In the pivotal years 1791-1794, methods and results developed by L. Galvani and A. Volta establish a profound basis for the scientific fields of electrophysiology and electrical telecommunications. Galvani’s twitching frog (and inadvertent battery) lead to the understanding that electricity mediates the flow of information inside the body. Volta’s pile battery created a stable power source for the seminal work of Faraday, Oersted and Ohm. Human nervous system extension took a significant leap forward with the development of the telephone in 1876. Electricity moving inside the body could now directly mediate the flow of electricity outside the body, at a relatively high bit rate.
In these most recent 220 years, the human nervous system has been greatly extended through the use of evolving telecommunications technology. We are now augmenting voice and image transfer modalities with techniques that extend the reach of new types of human-sourced data, such as emotional and motivational state.