Around what year do you think robotic enhancements for our bodies will be available?

Currently available (life changing but pricey )
..
..ReWalk robotic exoskeleton looks like science-fiction, but helps paraplegics walk again
http://www.pcworld.com/article/2866676/software-health/rewalk-robotic-exoskeleton-looks-like-science-fiction-but-helps-paraplegics-walk-again.html

I’m curious about what robotic enhancements are envisioned excluding limbs and pacemakers. Your first sentence leaves me guessing at its meaning. Those devices aren’t designed for “medical purposes”. But I can’t imagine any robotic device being “installed” in a body without some sort of medical procedure.

@stanleybmanly I meant robotic enhancements other than for medical purposes. All would have to be installed during a medical procedure, but I’m talking about things that would simply be used for enhancement and not merely replacement. Like a computer chip implanted into our eye so that we could walk around seeing things on a screen that only we could see. Stuff like that.

EDIT: So yeah, maybe I phrased the question badly. Instead of saying “robotics” specifically, maybe I should have just said “technological enhancements” in general.

I can’t imagine that there would be a high priority to develop something like the example you gave because it would necessarily cater to such a limited market.

I mean, how many people would be willing to risk elective surgery for something mostly cosmetic.

Yes, I know people do it for boob jobs and plastic surgery, but I’m referring to things non sexually motivated.

Now I get it. Not an artificial limb, but say a titanium implant adjacent to the bone in your arm with tiny but powerful motors that would triple your lifting capability.

@Stanley

Actually they already have something to triple your lifting capability but doesn’t require surgery.

It’s an exo-skeleton device and it assists the legs as much as the arms because even if one’s arm could lift triple or greater the amount of weight, it wouldn’t necessarily do much good if ones legs couldn’t support it. They would likely fall over from their legs buckling under them.

But the exoskeleton does the trick nicely.

I remember that thing Sigourney Weaver climbed into in one of the Alien movies.

Yes. But it’s used in real life as well as just being a movie prop.

I can virtually guarantee the first things we will see will serve a military purpose most likely along the lines of Universal Soldier type enhancements. Or how about a third arm for drummers.

Neil Harbisson has a cyborg antenna permanently attached to the occipital bone in his skull. It enables him to “hear” infrared and ultra violet light frequencies beyond standard human perception. It also has internet connectivity that enables him to receive calls into his skull.

At the moment, the eyeborg is available by donation only.

A lot of the above comes out of the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), an agency within the Department of Defence. The “iron man” super soldier exoskeleton is old stuff already. The really interesting stuff is in the area of neural protheses. At the moment the edge of this technology is in artificial limbs that are connected neurally to the brain enabling the user to not only have a fully functional complicated extremity like a hand, but complete with the sensation of touch as well. We have this. With a little imagination, one can easily see the military application to this type of technology beyond mere healthcare. At the moment, it is not within the bounds of American medical ethics or law to apply these technologies to otherwise healthy people, such as young soldiers. The way around this would be to do it off-shore, as was done with the first heart transplants and other risky new technology. Or suspend these barriers during a state of emergency,

The next generation is all about sensory enhancement as described by @Lawn above. Soldiers with night vision, remote motion sensory, dog-like hearing, implanted satellite and field communications, GPS., etc. would be extremely beneficial in recon conditions. DARPA’s Livermore Labs are making excellent headway on this.

@Lawn and @Espiritus_Corvus Cool links, thank you! Military will definitely see things first, but I think eventually it’ll also be mainstream. I’m interested to see some of it, but it’s also scary in some ways.

My D-I-L is trying to get into a program working with the robotic exoskeletons. I hope it works out for her and all the others out there that could certainly benefit from it. I am also hoping that the stem cell research into spinal cord injuries continues to be funded and make advances. Yeah, I know, not robotic but wtf