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Nokia CEO says 6G will be here by 2030 — but you might not access it via your smartphone
Headquartered in Finland, Nokia builds telecoms networks that enable phones and other internet-enabled devices to communicate with one another.
Asked when he thinks the world will move away from using smartphones to using smart glasses and other devices that are worn on the face, [Nokia CEO] Lundmark said it will happen before 6G arrives.
[...] "By then, definitely the smartphone as we know it today will not anymore be the most common interface," he said. "Many of these things will be built directly into our bodies."
He did not specify exactly what he was referring to but some companies, such as Elon Musk's Neuralink, are working on producing electronic devices that can be implanted into the brain and used for communication with machines and other people. On a more basic level, chips can be implanted into people's fingers and used to unlock things.
6G may be here in the next 8 years or so, but I believe the suggestion of implanted devices being commonplace is a totally unrealistic statement. We have not yet reached the stage where 'implanting things into the brain' has become a simple and low risk proposition. But even if we had, who is going to be performing these operations and at what rate? Who would pay for such medical treatment?
However, let us put these problems aside for a moment. What do you see as the future of personal communications? Let's discuss some realistic or even 'off-the'wall' ideas. What effect would such devices have on our privacy and freedoms? In Star Trek the communicator device, which appeared on our (television) screens around the mid 1960s, does not look too different from some of today's smartphones although at that time it was pure science fiction.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday May 31 2022, @12:04PM (6 children)
It's hard enough to transplant a kidney from one related person to another one. The receiver has to keep taking pills to prevent it from being rejected.
I wonder how medical researcher think about this; do you get similar responses from "chips" being planted in bodies?
(Score: 5, Insightful) by janrinok on Tuesday May 31 2022, @12:21PM (3 children)
I don't know for sure (because I am not a doctor or a surgeon), but I think it is only living tissue that gets 'rejected' in the way that you mean.
Broken limbs are often repaired with metal bars and screws which do not require a lifetime of special medication. Hip replacements likewise. Heart valves can be replaced with non-tissue replacements without medication being needed to prevent rejection. So based on this small amount of anecdotal data - I would guess not.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday May 31 2022, @01:06PM (1 child)
You can have reactions to metals and any foreign object, but it's not anywhere near as common and typically, not any of the materials that are cleared for implantation. They will eventually figure it how to get donated organs to work without the drugs to prevent rejection, but the immune system needs to be trained for it if you can't use cells that properly match, be and developing the immune system acceptance takes far more than the few hours b you typically get.
(Score: 2) by mhajicek on Tuesday May 31 2022, @05:21PM
There are people with nickel allergies, but there are other metals, like titanium, that are safe. I machine medical device parts for a living.
The spacelike surfaces of time foliations can have a cusp at the surface of discontinuity. - P. Hajicek
(Score: 4, Interesting) by HiThere on Tuesday May 31 2022, @01:26PM
It's not only living tissue that gets reacted to, though "rejected" might be the wrong word. Different substances, though, cause different reactions. Think about splinters. Consider artificial knees. So embedded electronics is possible, though you would need to encase them so that the only thing sensed by the body was something it didn't react to. (And, of course, people differ in their reaction profile as well as in other ways.)
It's definitely a non-trivial problem. Even rigidity can be a make-or-break issue. If an electrode is too rigid, THAT will kill the neuron it tries to connect to.
Javascript is what you use to allow unknown third parties to run software you have no idea about on your computer.
(Score: 2) by EvilSS on Wednesday June 01 2022, @01:49PM (1 child)
Seriously? We've been implanting electronics in people for decades now. Pacemakers, IAEDs, VNS devices to prevent or lessen seizures, etc. None of those require anti-rejection drugs. We know what materials can be used for these types of things already.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 01 2022, @08:16PM
Not to mention metal pins are commonly used when treating broken bones.