Oc318, you perhaps should stop throwing around assumptions. My loss is WAY worse than yours. I'm deaf as a stone. WITH my hearing aid I can BARELY hear sounds that are above 100dB originally. If I turned my HA down to 120dB, as you so naively suggest, it would be so quiet I wouldn't even notice it because of tinnitus. You seem very focused on comparing your loss to mine, post after post in this thread. That my loss can't be worse than yours, that I'll hear better than you in the end. You may not see it, but that is very odd.
Actually you're right, I don't see it. We both have different ideas of what "odd" is I guess. I find it odd for a surgeon to destroy an eardrum, even if it's never going to be used again. And then to repair it.. I'm not sure what was up with that, but then I've never really been all that smart so :P
Okay. odd but is it a true statement though? it seems to make sense to me because well.. it's the bionic thing I guess. I've been reading and watching too many videos on it, how they connect the electrodes and stuff, it seems to me to be a vastly more efficient way to do things than to use a HA. It's basically like you have a HA that's connected directly to your brain. It's like you really do have a bionic ear. I know right now you're probably thinking "What kind of idiot is this really..?" but I'm just being honest. I could pretend to be smart and "normal" but why would I right?
So anyway it does seem to me that it's somewhat cool to have an electronic ear (probably a guy thing though) -- well it's like, I've been in computer science for a while, and I know how this sounds, but .. an actual processor connected to your brain, bypassing inefficient biological systems, being better than them, that's like augmentation, I used to play games in which this was possible, and now it is.
And now I hope you will excuse me if I say we in Comp Sc have always been fantasizing about female cybernetic bio-augmentation. That's probably the reason why there are so many of them in games and movies (Mako on SWTOR, Ghost in the Shell, Seven of Nine etc.) And now it's actually possible.
Anyway, so I'm thinking all the ear really does is pass sound to the brain for processing. Since you will have what in effect a more efficient ear, and your brain stays the same, I would guess that you would be able to hear better, or more accurately than most people.
Or maybe I've been watching too many movies. But theoretically it has to be better, or at least more efficient, right?
You mention you've never seen an Audiogram worse than yours in signatures here. That's because a person with such a profound loss likely isn't going to be wearing HA's, therefore isn't going to be in this section. They also aren't going to post their Audiogram in their signature. That's because people with audiograms like mine are usually Deaf, not deaf. When you have your Audiogram in your signature, Deaf will refer to you as HOH, not deaf. Because deaf/Deaf do not care about numbers. They're just deaf/Deaf.
Just sayin'
What I'm saying is, I don't see how that can be worse than a normal ear, maybe different but not worse. After all, if your ears are damaged, and you bypass it, doesn't that theoretically at least give you normal hearing? I mean there's nothing wrong with your brain, and nothing wrong with the implant, so by right you should have a better-than-normal auditory system?
Will you still be deaf with it on? I'm thinking if the only part that was damaged is bypassed, then you should have normal sound levels for most frequencies right? and then after that, it's just learning to hear again?
