Machines that can connect to our brains and interpret its electrical signals hold all kinds of potential in all kinds of areas. A perfect demonstration of this is a research partnership between scientists at the University of California San Francisco, who want to help disabled patients speak again, and Facebook, which is pursuing technologies that would allow the general population to type words with their mind. This collaboration has now produced an exciting breakthrough, demonstrating technology that for the first time, decodes brainwaves as words and phrases in real time.