AI? Elon Musk plans to stitch computer chips into brains
Elon Musk has broken cover on plans to embed computer chips and a ‘neural lace’ direct into people’s brains, outputting signals into machine readable code (Wired).
Key points:
- Neuralink project has been underway two years, first reported byWall Street Journal
- Aims to pick up signals from brain and translate to code
- "We hope to have this aspirationally in a human patient by the end of next year” – Musk
- “We can have the option of merging with AI … It will take a long time” – Musk
As marketers and agencies race for basic AI capability, Musk is raising the stakes, talking about telepathy between humans and interfacing with machines. It brings a new meaning to ‘direct-to-consumer’.
Given Musk’s cult following, finding a willing human lab rat is unlikely to be a challenge. Regulatory approval might be trickier.
As Wired concludes, this is all highly aspirational and Musk makes no bones about what he’s smoking. But this is a man who has put a car in space, pushed the automotive industry into a once in a century pivot, and commercialised flame throwers.
The internet of people may yet happen.
