The God Wave Read Free Page B

going to do about it?
    He considered listening to them, his hand poised over the playback button, but the fact was he didn’t want to listen to them. He knew that at least three would be from his sister, Chelsea, asking where the hell he was.
    Instead, he picked up his iPhone, opened the remote for his entertainment center, and flicked on NPR, hoping there would be something distracting to listen to. There was—a repeat broadcast of Science Friday was in progress. He took some General Tso’s out of the fridge, removed the metal handle from the container, and popped it in the microwave.
    A few minutes later, lulled by the voices of public radio, Matt dove into his reheated dinner and considered taking a hot shower before he turned in. He was half-asleep already, only barely managing to chew his food. He polished it off, put the dish in the sink, and flicked off the kitchen light.
    Shower or straight to bed?
    â€œ. . . your work,” Ira Flatow was saying on the radio. “I read your paper, ‘A Musical Mind.’ I was especially taken by your description of the gamma waves your cellist friend generated.”
    Gamma waves?
    Matt paused in the middle of his living room. Who was Flatow interviewing?
    â€œI was wondering, Dr. Brenton, if you’ve come to any new insights since you wrote that piece.”
    Brenton. Where had he heard that name before? Had he heard that name before?
    â€œA few.”
    â€œA few,” Flatow repeated.
    Brenton laughed. “I’m really not trying to be coy. It’s just that what I’m working on right now probably sounds more like science fiction than science.”
    â€œTry me.”
    â€œWell, as Erica was playing, it occurred to me to wonder if the same brain waves that move a pulse on a computer screen or a needle on a graph can move physical objects, given the proper interface.”
    â€œLike drones?”
    â€œNot just drones. I mean when the human brain is engaged in an activity—even just going through the mental motions of the activity—it creates rhythms that describe that activity via brain waves. Theoretically it should be possible to harness those brain waves and channel them, so they can perform the activity remotely.”
    Flatow laughed. “That does sound like science fiction. What sort of applications are you considering?”
    Matt sank onto the sofa without registering that he’d done so.
    â€œSky’s the limit, isn’t it?” Brenton answered. “I mean just imagine what it would mean for disabled people. A thought to perform an act—operating a wheelchair or even a car or a computer. Imagine if, I don’t know, a scientist of the caliber of Stephen Hawking could perform any action just by thinking about it. Or people who are completely paralyzed but still have working minds that produce discrete brain waves. Those rhythms could allow them to communicate with the outside world, with their loved ones. Could permit them to manipulate their environment, even create art. Write. Perform. Live .”
    Matt was stunned by the thought.
    Lucy . . .
    He remembered Lucy—his wife, his everything —lying in a hospital bed, dead to the outside world—dead to him—while her brain, her magnificent brain, continued to pulse out brain rhythms he could read but not understand. Did this man understand them? Matt still had the record of the last weeks of her life as EEG readouts. If this guy could read and translate these brain waves into some sort of coherent message, what would it be? What had Lucy’s mind been doing once her body stopped translating its messages?
    â€œOr imagine,” Brenton was saying, “being able to perform operations in the vacuum of space without sending astronauts outside. Or even robots. The spacecraft could be built in such a way that between the mind of the technician and the interface, they’d be reparable by remote thought.” He laughed