Non-Humanoid Limbs for Humans

I’d like to see non-humanoid prosthetic limbs. We see a lot of progress from places like Carnegie Mellon’s Experimental Biomechatronics Lab and the Biomechatronics Group from MIT Media Labs headed by Hugh Herr. They do a lot of work related to mimicking the biological limbs. No doubt that our humanoid limbs are quite well designed and at the moment they are ahead of their artificial cousins. Most of all the environment we work and live in - they are all designed for humanoid users.

Nevertheless, I think it’d be interesting and novel to see prosthetics that don’t try to be human, but try to be something entirely different. If they can get the job done much better than humanoid limbs, I don’t see why we shouldn't try. I also wonder how our brain would adapt to the new non-humanoid limbs.

Ever imagine having 4 arms? Our brains have never come up against such a task. How would they handle it?