Ever wondered what your pooch was thinking when he’s giving you those puppy dog eyes? Or what on earth he’s barking for during EastEnders? Some very clever researchers at ST, the lab that brought you the rocking chair that doubles as an iPad charger, have created a headset entitled No More Woof for your canine friend that can translate his thoughts into human speech.
Just to be clear, your pup won’t start offering you relationship advice or ranting about the lack of good dog groomers in your area but ST claims it can identify patterns within the brain that are associated with specific feelings such as needing to go outside to pee, feeling tired, hungry or anxious.
The invention that your pooch will wear similar to a boyband headset circa the 90s, is made up of EEG recorders hooked up to a Raspberry Pi and speaker which picks up on patterns in dog’s thoughts and converts them to speech.
At the moment, this is only available in English but Spanish, French and Mandarin speaking dogs will be able to be heard at some point in the not too distant future. In the distant future ST hopes to be able to create a two-way communication device, that enables your thoughts to be translated back to your dog. So in other words, our dogs really could become our best friends.
Original post here.
Photo (cc) Josep Tomàs on Flickr
