One year ago, we launched Input Origins with a simple mission: to trace the story of how humans have interacted with machines. From ultrasonic remotes to voice commands, from joysticks to brain-computer interfaces, we’ve explored a century of interface ingenuity.
But for our 12th edition, our one-year anniversary - we’re zooming all the way out. This month, we celebrate the human hand: the original, and ultimate, interface. The one we’ve used to shape tools, command machines, and interact with nearly every input device ever created.
The Homunculus - a map of how much brain activity is dedicated to
each body part, based on a research by neurosurgeon Wilder Penfield in the 1930s
Your Hands!
2.5 million years of evolution, 27 bones, 30 muscles, over 17,000 nerve endings - and a thumb. The human hand, developed to grip, feel, move, gesture, create and connect, with nearly 40% of your motor cortex devoted to the hands, more than to your legs, torso, or even your face
And the strange-looking fellow from the image above? That’s the homunculus and it represents the amount of brain activity required for each appendage, look at the size of those hands! They loom largest for a reason, the hands are the brain’s primary interface, packed with sensation, wired for precision, and designed for constant action.
We Built Interfaces to Fit Our Hands,
But What if...
Once we learned to shape the world with our hands, we began shaping tools, and when we built the first computers, we created interfaces that fit the hand. Keyboards laid out for ten fingers. Mice sculpted to rest under a palm. Every input device we’ve ever used was designed to feel familiar in the hand.
But what if we could go deeper? What if, instead of designing around the hand, we could design with it, or even from within? Imagine bypassing the buttons and the plastic, and tapping directly into the neural signals that guide your hand? Movements detected before they even happen. Micro-commands mapped from muscle movements. Your nervous system already knows what your hand is doing - we just need to listen.
The Return of the Hand.
We've spent decades designing input methods to wrap around our hands. But what if we didn't need tools at all? What if we could read the very signals that tell your hand to move, before the movement even happens? Every twitch, tap, and flex is preceded by a neural command from your brain. If we could detect those signals at the source, we could translate intention into action. No buttons. No screens.
That’s the idea behind the Mudra Link. By listening to the neural signals at your wrist, Mudra captures the intent behind your hand movements and transforms them into digital commands, instantly and invisibly.
Your gestures become input. Your hand becomes the controller. It all comes full circle, back to the hand, the interface we started with.
Read Previous Editions of -Input Origins-
