The tongue is an acutely sensitive organ with very fine muscular control. It would be useful to have some kind of tongue-driven input device for a computer.
I imagine some kind of tongue-glove, or alternatively a shaped object for holding in the mouth and manipulating with the tongue. These objects would communicate with the computer via short-wave radio. Force-feedback technology would need to be improved, so that these objects could have varying texture and surface properties to communicate state information to the user. Needless to say, this would free the hands for typing and other activities.
In the same way that the point-and-click desktop metaphor evolved and was accepted as THE way to interact with a computer when using a manually-driven input device, we'll need a new metaphor for interaction that makes sense in terms of oral organisation of information, so that the presentation of documents and controls for manipulation is intuitive. This would be a much more immersive and sensual experience.
The device would need to be designed to take advantage of the extreme sensitivity of the tongue - i.e. tailor the device to the properties of the body part, as opposed to a mouse which turns the miracle of evolution which is the hand into a crude pointing device.
It might be impossible to improve computer security markedly, because the device could create some kind of fingerprint based on chemical analysis of the saliva. This would be used to verify the identity of the user.-- AllenGrace, Sep 21 2001 An Isometric Tongue Pointing Device http://www.almaden....apers/tongue/cs.htmThoroughly baked. [Lemon, Sep 21 2001, last modified Oct 04 2004] FUFME http://www.fu-fme.com/.. [lazerlore, Sep 21 2001, last modified Oct 04 2004] lectrical tongue input device http://www.goupstat...1230391/1051/NEWS01Opposite direction of "input". Transmit images or sound or whatever into the brain as electrical tinglies. This is so awesome. [omegatron, Nov 23 2004, last modified Nov 25 2004] hm, a tongue dataglove.
I'm a little bit worried about the prospect of french-kissing simulation games, though.-- wiml, Sep 21 2001 Perhaps this idea could be 'extended' to use the tip of the Penis as an input device - the statement 'My computer's F****ed would have a whole new meanin to it-- brianc, Sep 21 2001 See link for info on an interesting concept called fufme (of course parody of cuseeme).-- lazerlore, Sep 22 2001 "This would be a much more immersive and sensual experience."
No kidding. the pornography industry will never be the same.-- theperson10, Oct 23 2008 ...was about to post a similar idea, but found this (and was momentarily impressed that there is a "Computer: Input Device: Tongue" category). I was thinking of a small trackpad on the back surface of your upper front teeth, controlled by the tongue which is, of course, extremely sensitive and has very fine control in terms of position and pressure. Naturally, this trackpad would be blue in colour and communicate with your computer via bluetooth.-- hippo, Jun 07 2017 Is it actually true that the tongue is especially dextrous (or glossorous, as the case may be)?
I am pretty confident that I can control my tongue to an accuracy of maybe 500µm (half a millimetre) or so - I don't know if I can be any more precise than that. And the area over which the tongue could work is maybe 50 x 50mm. That gives me a resolution of about 100 increments.
Now, with a small trackpad on a laptop, I have a working area of maybe 100 x 100mm, and my fingertips can certainly move with at least 1mm control, giving me the same resolution. With a regular mouse, I have a working area of about 300x300mm, and I can control it to within say 1mm again (using arm movements for coarse motion, wrist movements for fine motion, and then using finger movements while my wrist is supported on the mouse pad, for even finer motion). So I can get a resolution of about 300 incremements using my mouse.-- MaxwellBuchanan, Jun 07 2017 [Max] It would be theoretically possible for someone with whom you had a very intimate relationship to provide more accurate data on the fine control you are able to achieve with your tongue-- hippo, Jun 07 2017 I'm pretty sure that my former Head of Department's arse isn't that sensitive.-- MaxwellBuchanan, Jun 07 2017 random, halfbakery