Elon Musk’s Neuralink approved to recruit humans for brain-implant trial

Things would have to seismically change in the tech/business world for me to trust any company enough to put something in my brain. That said, if I was forced to buy one the last two I would consider letting near my brain are Musk and Zuck

i mean its likely not reliable but i bet some animal deaths are inevitable when developing a new implant. 1500 sounds way too high though.

Perhaps like one of the vegetables from 2077?

Desperate enough.

i would say i don’t get it for the low hanging fruit troll, but fuck that. they really are just that stupid

There have been some news pieces put out, but most importantly

... the Physicians Committee (PCRM) said records it obtained for the 23 monkeys used in the experiments reflect a “pattern of extreme suffering and staff negligence.” The committee said that the letter to the USDA is based on nearly 600 pages of what it calls “disturbing” documents released after the committee filed an initial public records lawsuit in 2021.

Now, CNN did link to Nueralink's site, but not to PCRM. That, to me, says a lot about who you they're supporting.

If you want to read PCRMs report, it's here. Because reading the sources is always a good idea.

https://www.pcrm.org/ethical-science/animals-in-medical-research/pcrm-response-neuralink-claims

From the article posted in anothers comment:

Animal 11”: They were killed in a terminal procedure at UC Davis on March 15, 2019. Prior to this procedure, the monkey had a cranial implant surgically placed inside their brain on Dec. 3, 2018. Following this procedure, the implant became chronically infected. The monkey began to have a depressed appetite.

October 2018, UC Davis staff noted that the monkey was “missing multiple digits [on] both hands, [right] foot,” possibly from self-mutilation or some other unspecified trauma.

On Dec. 18, 2018, staff decided to “prophylactically or conservatively start [antibiotic treatment]” for the monkey after observing that “the skin was eroded” surrounding the implant. In the following two months, there are frequent observations of the monkey having a bloody, infected head wound from the device experimenters attached to their skull. The monkey was prescribed several types of antibiotics during this period. In January 2019, staff observed that the monkey had a “bloody head…dried blood around base at cranial implant.”

https://www.reuters.com/technology/musks-neuralink-faces-federal-probe-employee-backlash-over-animal-tests-2022-12-05/

A couple of excerpts here:

The first complaints about the company’s testing involved its initial partnership with University of California, Davis, to conduct the experiments. In February, an animal rights group, the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine, filed a complaint with the USDA accusing the Neuralink-UC Davis project of botching surgeries that killed monkeys and publicly released its findings. The group alleged that surgeons used the wrong surgical glue twice, which led to two monkeys suffering and ultimately dying, while other monkeys had different complications from the implants.

A note about Musk's use of propaganda in the face of truth (emphasis mine):

Neuralink executives have said publicly that the company tests animals only when it has exhausted other research options, but documents and company messages suggest otherwise. During a Nov. 30 presentation the company broadcast on YouTube, for example, Musk said surgeries were used at a later stage of the process to confirm that the device works rather than to test early hypotheses. “We’re extremely careful,” he said, to make sure that testing is “confirmatory, not exploratory,” using animal testing as a last resort after trying other methods.

In October, a month before Musk’s comments, Autumn Sorrells, the head of animal care, ordered employees to scrub "exploration" from study titles retroactively and stop using it in the future.

There's lots more in there and I highly recommend reading the whole article. It is from December of last year, but I'd find it hard to believe that things would have improved in the past 9 or 10 months....certainly not enough to excuse the shoddy work and unnecessary suffering caused early on in the project.

I had forgotten about this until you mentioned it..

It's already pay to win. They're trying to make it pay to live.

We've had implants that can control a mouse and even type on a keyboard for decades now...

I don't really know if we've had other companies that are crazy enough to pierce the blood brain barrier, just for a brain interface machine.

There have been plenty of brain interface machines, but most are just pieces of headgear that you wear. And they're just as useful as Musk's interface..... not very.

When you utilize a traditional mouse you are relying on both visual and proprioceptive data, which is interpreted in conjunction in real time by your brain. Without the proprioceptive sensation, your brain loses track of where the mouse is in the operational space. Meaning it takes a large amount of concentration to operate anything with just the aid of visualization.

The biggest problem is that they've essentially designed a meningitis machine. For my job we occasionally have to set skull pins for halo devices, basically a cervical immobilizing brace. These pins pierce the skin and are set into the bone of the skull, though we don't pierce through the skull or damage the blood brain barrier.

These pins are extremely susceptible to infection depending on the level of patient compliance. Because the scalp is not firmly attached to the skull it's is free to move against the pins and create a lot of skin irritation, which can lead to infections if not properly cleaned on a regular basis.

Even if it were secure, what happens to all the gen 1 implantees when gen 2 comes out? or when Musk decides to no longer support certain models? Imagine having a 2007 iphone stuck inside your brain, forever. Or I guess people could get brain surgery every few years. That seems reasonable.

Even if it works completely as intended, that's also terrible under capitalism. You think advertising is manipulative now, wait until it comes in the form of literal mind control.

I’m going to take the opposite stance here and hope some of his most devoted sycophants end up even more brain damage.

We’re way past being polite about this Nazi and his enablers.

"come a long way "

Sure, I agree. But it's not "there" yet. I've had headsets since the DK2. I love VR but it still needs a few years and there's no real killer app yet. AR is the same if not worse. The Apple headset is interesting but it;s still not close. I'm looking forward to see where it will go.