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This IBM programmer can control a BB-8 droid from 'Star Wars' with his mind

Matt WeinbergerJan 11, 2016, 23:39 IST

IBM engineer Joshua Carr and his BB-8.Screenshot/IBM

Joshua Carr, a lead engineer at IBM, decided to take Sphero's excellent "Star Wars: The Force Awakens" BB-8 app-powered droid and take it a step further with the ability to control it with his mind.

It's just as Jedi as it sounds.

To make it work, Carr turned to the Emotiv Insight, a consumer headset that can read your brain waves, plus some under-the-hood plumbing from IBM's cloud computing platform.

He says he had to train the Emotiv Insight to "read" his brainwaves and translate it into motion for BB-8, but it works now.

Here's the best part, in GIF form:

via GIPHY

And the full video:

"Can you imagine giving a lightsaber to somebody? They'd chop their arms off," Carr says.

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