Monkeys Write Shakespeare with a Little Help from Mind-Reading Technology Libby Plummer - Mailonline
go to original September 14, 2016

It is often said that, given an infinite amount of time, monkeys hitting random keys on a typewriter will eventually type the works of Shakespeare.

While it may seem far fetched, an unusual experiment has achieved the fabled task.

To illustrate how paralysed people can type using a device called a ‘brain-computer interface’, scientists used monkeys to show how it can be done.  

As a result, two rhesus macaque monkeys typed a passage from William Shakespeare’s Hamlet, as well as portions of the New York Times, at 12 words per minute.

While this speed is a long way from a fast human typist, the experiment shows that if a monkey, with no English skills, can operate the system, it should work just as well with a human.

To achieve the task, monkeys had electrodes implanted in part of the brain that controls hand movement.

The monkeys were able to move a cursor backwards and forwards on a grid which represents letters of the alphabet by thinking about moving up and down, left and right.

Read the rest at DailyMail.com

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