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People with blindness can read again after retinal implant and special glasses

nbcnews.com

31–40 of 117 posts

Re: People with blindness can read again after retinal implant and special glasses

#31
post #25

A bit of a tengent, but... For those worrying about their eyesight when getting older... If you are into FLOSS, one last defense against your eyes failing when you get older is actually to contribute to accessibility before you (hopefully never) end up needing it. Disclaimer: I am blind myself.

What do you think about the recent "People with blindness" obsession, as evidenced in the title?

I am not blind nor deaf etc., but I am frankly fed up with it. In my case, should I call myself "a person with programming, Czechness and fortysomething years"?

Nope, I am a middle-aged Czech programmer. Yes, that does not reflect my entire personality and humanity. So what. Better than this sort of language abuse.

Re: People with blindness can read again after retinal implant and special glasses

#32
post #29

For the sake of the patients, I hope there's a better long-term service plan than Second Sight Medical Products had: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argus_retinal_prosthesis

Free software is more important than ever

As is regulation of medical devices.

Re: People with blindness can read again after retinal implant and special glasses

#33
post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wearing sunglasses apparently helps. You just need to make sure they have a proper UV rating, a lot of the cheap ones you get online don't do a good job of blocking UV.

Years ago I saw on TV a report where people bought several sunglasses sold in the street in Brazil and compared to the expensive brands and they all cut UV quite effectively. Not that I would trust national TV test methodologies and risk my vision but it was a curious result.

Off topic but in the same vein: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judgment_of_Paris_(wine)

Re: People with blindness can read again after retinal implant and special glasses

#34
post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I find that surprising since most plastics you would make glasses from should block uv.

Glass protects from UV bellow 350nm, which leaves 350nm-400nm band open. So additional coating is required. I might be wrong but such factors as glass thickness and the radiation intensity should be also accounted for. Every physical object is mostly an empty space ...

Visual range goes to 380. I'm skeptical that light at 350 is really doing much damage to my eyes.

Re: People with blindness can read again after retinal implant and special glasses

#35
post #2

The one thing I maybe missed, is there anything that can be done to reduce the risk of developing Age-Related Macular Degeneration?

I believe fish oil / omega 3 helps.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK11888/

Re: People with blindness can read again after retinal implant and special glasses

#36
post #25

A bit of a tengent, but... For those worrying about their eyesight when getting older... If you are into FLOSS, one last defense against your eyes failing when you get older is actually to contribute to accessibility before you (hopefully never) end up needing it. Disclaimer: I am blind myself.

What do you think about the recent "People with blindness" obsession, as evidenced in the title? I am not blind nor deaf etc., but I am frankly fed up with it. In my case, should I call myself "a person with programming, Czechness and fortysomething years"? Nope, I am a middle-aged Czech programmer. Yes, that does not reflect my entire personality and humanity. So what. Better than this sort of language abuse.

It shortcuts the American tendency to turn all disability-related nouns into slurs. (I found out a few weeks ago that "deaf-mute" is a slur in the States.) That's the major advantage, as far as I can tell.

Re: People with blindness can read again after retinal implant and special glasses

#37
post #29

For the sake of the patients, I hope there's a better long-term service plan than Second Sight Medical Products had: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argus_retinal_prosthesis

Free software is more important than ever

Accessibility of free software is more important than ever.

Re: People with blindness can read again after retinal implant and special glasses

#38
post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, yes. Capitalism is why the product could even be developed in the first place, and also why it ended the way it did.

It's not the only imaginable way, but it is the society we (in the vast majority of the world) live in, and I agree it doesn't really make sense to bash something not continuing to exist unprofitably when it was developed for profit. It's annoying when software support ends for anything, phones, Nest Protect, (any Google product!), but I think best to bear it in mind in buying anything that it's a possibility, who ar…

Except when these guys pays millions in marketing to make you believe you can rely on them. If at least they would just say nothing instead of propagating their distorted vision.

Re: People with blindness can read again after retinal implant and special glasses

#39
post #25

A bit of a tengent, but... For those worrying about their eyesight when getting older... If you are into FLOSS, one last defense against your eyes failing when you get older is actually to contribute to accessibility before you (hopefully never) end up needing it. Disclaimer: I am blind myself.

What do you think about the recent "People with blindness" obsession, as evidenced in the title? I am not blind nor deaf etc., but I am frankly fed up with it. In my case, should I call myself "a person with programming, Czechness and fortysomething years"? Nope, I am a middle-aged Czech programmer. Yes, that does not reflect my entire personality and humanity. So what. Better than this sort of language abuse.

I’d argue that a plain-English reading is actually the other way around. A “person with a car” is a normal descriptor, a “car person” is somebody for whom cars are a major life fixture. So accordingly I feel that “blind person” makes it more… conclusive? all encompassing? than “person with blindness”.

Re: People with blindness can read again after retinal implant and special glasses

#40
post #25

A bit of a tengent, but... For those worrying about their eyesight when getting older... If you are into FLOSS, one last defense against your eyes failing when you get older is actually to contribute to accessibility before you (hopefully never) end up needing it. Disclaimer: I am blind myself.

What do you think about the recent "People with blindness" obsession, as evidenced in the title? I am not blind nor deaf etc., but I am frankly fed up with it. In my case, should I call myself "a person with programming, Czechness and fortysomething years"? Nope, I am a middle-aged Czech programmer. Yes, that does not reflect my entire personality and humanity. So what. Better than this sort of language abuse.

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