project from the
80's/90's: [http://stelarc.org/?catID=20265](http://stelarc.org/?catID=20265)

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jerf
I wonder what it would feel like to take this off after wearing it for a week.

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magic_beans
A bit like losing a finger.

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sluggg
what if I want two? I can't have two third thumbs

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hellbanner
Silly puns don't add to the conversation here.

A better comment would be addressing vulnerabilities or interference issues in
bluetooth.

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sluggg
my question still remains... is it, or could it be, designed so that I could
wear two. If so, then the name itself is confusing and should be changed.

Also, I encourage you to go make your own "better" comment and start the
discussion you want to see.

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hellbanner
Good point on the question, and thank you for the advice. Sorry for taking
your comment the wrong way.

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micros
Predicted by the Onion: Google Engineers Invent New Body Part To Strap Gadgets
Onto
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V7T6CAKUVJ4](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V7T6CAKUVJ4)

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jff
If anyone else is using uBlock Origin, at least for me the page displayed
completely blank until I disabled uBlock temporarily.

Nice one.

