Neuralink Live Stream [video]
youtube.com
youtube.com
Summary: 3k+ electrodes in the test device, each thread is 1/10 of a human hair, they connect directly to custom chips that are bundled in a 4x4mm package. The test one has a USB-C port but in humans it would be implanted under the skin - a single 2mm incision with minimal bleeding - and communicate wirelessly.
Looks like their main technology is the surgery robot and the custom chips. This is truly out of science fiction and will be an incredible revolution if it works.
They're also building up a software stack to analyze the sensor output, complete with a user-facing smartphone app.
It's a long read, but fascinating. The analogy of comparing the brain to a stadium of people cheering made it really easy to understand Neuralink's aims.
https://web.archive.org/web/20171002152147/http://templeos.o...
https://web.archive.org/web/20180404034756/http://nasimabc.c...
The problem we have is that we have no idea about the language they are speaking.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-07-17/elon-musk...
Maybe I've read a bit too much cyberpunk lore in my day, but this sounds incredibly ambitious. Can't wait for the livestream to start!
The first versions of the magnet implants had an unnerving tendency to shatter or have their neutral coating breach. And we're talking about the brain here - any damage caused by implanted devices may not be nearly as obvious as an exploded finger. I never miss an opportunity to trot out this quote from Alpha Centauri:
>I think, and my thoughts cross the barrier into the synapses of the machine - just as the good doctor intended. But what I cannot shake, and what hints at things to come, is that thoughts cross back. In my dreams the sensibility of the machine invades the periphery of my consciousness. Dark. Rigid. Cold. Alien. Evolution is at work here, but just what is evolving remains to be seen.
For example...
- I find myself trying to memorize fewer things if I can easily reference them digitally later
- My expectations for having answers at my fingertips has grown such that not having internet or cell service causes anxiety
- My communication is increasingly in a pure visual format, condensing complex ideas, concepts, emotions etc. to a pic or gif. Further, my concept of a photo has bifurcated into more permanent photos I care about, and more ephemeral "pics" that get forgotten about. TBD whether I'd say my overall communication throughout speed has increased
- Phantom phone vibrations when I don't have my device on me
- Shortened attention span due to the wealth of data immediately available, but also many notifications vying for my attention
- A tendency to avoid situations where I'd be without electricity long term
- The ability to enjoy virtual experiences in a way that delivers some of the enjoyment of in-person experiences (think socializing in online games)
You can start thinking about brain augmentation for non-medical reasons after the technology has been used for decade or so and all the side effects and risks have been minimized.
Any speculation around why USB-C was used? Or why this was a detail Neuralink wanted to message on?
I'm all for universal standards, but this really does seem like a case where the connection should be a clean sheet (maybe even proprietary) design where safety parameters can be tightly controlled. My guess is that they're using USB during the development phase for ease of development (they probably just haven't spent the time on making a different connector yet). I would be very surprised to see this actually go to market with a USB-C port. Given the notorious issues with USB-C cables, I would be surprised if the FDA even approved a device with a user-accessible USB-C port.
A mature product may well use a proprietary connector that isolates against brain-zapping, has better shielding, has no snap-off parts, etc.
Using off the shelf hardware saves time for the scientists to develop more meaningful parts of the system.
Using off the shelf hardware makes it seem a little less hacky than if they were running a bunch of jumper wires off a DB-25 connector from an old printer.
given USB C as a "standard" is a complete mess atm...
https://writingexplained.org/on-accident-or-by-accident
https://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=by+accident%2C...
However while it's accepted in regional spoken US English, it's not accepted in written English, even US English.
As for evolution, language does indeed evolve but only when changes are accepted by a significant number of speakers. No matter how much you wish it, you can't simply start forcing a linguistic change on society without society agreeing. If you start to spell "agree" as "agrii" for example, nearly all English speakers will (rightly) tell you that you're wrong, you can't just respond to them with "language evolves". "On accident" is still rare enough that we have a choice to reject it and that's the choice I'm making.
Also, remember that there are non-Americans on this site (I'm one of them). To us, this is simply incorrect. We don't have exposure to this kind of US English in most of the American media we consume (TV, movies etc.).
This is going to be a hell of a ride.
Involuntary implants for behavior control of violent criminals, or just hackers taking control of regular implants, or worse still ... advertisers
It is not hard to come up with plenty of dystopian scenarios involving this sort of technology.
My thoughts are that each brain has their own neural network that is unique to the person. This would mean that each neuron, despite similar/same location, will respond uniquely, as our personal neural networks were trained separately (across many years/decades). While I believe it may be possible to train a system to output stimulation to invoke a response, it would be susceptible to the same issues as simple password hashing (that is, while you could break a single hashed password, it would be computationally inefficient). Ignoring quantum computing theory, I think this would then make developing a system that can accurately control someone in LONG sequences would be difficult.
stimulate_purchase_region_of_brain(customer_id);Imagine the gap between rich and poor to be muddled with an arguable gap between human species.
Imagine the very real arguments about what consciousness is, what a person is with relation to a self spreading to include the machine hardware, perhaps entirely.
Once two-way communication is achieved, there will be huge leaps in what people can do in their lifetimes. Doubly-so if we figure out how to improve our perception of time and turn ourselves into high speed cameras. We'll have more thoughts per hour, while having access to all of human knowledge and be able to run complicated computer sims (games or actual physical work sims) and do accurate calculations and quickly design stuff with CAD software.
When designing, even a whiteboard is a bottleneck for me, and so is pen and paper. I can't draw nearly as fast as I need, and then I can't really manipulate the drawings much either. I dream of being able to conjure 2D and 3D diagrams at will, of manipulating them and connecting them together. When focused, I really do feel like I have limited RAM and a very slow I/O for swap.
(I seem to suffer from aphantasia. I'm jealous of people who can freely visualize and manipulate stuff in their heads and actually "see" the results.)
I'm interested for the same reasons - I can't hold much of an image in my head for very long, and being able to persist what I can imagine so I can examine it in detail with my actual eyes would be extremely useful.
There's also "image streaming" which is similar, and might be more accessible:
https://photographyinsider.info/image-streaming-for-photogra...
Tibetan Buddhist practices involve visualisation of fairly complex 'deities'; supernatural beings wearing certain clothes, certain ornaments, surrounded by certain other complex objects. As the visual complexity of the imagined scene is much more than in Kasina practice, the 'phantastic' benefits might be different as well. The deities are convenient as visual object because (I suppose) Tibetans are familiar with their visual appearance. Choosing any other similarly complex familiar object should work as well.
It unfortunately sets off my BS radar in full:
* Most references to the technique appears to originate from a book called "The Einstein Factor: A Proven New Method for Increasing Your Intelligence", by the same Win Wenger as you linked above.
* Win Wenger is always written as "Win Wenger, Ph.D", but I can find exactly one paper from him on Google scholar [0], written solo, written well after he was already publishing books [1].
* The "Reinhart Study" cited by the book is listed on this website [2] with the heading "Reviewers have found that this study was statistically inadequate. Further and better studies are requested, please contact wwenger101@aol.com".
* The author of that not-published paper is listed as "Charles P. Reinert, Ph.D., Dep't of Chemistry/Physics" (not psychology).
* Other works attributed to Win Wenger on that same site are very obviously nuts [3], containing such gems as "It is unclear at this point whether anyone in fractile theory or in interference pattern physics has noticed yet the relationship between these two fields, each of which by itself is and will be totally transforming our understanding of our world and of ourselves within the next decade or so."
In short, Win Wenger appears to be someone without any actual credibility who is nevertheless attempting vainly to forge it. And I can't find any actually credible references to this technique working.
[0] https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1002/j.2162-6057....
[1] https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0931865018/ref=dbs_a_def_r...
[2] http://www.geniusbydesign.com/other/windocs/reinert/rein_1.s...
[3] http://www.geniusbydesign.com/other/windocs/physics.shtml
https://www.reddit.com/r/Aphantasia/comments/c0o1tk/ive_just...
Some comments here say they made progress with it:
https://www.reddit.com/r/Aphantasia/comments/cb07w1/dont_be_...
Imagine a computer interface capable of actualising the conceptual structures that you are imagining.
Imagine that this interface had a feedback mechanism simulating a virtual eye allowing you to perceive a full three dimensional rendering of that concept in real time.
Now think of an arraylist, think of how it responds to changes, visualise the corner cases.
You just wrote the code.
Imagine a movement. Follow an intense training protocol many times for each possible movement so that the signal processing component actually gets meaningful data it can differentiate and is certain enough that you want to trigger something. After multiple hours of training it might actually get good enough. Input dimensionality for that method would likely be simple action triggers (at least less than a traditional keyboard) instead of a complex concept abstraction.
Alternative: Stare at a board of visual stimuli, repeat for a few hours in order to train the system to your brain. Stare at board of visual stimuli again in order to actually use the thing. Again, slow paced and limited input dimensionality.
While these invasive models produce better signals than non-invasive BCI, they do not include a feedback mechanism and have far less throughput than using a keyboard. Which is great if you have a medical need for the technology and thus cannot use traditional interfaces, everything else is sci fi. I'm not trying to say that this isn't cool but we should really refrain from painting it as some miracle tech, otherwise we cannot really complain if media adopts that image and misrepresents the whole field again.
Also, wouldn’t the stim abilities count as a feedback mechanism?
Making this sci-fi levels of usable and getting it to consumers are both pretty unrealistic claims. I'm pretty sure you still couldn't get invasive research BCI past an ethics board around here if the patients skull isn't opened out of medical necessity anyway, doing so for fun isn't analogous to getting a piercing or tattoo, it's analogous to chopping off a limb to get a robotic arm.
The man's not perfect, he's a PR nightmare and his estimates tend to be far enough off to give cause for concern regarding financials.
But he's brought us reusable rockets and very usable electric cars in what is still a staggeringly short time frame.
What he's doing here makes me nervous, but there's no fucking way I'm betting against him.
Musk has the habit of taking some established technology like solarpanels or pneumatic tubes and then repackage them in ways that get futurology type people all exited, but that doesn't explain how he's going to hook us into the matrix.
Not only do we not have the AI required for natural language processing of the sort Elon is after, we also don't really have the neuroscience that explains how information is stored in the brain or let alone how we "write" to it. That's a different beast.
The idea that this is going to be controlled with anything other than a direct connection to an air-gapped computer scares the shit out of me.
Well to be fair they really haven't much, as far as technological advancements are concerned.
Reusable rockets weren't used before not because we didn't know how to do it, but because it doesn't seem to be economical. The judge is still out on whether SpaceX will actually be able to reuse the first stages in a way that's even remotely useful.
And there's even less innovation involved in Tesla cars. The only new thing they bring to the table is Autopilot, which arguably is a huge accomplishment, but not one that's "breaking the mold" in the hypercompetitive autonomous car space right now, and hasn't really delivered on its promises either.
What Neuralink proposes is so far ahead in terms of what we even glimpse to be technologically possible I have trouble thinking it's not basically his pet project that is guaranteed to receive press and funding just because the topic is sexy and it has Musk's name of it. If we are ever to get as far as NL implies, it will take more than a single consumer electronics company.
tl;dr I'll believe it when I see it.
I had a NASA fellow (guidance, navigation, etc, so a relevant field) who literally told me landing on a barge is impossible, just months before they accomplished it.
I personally think this will take decades. And the implications of it for humanity if it works are probably greater than anything else Elon is working on.
We're already close to replacing the eyes as a source of visual data.
We've already used brain waves to directly control input to a computer.
What I was talking about was essentially computer aided design with an integrated computer.
And I know how code is written, on many occasions I've known almost completely the structures that I'm going to spend the next two and a half hours translating and typing out.
The minutiae of the code that emerges as I'm typing is often an exception, but I generally have a fair idea of where and what the corner cases are going to be.
The biggest bottleneck by far comes in translating the internally visualised structure into an English derived programming language.
Of course that’s not systematically the case - in many instances, I am thinking as I am writing the code. But for many straightforward control functions, tests, constructors/destructors, etc. the keyboard absolutely feels like a bottleneck.
(There is the orthogonal debate that perhaps a better language would allow me to express more concisely these things that feel straightforward)
I'm also excited offload mathematics to a computer.
It feels like a huge rate limiting factor for me. Even typing 2x as fast would be a phenomenal improvement.
Speaking is even worse though. Communicating verbally with other humans is frustratingly slow and inaccurate. A new non-verbal means to communicate would enable us to understand others faster and better. This would solve a lot of problems immediately that arise from our inability to understand others or the amount of time it takes to arrive at understanding.
I actually have looked into this using a Neurosky mind wave, but the signal wasn’t great.
I also tried a USB foot peddle.
[1] https://www.alfredapp.com/I think this idea that computation/programming is a thing that happens through a window into the world of computing is one of the major concepts of our time that will be laughed at in the future. Solving HCI is (imho) one of the most important problems of our time.
You might think: “what are the params for that function?”
That question would be detected, the answer found online, and would be presented to you as a “memory.”
Just think about how Siri’s AI can mostly understand what you’re saying even with background noise, stuttering, pausing, and coughing when talking. Now imagine talking to Siri at the speed of your thoughts.
Tasks along these lines would be a great match for better computer interfaces.
To refute your assertion more precisely, there is ample evidence that bikes have hand and foot controls that are frequently modified from the current controls. Some electric bikes move both brakes to the handlebars. Many roadracing motorcycles have added thumb brakes. And I've had plenty of situations on dirtbikes where I can't use to the shifter or rear brake because of silliness like water or mud. And then there's broken levers.
Another example would be feelings, describing love, fear, anger is almost impossible by words. I can also think about sharing dreams, memories, with sounds/scents/&c.
I'm not a huge fan of the thing, I'd probably never get one myself, but I see the potential real use cases.
For example:
> "As an Optical Engineer at Neuralink you will develop custom optics and imaging systems used directly in our surgical robot, and associated consumables manufacturing systems." [0]
EDIT: I guess the article from The Verge linked in the other comments sheds even more light on that particular bit:
> "[...] the company has developed ”a neurosurgical robot capable of inserting six threads (192 electrodes) per minute [automatically],” according to the white paper. " [1]
Similarly described in the Bloomberg article which was just released [2]
[0] - https://jobs.lever.co/neuralink/c98c011c-0f49-497e-a504-59a5...
[1] - https://www.theverge.com/2019/7/16/20697123/elon-musk-neural...
[2] - https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-07-17/elon-musk...
I hope we see massive improvements in computer security in the next few decades because otherwise “jacking in” to any kind of computer with Internet access is a terrifying thought.
Like all such tech advances, there will be a mixed bag. Best to pick and choose the advantages while avoiding the bad parts. Well-curated YouTube videos versus digital heroin.
We already curate the people we hang out with, and to some extent the people we disagree with, but listen to.
If one day we can really really scan brains, how do we resist the temptation to eat them (figuratively) and become something ... more ...
Life will change with advanced BCI, but it's difficult to anticipate how.
I guess my bias is that I feel like my own personal mind-map or world lens is my own personal competitive advantage against the rest of the world and that's what I use to differentiate and make money. Taking that advantage away seems like a life-deranging experience as it defines who I am.
But that's how incumbents always feel when they get disrupted. I suppose victors always have defined themselves by their ability to adapt to change.
Pleasure industry should be one of the early adopters of this.
I'd always thought of Black Mirror as a warning or reminder to consider the wider consequences of technology. Not as a motivator to develop it faster.
The thought of this kind of technology (no matter how far away it really is from being deployed) terrifies me. I certainly do not trust someone like Elon Musk to develop it responsibly and pause to consider what it will do to all of humanity. That's what is at stake here, the definition of humanity, for better and worse.
I don't know how much credence to give it, however it's a fascinating thought experiment, especially the "Type-1" vulnerabilities.
Unless you conclude "dumb luck".
There's probably no one we could trust with this task. The best we can do is avoid having a monopoly and lock-in.
Additionally, you'd be able to more accurately predict what new technology will do to humanity if you could calculate and process information like a computer.
We need to increase our capacity to comprehend complex systems as things become more complex.
I'm less convinced by the overall concept of "I know kung fu", but easy deep brain stimulation or cascade monitoring is probably enough to make a tidy buck.
A key example that falls short is CRTL-labs' armband. I've seen a few demos that allow you to "control a keyboard with your brain" while wearing the armband. The only problem is that this setup requires you to move your hands as if you were actually typing on a keyboard. If my hands have to move I might as well use a real keyboard. I realize that there are some people that could use CTRL-labs' armband, such as amputees, but it's not compelling to me.
If Neuralink can let me control a computer by visualizing words or something similar instead of physically moving my hand then I'll call it a win.
They also talked about virtual arms, and there was one guy controlling nine cursors simultaneously.
They may have other things in R&D. At least they are closer to having a real product than Neuralink and they started their presentation on time at Re:MARS.
One of my biggest “Wow!” moments of 2018 took place in the offices of neural interface company CTRL-labs. Their demo involves someone playing the old Asteroids computer game without touching a keyboard, using machine learning to interpret the nerve signals that are sent to the hands. But it isn’t quite what you think. Moving things in the digital realm without moving your hands seems startling enough (though it’s worth remembering that it was once considered remarkable to be able to read silently without moving your lips). But that’s just the first stage. Essentially, users of this technology “grow” another virtual hand, which they can move independently of their physical hands. One of the researchers bowled me over when he said he was “working on controlling nine cursors at once.” Gradually, then suddenly, our children will interface with machines in deeper and deeper ways. Humanity is already going cyborg (see trend 1); expect it to accelerate. Don’t fall into the trap of thinking that AI will replace humans when it can be used even more powerfully to augment them.
This is the biggest overselling point from them. The only people that can grow a "virtual hand" are amputees. Everyone else simply has a shadow hand that follows what their real hand does (or would do if there wasn't a restraint). All of their control interfaces are coupled to what the shadow hand does- i.e., if the shadow hand's index finger curls in, the spaceship spins to the right in the game. In reality it's not a shadow hand they are sensing, but the neurons that control the movement in your hand/arm.
It's a fact of biology that if you are reading nerve impulses from the arm, then to control the computer something must be happening in your arm. Every motor neuron is connected to a muscle. The best we can get is a very sensitive system where your arm doesn't move very much. You cannot (without a million years of evolution) send signals to your arm without it moving. If you were to cut the neurons off from the muscle, you could then send activations without your arm moving. However, you would also lose physical movement ability, and nobody is doing that (except for amputees).
Specifically that the brain-muscle mapping isn't preprogrammed and the brain learns to control what is there.
For example people with fully formed extra digits can just have a fully functional extra finger.
This does get baked in pretty well but the adult brain can re-learn after a catastrophic injury so it's not hard to believe you could figure out how to add virtual appendages or entirely novel "extremities".
The brain does learn to control what is there, and what is there is attached to your muscles. I'll say it again: the CTRL-labs kit works on electromyography, which only works with muscle activity. You will not magically grow new neurons in your arm that are dedicated sole to the control of a computer.
Of course the end goal would be to directly stimulate the sensory cortexes, but we had decent trains before having decent planes.
So has this thing been implanted in even a single human? Or are his words just conjecture? If not, what brains are they reading neural data from, animals?
This technique has been used on rats for at least a decade now, and I believe it's already been tested on humans prior to this.
Edit: IRL Presentation hasn't started either ( https://twitter.com/RebeccaDRobbins/status/11513308672324321... )
Here is a better, non-snarky review:
Even if I could close my eyes, tense my brow, and with a wiggle of my nose, launch an army of autonomous drones to hoist a nuclear tipped cruise missile from a launch tube, and point it at some world leader, what a puny plan. And the reality is, that's not the way this will go for me.
This isn't going to be the kind of thing that gets us ahead. If anything, this is the T-Mobile Sidekick of cybernetics. And even when the new iPhone of cybernetic neural interfaces emerge, it's still going to fucking suck.
We're 10,000 light years from the kind of thing I'd find compelling. Hard pass.
Wow, I would love to see this in action...
This is under the umbrella of the FDA's Medical Device Safety Action Plan[3] overhaul.
[1] https://www.fda.gov/medical-devices/how-study-and-market-you...
[2] https://www.fda.gov/media/108135/download
[3] https://www.fda.gov/about-fda/cdrh-reports/medical-device-sa...
Brain implants almost always end up useless long-term because they are attacked and surrounded as foreign objects by the brain's defense system.
I admittedly skimmed the neural sewing paper, but from what I saw there wasn't anything new in there about preventing this.
But moving to humans with a weaker immune system and a much higher risk of rejection was always extremely difficult/not possible.
It'll be interesting to see how they solve this.
https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/553255v2
https://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/abs/10.1162/neco_a_0121...
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S016502701...
If that neural lace materializes there will be a lot of new material for that particular mental playground.
Take a CMOS sensor, and put a metal spike on top of every pixel (easy with current processes). Now you have 10 million measurements that you can take at 240fps...
Powerful tools can be used for both good and bad.
01:32:19 https://youtu.be/r-vbh3t7WVI?t=5539
I love it that his solution to the "AI terminator" problem is making a brain-computer interface so that we can have a fighting chance when AI takes off.
I love it that he wants to help us kick our addiction to non-renewable fossil fuels.
I love it that he wants to make us a two planet race so that we don't have all our humanity eggs in one planetary basket.
Thank you Elon.
Musk sits in a weird position where his unique blend of controversy keeps him in the headlines and ensures he gets linked to these technologies, but that does not mean he is responsible for nor deserves the credit. It could be argued that his "ability" to constantly land in the limelight draws more attention (and thus progress) to these issues, but others would argue that we would be even further along if not for the constant controversy he creates.
No one credits Musk for solving bugs with the software on his products, or creating these brain-computer interfaces. But he can assemble the team to do, and motivate them to keep moving and progressing pretty aggressive schedules. And he frequently gives credit to his team (and doesn't sit there patting himself on the back).
Yes, the list of authors on the whitepaper they released is "Elon Musk & Neuralink". I guess his team should be thankful.
https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/6204648-Neuralink-Wh...
>A CEO does only three things. Sets the overall vision and strategy of the company and communicates it to all stakeholders. Recruits, hires, and retains the very best talent for the company. Makes sure there is always enough cash in the bank.
Based on everything we saw in the Neuralink livestream, it seems like Elon is nailing all three of these. Doesn't mean he deserves all the credit, but it mean he's doing his job.
How do we know that's why, vs his estimation of Musk being the right kind of showman to get a lot of investment.
Because it is what he explicitly said. As I pointed out in my parent comment.
Of course I'm sure access to capital plays a role. Otherwise it's just someone with a good idea and no money. A meh idea but lots of money also wouldn't attract these kinds of people.
People like Musk (and the people he co-founds these companies with) are important because they're taking nascent product categories that are "stuck" in the R&D stage with little attention being paid to them, and directing large-scale consumer demand onto them in a way that brings profit-driven industry interest—and therefore industry talent—into the picture. Even if it's not Musk's offering that end up winning the space, these efforts redefine the public perception of the category in a way that means that every company in the space wins.
(For another equivalent example: the creator of Bitcoin did more for smart contracts by creating one platform that lead to competitor platforms that actually had smart-contract support, than a thousand academic smart-contract systems projects ever could have.)
I personally have no problem with him.
BUT:
1. This has not been tested on a single human yet, as it has no FDA approval.
2. Preliminary trials in full quadripilegic patients are several away (these are also not yet approved)
3. Should these trials succeed, this will still not be available as an elective procedure for healthy people (that will take much more time)
3. The skull exists and is a hard barrier that is not going away. A decade or so from now, should this be approved as an elective procedure, patients will have to have a hole drilled in their skull (note that most people find LASIK invasive, even after decades of successful surgeries)
4. Patients will also have to become comfortable with thousands of fibers being inserted (albeit in a minimally invasive way) through brain tissue by an automated surgical robot.
5. Should the procedure be successful, patients should finally, at long last, be able to control a mouse, or keyboard, or smartphone using their brain and imagining the movements instead of using their hands.
There is perhaps, a cyberpunk future where crime syndicates mine Bitcoin in the brains of their victims, where malware pipes gigabytes of extremist political memes in seconds through the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex of young adults.
Maybe that will come one day, but this technology is only using the signals generated by the brain to control a mouse and keyboard. This existed twenty years ago in chimpanzee studies. The real innovation here is in materials science and surgery.
This is amazing multi-disciplinary science in the pursuit of advanced medicine, and we should be applauding it for what it is.
So, thank you Elon for funding this -- but more importantly, thanks to all the scientists, researchers, and engineers who have dedicated their lives the advancement of our science and medicine.
I will not be electing to undergo this surgery in the future.
Not bad, man. I'd read that book.
This seems like making a well-intentioned medical application that incorporates latest research findings and likely addresses historical downsides of the field (e.g. scarring issues with long term deployment of invasive BCI).
I don't see how that is anywhere close to being related to some sci-fi "AI terminator" scenario though. If you want to go into some cyberpunk fanfic about Musk you can just turn this application around and spin a "AI is now able to fry our brains out" narrative, which is neither helpful, nor realistic. This AI FUD is so weird to me, it's much more likely to be killed by badly written auto pilot for fancy cars, a failed operation to get your brain USB plug, a malicious application of AI by companies or state actors in areas like mass surveillance and population control... than it is for a real, strong AI to suddenly emerge, become sentient and decide that humanity cannot be trusted.
Of course with something like a general AI all bets are off. This neural link think is a horribly bad defense, because of all possible defenses this is the one that could give the AI a direct connection with your brain.
For an analysis of the state of the field and the surrounding media attention, I highly recommend this blog post by Zachary Lipton [1].
[1] http://approximatelycorrect.com/2017/03/28/the-ai-misinforma...
1. paperclip optimizers where a very smart computer you tell to do one menial task like producing as many paperclips as possible or proving a mathematical theorem can turn into a catastrophy as that computer turns all iron on earth into paperclips or into computers that all try to find a solution to the theorem. This also includes computers that we task to "protect" humanity coming to the conclusion that humans having power to kill each other is mankind's biggest threat.
2. crazy would-be dictator who wants to rule over the world and tells an AI to do it or kill all humans or something else.
TLDR: First way: forgetting machines to tell to not kill humans (or not doing it in an effective manner). Second way: some really shit individual explicitly telling machines to kill humans.
The first danger is one we already face: basically since we've had machines there have been accidents with them, also ones involving casualties. In general, the more we care about avoiding casualties the less likely they are. However, it only takes one super intelligent paperclip optimizer to "break lose" so given the high amount of possible casualties, there needs to be a lot of care taken to prevent even one such event.
The second danger needs to be coped as well. One could do two things: very slow deployment of super-AI capabilities at the start, while building AIs that can defend governments and somehow encoding into them how the government works (to prevent parts of the government from using that machine in a coup). The same computers will prevent revolutions though, so I guess we'll see less and less of those. You can think of variations of those ideas like AIs that only enforce asimov's laws or only make sure that we don't use any weapons more powerful than $weapon on each other.
What I don't understand though is how neuralink will help with coping with those threats.
2. They can do that now. What would an AI do differently that couldn't be accomplished by conventional weapons? How would it do so without using said weapons or any sort of thing that could be done so without it?
The AI thing is just a secular form of the rapture, a particular variant of existential dread for people with little to no religious belief.
Sure, the risk is low right now, but the more powerful computers we can build, the larger the potential risk is. Before you manage to press the off button the computer might already have deployed a bioagent or killed countless lives with drones.
> They can do that now. What would an AI do differently that couldn't be accomplished by conventional weapons?
A military made out of humans is subject to human failings. It is generally a big problem that soilders shoot in the general direction of the enemy to not get punishments for not shooting but miss on purpose. As an extreme example, the nazis had to give lots of free alcohol to their soilders so that they'd continue shooting civilians and burying them under new bodies before they have even died. They later invented gas chambers as an easier method to kill masses of people. Compared to humans, an AI is doing what it is being told to. If you tell it "Kill all humans" it will do it.
Do you have anything more substantial to say than ad hominem? Like a response to the video I linked instead of grinding your unrelated axe against the guy?
>Do you have anything more substantial to say than ad hominem?
Nope, because the title of the book says it all
Point being, if you get (at least some of) what there is to get then does it matter where your body was born or what it looks like? Is it a bad thing that western born people are bringing this (buddhist/hindu/jain) thought to the west?
I would revise your statement that there are the monastics who dedicate their lives to this, the lay people who practice and the commoditized 'yoga' as exercise/stretching folk/peddlers who are far removed from its spiritual components.
I think people really don't get religion in this sense. The radical, wild, anarchic aspects of it. Mindfulness is more just a wish for stoicism in religious guise; the idea of being not stoic, and weeping over your prayers in a cell because you feel the weight of the world's sin and know that the time is short will not often occur to people.
Everything in Buddhism and meditation surrounds around mindfulness/sati/awareness you call it.
>A monk isn't mindful, he is mortifying his flesh to practice the tenets of the religion he believes in so fiercely enough he is willing to self-imprison to follow it better.
Monks have to cultivate the 8 fold path which includes right mindfulness so saying he isn't doesn't make him monk. And also wow that sounds so disrespectful and ignorant.
The philosophy I have been exposed to through meditation has helped me better understand how the ego can cause problems. It seems you are rather attached to the idea of a very pure, austere study of meditation and associated philosophies. There are other valid ways of approaching such things that you are unjustifiably disregarding.
Alternatively, you could look at it as someone simply being earlier on their path, and provide encouragement instead of ridicule.
our fighting chance is EMP.
Or if you're no fun, it's an electromagnetic pulse.
there wouldn't be a need for this without rampant, myopic introduction of AI. why not just stop that irresponsible "innovation"?
There is no stopping individual agents in a system from doing what helps them most without an authoritarian at the top. Mostly, those authoritarians come with even worse problems so we're left with this imperfect world.
I'd love to see comments on hn not focused on self righteousness and instead realize that there is no one guy at the top that you just have to scream really loud at.