Think about it. Isn’t light+eyes and ears+sound just the same in terms of their “influence at a distance”? We don’t feel that as abnormal or magic - simply because we’ve sensors for them and are used to it. But physically speaking light and magnetism are based on electromagnetic forces.
You can implant a small magnet in your fingertip and then have the ability to sense magnetic fields.
It doesn’t even have to be a finger. There are so many underused parts of the body
Fair point, but then, most people don’t have this.
And even if you do it, you need to get some experience for your brain to develop a model of what to expect in certain situations. For instance, your brain will need some time to get used to the fact, that putting our hand on a fridge will give the brain new sensory stimuli because of the magnets on the fridge.
This intuitive understanding of light and sound is just that - brain neurons being used to what to expect. And even with an implant you would need to train that.
Though I’m definitely curious to experience once how that would feel like 😄
Get a tight-fitting glove, sew some magnets onto the fingers, wear the glove for awhile.
At least that won’t be disastrous if you need an emergency mri, they’ll just take it off
I mean, it’d be no different than what it does for all the other sensors. Just those kick on and start training at birth whereas any augment is going to be in adulthood. But the brain is really really good at figuring that stuff out so it’d be interesting, kinda want to do it now lolol
detecting magnetism will rarely be useful for humans especially in the context of survival
And I’m over here still jealous of plants for their photosynthesis and capillary action.
I actually heard about an experiment with magnets. They implanted them under people’s finger tips or something like that. Think they left it in for a year. They were able to even detect electricity through walls as well. After it was removed they could still do it!
Tory Belleci did that in an episode of the white rabbit project and talks to people who’ve had them in them implanted for a while.
This sounds really interesting. Do you have any clue who did it or any other context? Id like to find out more.
Biohackers put magnets in their fingertips frequently. It’s in the same vein as putting an NFC chip in your hand.
A real doctor won’t do it, since it’s body modification… it doesn’t even classify as cosmetic surgery, so you have to go to like a tattoo/piercing place (or something sketchier) to get one outside of a scientific study. I think it falls under “do no harm” more or less, which is also why doctors won’t do things like piercings despite being very qualified to do it safely and preventing infection in the process.
The hardest part is finding something to implant, since the body will readily reject a hunk of neodymium or iron in the body; so you need something that’s either “biocompatible” or coated in a biocompatible substance, then sterilized. Finding a mostly sterile field and tools, then a quick incision and a few stitches later, and you have it installed.
Usually it’s a neodymium magnet (to provide the highest magnetic field per gram), coated in a biocompatible film… there’s a couple different biocompatible substances that can be used, the key is to get something that is durable, since your fingers get a lot of use, and something that will last a good long time so you don’t have to get it removed and a new one sourced and implanted every few years.
No, I don’t have one myself, but I’ve been interested in the neighboring implant, which is the NFC/RFID chip, and the idea is largely the same.
Do your research on it if you’re considering it, it’s incredibly easy to get the wrong magnet implanted, or something with a poor biocompatiblity layer on it (maybe it’s too thin? Or poorly applied or something), so spend a bit more for a good product, and find a good place to get it implanted otherwise the infection may be quite the bitch to get over, and may require removing the implant before the infection clears up entirely.
Buyer beware on this one. 0/10 medical professionals recommend doing this.
I don’t even know that implanting them is necessary. See the idea behind this device, which gives you a sense of direction relative to the Earth’s magnetic field.
I think a wearable device with the right type of feedback would probably work too.
What if you implanted thousands of small magnets just underneath your skin all over your body?
Actually putting a magnet in your fingertip so you can “feel” magnetic objects is a bodymod I’ve heard some people do
But yeah, like @Pons_Aelius@kbin.social said, MRIs probably aren’t an option ever again unless you have it removed. I guess removing one from your finger would be easier than everywhere on your body.
Edit: I should have read the comment section before typing this, people are already talking about it lol
I wonder if that works with, like, jewelry. Could you build up the same sensations if you, say, practically always wore rings with magnets in them?
I think so. I posted this link above about a belt that gives users a sense of direction relative to the Earth’s magnetic field.
because we don’t have biological sensors for it
Honestly. The evidence for or against this is still far from certain.
New evidence for a human magnetic sense that lets your brain detect the Earth’s magnetic field
Fair point, I didn’t know about that. But even then, most of us don’t feel like we can feel it - and in the modern city living spaces it gets even less important to train such a sense.
Earth’s field is very large and very weak compared to small strong household magnets.
Whatever senses we’ve evolved for navigation could be dealing in a completely different scales so as to be useless.
It might be like trying to use a 5ml teaspoon to measure the volume liquid in a of a bathtub.
or using an alcohol thermometer to measure the temperature of molten iron
