so the second paragraph of the US
Declaration of Independence states that
all men are created equal that they are
endowed by their creators with
inalienable rights to life liberty and
the pursuit of happiness early in my
career I believe this to be true across
the board that all men and all women
have equal opportunities and were all to
be treated equally and I was never
really confronted with the inequities of
our society until a tragic accident left
me with a spinal cord injury at the age
of 26
and from that point forward I was thrown
into the world of paralysis and
immediately became a member of the
minority class those of us living with
disabilities there are over 57 million
people in the United States living with
some form of disability many of them are
not visible and many of them live on the
fringes of society so you can imagine
it’s only a few months after my injury
and I’m trying to reintegrate into
society in this new form in this new
form as a wheelchair user and I’ll never
forget this moment I was in downtown
Concord New Hampshire with my physical
therapist and we were maneuvering
sidewalks and curb cuts and uneven
streets and it was the first time I had
ever been out in public and the first
stranger we encountered was this man who
came up to me and he put his hand on my
head and said God allows you you are
blessed and then immediately walked away
I was thinking is this the way it’s
gonna be well it’s not really like that
really but people do treat you
differently like when you roll into a
room and people are staring but they
really don’t want to get caught looking
at you or the proverbial pat on the head
and oh dear or I love this one hey you
better slow down you’re gonna get a
speeding ticket and I could go on about
things that people say to you but the
one valid look that I get is a look that
I get from fellow members of minority
classes
it’s that look that says yeah you know
what it’s like like what you say to be
excluded you see we have laws in place
that tell us that we are to be treated
equally we have the Civil Rights Act of
1964 we have the Americans with
Disability Act of 1990 that tell us that
we are all to be included but those are
only guidelines how we act is what truly
shapes our society at one point in our
nation’s history these images were
common place where we blatantly excluded
people in a minority class and we
thought nothing of it and I’m grateful
to say that today these are no longer
common but these are how is it any
different I’ve spent my fair share of
going into buildings through the back
cargo bays or into restaurants to the
kitchen or where they deliver food and
the funny thing is it’s a true
reflection of how we treat each other
how we treat each other as human beings
and look around you’ll see examples of
that does it say we’re separate but
equal but there are examples in society
that we can point to you to drive us in
the direction of a much more inclusive
society why can’t we move into something
of universal design where we have images
like this that become commonplace and a
real great example is what gravitated me
to the sport of sailboat racing you see
this is a common image of a mark
rounding at a sailboat race in one
design sailboat racing the boats are all
the same the equipment’s the same the
rules are all the same on the water and
we’re all treated equally we’re all
punished and rewarded equally but if you
look back at the docks you’ll see
something like this and that’s because
in sailboat racing we use a
techniques and technologies to
compensate for our disabilities on the
water so we can compete on an equal
basis alongside our able-bodied sailors
and that’s when technology becomes the
equalizer technology can also break down
our societal barriers in 2012
Oscar Pistorius became the first person
to blur the lines between Olympic and
Paralympic when he it was a double leg
amputee competing in both games now
regardless of what you might think of
him as a person
it was the prosthetics the innovation in
an prosthetics legs that helped to
elevate him to that level and today
we’re using 3d printers to create upper
arm prosthetics for children where they
get to choose their favorite color or
their favorite superhero and suddenly
they become the envy of their
able-bodied friends think about how that
makes those children feel included and
we have pioneers on the front lines
today in the world of neuro technology
it’s a world where we’re we’re merging
medical electronics with the human
nervous system and these pioneers are
blazing the trails today in this world
now you probably think I’m gonna mention
an engineer or a scientist right but I’m
not because you see in flight
Exploration we celebrate the pilots we
celebrate people like Charles Lindbergh
and Amelia Earhart and Chuck Yeager and
Space Exploration we celebrate the
astronauts like Neil Armstrong and Buzz
Aldrin and Sally Ride and in all of
those cases those people put their lives
on the line for the Advancement of
Technology and science and in the world
of neuro technology there are people
that are doing that today there are test
pilots that are putting their lives on
the line there’s people like Jim Janet
he dove into the shallow end of a lake
on a hot
summer day and became a quadriplegic but
later he became the first person to be
implanted with a prosthesis that allows
him to use his arms and his hands and he
was able to return to his drafting job
there’s people like Kathy Hutchinson who
has locked-in syndrome from a brain stem
stroke at the age of 45 and it left her
that her only conversations could be
blinks of her eyes for yes and no but
she became the first person to
manipulate a robotic arm using a
brain-computer interface and her
thoughts so she can enjoy her beloved
cinnamon lattes and then there’s Kim
O’Shea who became blind from retinitis
pigmentosa after the birth of her second
child and she is one of few that has a
retinal prosthesis that allows her to
see black-and-white shades of grey
movement and some color now on the
surface you say this technology is great
it gives these people function it allows
Jim to use his hands it allows Kathy to
manipulate a robotic arm it allows Kim
to see but it’s so much more than that
you see for Jim it was the ability to go
into a restaurant and feed himself for
Kathy it was to independently drink her
cinnamon lattes and to have rich
conversations using a computer and for
Kim it was the joy of playing with her
pets in her backyard and the ability to
recognize her husband in a crowd that’s
the equalization of Technology and then
there’s this person who left her
wheelchair behind during our entire
wedding ceremony over 19 years ago I was
implanted with a neural prosthesis that
allows me to use my paralyzed legs and
you look at me right now and you might
say see nothing of that say well how can
you possibly use your legs and you can’t
see it and the reason you can’t see it
is because it’s all implanted inside the
body you see with the use of electrodes
and receivers that look a lot like
pacemakers a little battery power and
the press of a button I can return to
the upright world
pretty awesome huh so this is pretty
cool technology and you think hey that
must help with daily function and
probably help with health and you’re
right it sure does but it’s more than
that
it’ll gives me choices in society to
choose between standing and the
wheelchair it gives me a feeling of
inclusion that the developers have never
imagined that this technology can do now
just as in flight exploration and in
space exploration there are naysayers
there are people that reject this
technology like there’s members of the
disability community that say hey don’t
fix me I’m happy with my disability
there’s journalists that are putting
misleading information out there saying
that advanced technologies are loosely
regulated when in fact they are
vigorously regulated by the FDA and then
there’s the case of the cochlear implant
when it was first introduced it was
rejected by the deaf community and today
there’s over 400,000 people living with
cochlear implants that allow them to
hear there’s over a hundred that’s right
and there’s over a hundred and fifty
thousand people using deep brain
stimulators to treat brain disorders
like Parkinson’s disease an essential
tremor and dystonia
now these naysayers have the right to
their voice but they do not have the
right to obstruct our access to this
technology because we we deserve the
choice and freedom is the right to
choose then we think about implanted
technologies think about how it
integrates with us so many times we
think about technology is something that
we wear on our wrist we put over our
eyes we carry in our pocket but what
happens when technology becomes part of
us just as there are hidden disabilities
like brain injury and post-traumatic
stress and epilepsy there are hidden
enabling technology
jeez like implanted devices and some
very savvy external ones that give
people with disabled conditions the
ability to partake in activities that
they never were able to do before or
that they miss so much so at the end of
the day it all comes down to how we
treat each other as people how we treat
each other as human beings it’s not
about the laws and the rules and the
signage that we place in front of us
it’s about how we treat each other so
the next time you attend an event or
create a program or write a blog or
patron of business think about inclusion
we have an opportunity today to use our
technological developments to change
inclusion across society in the ways
that we teach our children how we look
at each other and how we interact and
there are Bionic pioneers on the front
lines today that are blazing the trails
forward for us for the future so let’s
figure out how we can use the technology
as a vehicle for inclusion thank you
you
Declaration of Independence states that
all men are created equal that they are
endowed by their creators with
inalienable rights to life liberty and
the pursuit of happiness early in my
career I believe this to be true across
the board that all men and all women
have equal opportunities and were all to
be treated equally and I was never
really confronted with the inequities of
our society until a tragic accident left
me with a spinal cord injury at the age
of 26
and from that point forward I was thrown
into the world of paralysis and
immediately became a member of the
minority class those of us living with
disabilities there are over 57 million
people in the United States living with
some form of disability many of them are
not visible and many of them live on the
fringes of society so you can imagine
it’s only a few months after my injury
and I’m trying to reintegrate into
society in this new form in this new
form as a wheelchair user and I’ll never
forget this moment I was in downtown
Concord New Hampshire with my physical
therapist and we were maneuvering
sidewalks and curb cuts and uneven
streets and it was the first time I had
ever been out in public and the first
stranger we encountered was this man who
came up to me and he put his hand on my
head and said God allows you you are
blessed and then immediately walked away
I was thinking is this the way it’s
gonna be well it’s not really like that
really but people do treat you
differently like when you roll into a
room and people are staring but they
really don’t want to get caught looking
at you or the proverbial pat on the head
and oh dear or I love this one hey you
better slow down you’re gonna get a
speeding ticket and I could go on about
things that people say to you but the
one valid look that I get is a look that
I get from fellow members of minority
classes
it’s that look that says yeah you know
what it’s like like what you say to be
excluded you see we have laws in place
that tell us that we are to be treated
equally we have the Civil Rights Act of
1964 we have the Americans with
Disability Act of 1990 that tell us that
we are all to be included but those are
only guidelines how we act is what truly
shapes our society at one point in our
nation’s history these images were
common place where we blatantly excluded
people in a minority class and we
thought nothing of it and I’m grateful
to say that today these are no longer
common but these are how is it any
different I’ve spent my fair share of
going into buildings through the back
cargo bays or into restaurants to the
kitchen or where they deliver food and
the funny thing is it’s a true
reflection of how we treat each other
how we treat each other as human beings
and look around you’ll see examples of
that does it say we’re separate but
equal but there are examples in society
that we can point to you to drive us in
the direction of a much more inclusive
society why can’t we move into something
of universal design where we have images
like this that become commonplace and a
real great example is what gravitated me
to the sport of sailboat racing you see
this is a common image of a mark
rounding at a sailboat race in one
design sailboat racing the boats are all
the same the equipment’s the same the
rules are all the same on the water and
we’re all treated equally we’re all
punished and rewarded equally but if you
look back at the docks you’ll see
something like this and that’s because
in sailboat racing we use a
techniques and technologies to
compensate for our disabilities on the
water so we can compete on an equal
basis alongside our able-bodied sailors
and that’s when technology becomes the
equalizer technology can also break down
our societal barriers in 2012
Oscar Pistorius became the first person
to blur the lines between Olympic and
Paralympic when he it was a double leg
amputee competing in both games now
regardless of what you might think of
him as a person
it was the prosthetics the innovation in
an prosthetics legs that helped to
elevate him to that level and today
we’re using 3d printers to create upper
arm prosthetics for children where they
get to choose their favorite color or
their favorite superhero and suddenly
they become the envy of their
able-bodied friends think about how that
makes those children feel included and
we have pioneers on the front lines
today in the world of neuro technology
it’s a world where we’re we’re merging
medical electronics with the human
nervous system and these pioneers are
blazing the trails today in this world
now you probably think I’m gonna mention
an engineer or a scientist right but I’m
not because you see in flight
Exploration we celebrate the pilots we
celebrate people like Charles Lindbergh
and Amelia Earhart and Chuck Yeager and
Space Exploration we celebrate the
astronauts like Neil Armstrong and Buzz
Aldrin and Sally Ride and in all of
those cases those people put their lives
on the line for the Advancement of
Technology and science and in the world
of neuro technology there are people
that are doing that today there are test
pilots that are putting their lives on
the line there’s people like Jim Janet
he dove into the shallow end of a lake
on a hot
summer day and became a quadriplegic but
later he became the first person to be
implanted with a prosthesis that allows
him to use his arms and his hands and he
was able to return to his drafting job
there’s people like Kathy Hutchinson who
has locked-in syndrome from a brain stem
stroke at the age of 45 and it left her
that her only conversations could be
blinks of her eyes for yes and no but
she became the first person to
manipulate a robotic arm using a
brain-computer interface and her
thoughts so she can enjoy her beloved
cinnamon lattes and then there’s Kim
O’Shea who became blind from retinitis
pigmentosa after the birth of her second
child and she is one of few that has a
retinal prosthesis that allows her to
see black-and-white shades of grey
movement and some color now on the
surface you say this technology is great
it gives these people function it allows
Jim to use his hands it allows Kathy to
manipulate a robotic arm it allows Kim
to see but it’s so much more than that
you see for Jim it was the ability to go
into a restaurant and feed himself for
Kathy it was to independently drink her
cinnamon lattes and to have rich
conversations using a computer and for
Kim it was the joy of playing with her
pets in her backyard and the ability to
recognize her husband in a crowd that’s
the equalization of Technology and then
there’s this person who left her
wheelchair behind during our entire
wedding ceremony over 19 years ago I was
implanted with a neural prosthesis that
allows me to use my paralyzed legs and
you look at me right now and you might
say see nothing of that say well how can
you possibly use your legs and you can’t
see it and the reason you can’t see it
is because it’s all implanted inside the
body you see with the use of electrodes
and receivers that look a lot like
pacemakers a little battery power and
the press of a button I can return to
the upright world
pretty awesome huh so this is pretty
cool technology and you think hey that
must help with daily function and
probably help with health and you’re
right it sure does but it’s more than
that
it’ll gives me choices in society to
choose between standing and the
wheelchair it gives me a feeling of
inclusion that the developers have never
imagined that this technology can do now
just as in flight exploration and in
space exploration there are naysayers
there are people that reject this
technology like there’s members of the
disability community that say hey don’t
fix me I’m happy with my disability
there’s journalists that are putting
misleading information out there saying
that advanced technologies are loosely
regulated when in fact they are
vigorously regulated by the FDA and then
there’s the case of the cochlear implant
when it was first introduced it was
rejected by the deaf community and today
there’s over 400,000 people living with
cochlear implants that allow them to
hear there’s over a hundred that’s right
and there’s over a hundred and fifty
thousand people using deep brain
stimulators to treat brain disorders
like Parkinson’s disease an essential
tremor and dystonia
now these naysayers have the right to
their voice but they do not have the
right to obstruct our access to this
technology because we we deserve the
choice and freedom is the right to
choose then we think about implanted
technologies think about how it
integrates with us so many times we
think about technology is something that
we wear on our wrist we put over our
eyes we carry in our pocket but what
happens when technology becomes part of
us just as there are hidden disabilities
like brain injury and post-traumatic
stress and epilepsy there are hidden
enabling technology
jeez like implanted devices and some
very savvy external ones that give
people with disabled conditions the
ability to partake in activities that
they never were able to do before or
that they miss so much so at the end of
the day it all comes down to how we
treat each other as people how we treat
each other as human beings it’s not
about the laws and the rules and the
signage that we place in front of us
it’s about how we treat each other so
the next time you attend an event or
create a program or write a blog or
patron of business think about inclusion
we have an opportunity today to use our
technological developments to change
inclusion across society in the ways
that we teach our children how we look
at each other and how we interact and
there are Bionic pioneers on the front
lines today that are blazing the trails
forward for us for the future so let’s
figure out how we can use the technology
as a vehicle for inclusion thank you
you
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