Vision Quest – Utterly fascinating.
According to a printout Dobelle hands me, the price tag for curing blindness is now around $115,000:
- Visual Prosthesis System: $100,000
- 1 miniature camera mounted on eyeglasses
- 1 frame grabber
- 1 microcomputer
- 1 stimulus generation module
- 2 implanted electrode arrays with percutaneous pedestals
- 3 sets of rechargeable batteries and 1 charger (customer is responsible for replacement batteries as needed)
- 5-year full warranty (not including travel or freight)
- 5 years of annual follow-up examinations in Portugal (not including travel) unlimited telephone consultation
- Evaluation of patient: $2,000 psychiatric evaluation/all other testing
- Hospital expenses: $10,000
- Miscellaneous expenses: $5,000 airfare to Lisbon, hotel and food for one week (2 people) miscellaneous (such as taxis)
Also in this month’s Wired, Hacking Vegas, an article on MIT card sharks, and Professor X, an article on the Alexander Shulgin, the chemist that reintroduced MDMA to the world. (it was first synthesized by Merck back in 1912)