WHAT IS NEURALINK AND HOW DOES IT WORK?
Elon Musk introduced the revolutionary technology of the Neuralink company in a live broadcast on the internet on the evening of July 18. Founded by Musk in 2017 , Neuralink develops digital interfaces that will connect the human brain to computer systems and artificial intelligence.
Neuralink is designing more advanced versions of the brain chips used today to give paralyzed patients mobility. Bionic chips, currently tested on guinea pigs, will be used in human clinical trials by 2020.
If you ask what it will do: I can say that Neuralink has developed revolutionary technologies that will change the future of the human species and shape its evolution . For this reason, the potential ingenuity of Neuralink products is innumerable; but in a nutshell, cyberpunk will make people with bionic-cybernetic brains in sci-fi literature come true:
YES, JOHNNY MNEMONIC IS COMING
Johnny Mnemonic is a novel and movie character directly related to our subject: Johnny Mnemonic, which is adapted from the neuromancer novel of William Gibson, the pioneer of the cyberpunk movement, and starring Dolph Lundgren, who plays Russian boxer Ivan Drago in Rocky IV, and Keanu Reeves, Keanu Reeves He plays an information smuggler with a chip in his brain.
Just like in the character of Johnny Mnemonic played by Reeves, the company Neuralink aims to create people with bionic brains.
However, while Neuralink has the potential to realize the ill-fated future of cyberpunk literature via the telepathic internet (we'll see the biggest risks below), the company's founder, Elon Musk, has a different purpose. Musk wants to help patients with brain disorders, and Nerualink is designing brain-computer interfaces for this:
NEURALINK DIGITAL NEURAL NETWORKS
The digital neural networks (neural lace or nerve lace) developed by Neuralink, which will work by piercing the skull and injecting it into the brain, will work with bionic control chips.
- These chips, which are inserted into the human brain, will eliminate blindness and give the visually impaired people the ability to see. At the same time, it will help those who are deaf to hear the world again by eliminating hearing loss.
- Neuralink chips will begin to replace damaged tissues in the brain within 10 years. Thus, it will be possible to cure Parkinson's disease and the like, which causes uncontrolled tremors of the muscles, with cybernetic chips.
- Bionic chips will also be attached to the hippocampus region of the brain. To prevent age-related memory loss, damaged neurons of the hippocampus, which transfer short-term memory to long-term memory, will be replaced with Neuralink digital neural networks. This will strengthen the memory of the elderly and prevent forgetfulness .
- Neuralink chips will also enable psychiatric disorders such as chronic depression to be cured by supplying low-voltage current to the brain . This is a treatment method currently applied in hospitals abroad. However, hospitals wear EEG hats on the person's head for this, which requires the patient to go to the hospital regularly.
NEURALINK AND TELEPATHIC INTERNET
However, the most revolutionary aspect of Neuralink is its telepathic internet and souvenir planting feature. In terms of digital transformation, we can say that the telepathic internet will come before the memory planting technology that we saw in Arnold Schwarzenegger's movie Call to Truth ; because there are already computers and robotic arms that work with thought commands.
5) For example, paralyzed patients can put water on themselves by controlling the robotic arms with the power of thought with a control box attached to the skull. Smart home control computers that work with simple thought commands were also released 5 years ago. There are even telepathic mobile application prototypes like Prose and Emotiv telepathic headbands for controlling robots .
6) Finally Neuralink digital nerve lace; It will erase the bad memories of soldiers, survivors and victims of PTSD and plant new good memories, which is the most risky part; because what makes a person human is what they experience. Adding new memories to the person by erasing the memory may mean brainwashing the person and killing the old one and creating a new person.
OK, HOW DOES IT WORK?
Neuralink products are designed to replace today's brain-computer interfaces; because in order to place these chips, which are implanted in voluntary paralyzed patients, it is necessary to cut the skull and attach a fist-sized control box to the patient's head that directly contacts the brain.
A version of this attaches to the spinal cord at waist level and allows the paralyzed to stand up by turning the knobs on a control box attached to a belt. Exoskeletons based on this technology have been used by a limited number of volunteer patients for 7-8 years.
However, both are cumbersome solutions that do not allow paralyzed patients to shower, swim or walk in the rain. These systems, which are the first examples of body hacking and body internet, carry the risk of infection of the brain due to the cut area in the skull.
NEURALINK BRAIN INJECTION
New digital neural networks are injected into the brain using tiny holes drilled in the skull; because they consist of flexible cables and fibers that do not cause an allergic reaction in the body. Thus, the nerve lace will be in contact with the brain under the skull for life. On the scalp, there will only be an electronic tag that looks like a jack or band-aid, which will act as a control box.
ELON MUSK SAYS
“Most of the public doesn't know that we can solve this with a chip. The long-term goal of our company is to create a kind of symbiosis (symbiosis) by connecting the human brain to artificial intelligence. This is not a requirement, of course, you can use it if you want.”
So why would you want to connect your brain to artificial intelligence ? 1) In order not to forget anything in your life, 2) To think hundreds of times faster than a normal person, 3) To look at events and the world from thousands of different angles thanks to the integration of artificial intelligence and to analyze big data. In short, you will connect your brain to the computer in order to become super intelligent .
Of course, most people, myself included, would not want to drill holes in their skulls just to be super-intelligent. This only happens when we succeed in implanting cybernetic brain chips in our heads without the need for skull surgery. Then the product is commercialized.However, paralyzed patients and other patients with brain damage may want to use Neuralink chips right away. For now, these are placed in the brain by drilling the skull with a drill; but don't confuse it with a masonry drill. Think of it more like a fine needle sewing machine. Still, in the future they will pierce the skull with laser beams, making super-thin microscopic holes that are only 4 to 6 microns wide. So they will sew the digital nerve lace threads directly into the brain.
IT WAS LIKE A HORROR MOVIE
However, 20 years from now, this technology will be as easy as anyone would like. In 30 years, you will turn into super smart people with electronic stickers that you just place on the skin. You will encounter funny situations such as “Oh, I forgot my chip at home, I'm an ordinary person today”; but until then, a long process awaits Neuralink company: Is it easy to get permission to drill the human brain?
NEURALINK WAS FOUNDED IN 2017
So why did Elon Musk announce the products developed by the company with a delay of 2 years? This is because they are developing technologies that are unprecedented in history. It took two years for them to even develop a technology worth announcing to the public; But two years is actually a very short time. During this time, we saw that many charlatan companies were unable to keep their word and closed down. Elon Musk continues on his way.
The second reason for the announcement is to introduce the technology to scientists and get help from artificial intelligence experts and neurologists . Obviously, it is not possible for Neuralink to commercialize medical products before 2025, and this technology is not expected to leave hospitals before 2030. However, this business is not something that two or three crazy entrepreneurs can achieve and professional help from physicians is required.
Moreover, with the help of physicians, it is necessary to develop the compliance infrastructure that will require the government to allow human clinical trials. Max Hodak, co-founder and president of Neuralink with Elon Musk, says they've found a way to speed up the bureaucratic process : developing control chips to use prosthetics fitted to those who lost an arm or leg in an accident.Maybe they'll transplant them directly into the limb nerves instead of the brain. Thus, for example, people will use robot arms more dexterously and flexibly than bionic arms that work with superficial skin contact. Neuralink's other solutions will be to develop eyes with a bionic ear for those with vision and hearing loss . This will pave the way for human clinical trials.
I KNOW KUNG FU WITH NEURALINK!
Neuralink announced this week that it has successfully tested the first prototype of its digital neural networks on mice. So much so that today's telepathic systems and sensor systems working with wireless internet have increased the data transfer rate 10 times. Moreover, this technology really resembles the movie The Matrix; because they transferred the big data from the mouse brain with the control chip attached to the computer with the USB-C port attached to the mouse's head.
The next step is to ensure that the cables attached to the brain are long-lasting; because cerebral fluid and blood are basically a mixture of salt water. This can melt the plastic cable sheaths, exposing the wires. Exposure of the wires does not only mean the failure of the system, but also poses a life-threatening danger to the user. This life-threatening situation must be eliminated for digital neural networks to exit the guinea pig phase and be used in humans.
The ultimate goal is to wirelessly connect electrodes attached to the brain, which is what we mean by digital neural network or lace, to chips that will enable telepathic internet access. Thus, there will be no need to place control chips in the brain or scalp. People will be able to connect their brains directly to the Internet with IoT- supported smart bracelets or e-tags . So much so that the telepathic internet will lift the rest of the wearable device industry due to the lack of artificial intelligence.
$158 MILLION
Neuralink's capital is currently $ 158 million, and Musk, the largest shareholder of the company, has invested $ 100 million of the money he earned as the CEO of SpaceX and Tesla. Neuralink, which employs 90 people, attaches great importance to privacy and continues to recruit on its simple site, which contains only job postings. After all, telepathic internet is an ambitious and sensitive business that requires a lot of R&D. For example, when the Prose application failed, it switched to gesture control from the telepathic internet.
IN SHORT, PRESTIGE MATTERS.
And for whom are the bells ringing? The bells are ringing for the future of the human species. As a matter of fact, what makes a person human is our memories and our personal experiences with our different lives. In the future, people who write false memories in their brains to live a happier life with Neuralink technology will be completely different selves.
We can say that such treatments are necessary in severe psychiatric disorders. However, I want to remind you of the 2000 video game Half-Life 2. In the game, aliens were taking over the Earth and implanting chips in people's brains and turning them into robot soldiers.
Neuralink-like chips erased soldiers' parental love and replaced them with false memories of obedience to aliens. Combination soldiers, brainwashed in this way, were attacking free people. The exaggerations wouldn't be true, of course, but even if 1 percent of this scenario did happen, it would be terrible.
ELON MUSK'S FEAR OF SUPERINTELLIGENCE
In addition to the supply-demand issue and risk scenarios with realistic company goals, there is also the idealist side of the business: Elon Musk thinks that superintelligence, which will manifest itself with intelligent robots and artificial intelligence, can intentionally or accidentally destroy the human species. According to him, the best way to prevent this is to make people super-intelligent as well.
In this context, Musk wants to transform the human brain into an organic supercomputer in order to enable people to better deal with the super-intelligent robots that will emerge in the future, and plans to create super-intelligent people with the help of Neuralink.
However, the careless use of this technology does not create free, healthy people with superior morals and intelligence; It can turn billions of people into unconscious consumers with voters who are brainwashed a million times a day with a wireless internet connection.
DON'T GET MAD AT NEURALINK COMPANY
When you read the risks above, you might think that superintelligence is something very dangerous for humanity. You could also conclude that Elon Musk would hasten the extinction of humanity by trying to create superintelligent humans to deal with superintelligence.
However, we see that we cannot put this technological lamp genie back in the bottle, which will fulfill all our good and bad wishes. In this context, Elon Musk is not trying to prevent the advent of superintelligence. It doesn't actually try to control the superintelligence either; because we cannot control a being that is smarter than us.He's just trying to manipulate the superintelligence not to harm people and make people smarter with the Neuralink company. According to Elon Musk, superintelligent people can better communicate with synthetic superintelligence, which will derive from artificial intelligence.
If we eliminate the communication gap, both the superintelligence will understand us better and we can better explain our problem to him. In this way, we prevent a being who will be more powerful than the Greek Gods of ancient myths from destroying us on purpose or by mistake or carelessness.
HOW CAN SUPERINTELLIGENCE DESTROY US?
In the future, more intelligent robots than humans, computers and artificial intelligence software will be developed. The feelings (?) and thoughts of a gifted being will be different from ours. The passions, desires, needs and desires of such a being will also be different from us humans.
For example, he will not need sleep, he will not be hungry, he will not be thirsty, he will not get tired, he will not get sick and of course he will not grow old. Indeed, superintelligence can see us like Agent Smith in the movie The Matrix. Agent Smith showed that the human species is a virus that contaminates the Earth as the reason why machines enslave humans in the virtual world.
Indeed, we cause hunger, poverty, and pollute the environment and deplete living things. By consuming natural resources, we cause climate change due to global warming . In summary, superintelligence can destroy us to save Earth from us.
NEURALINK AND EXISTENTIAL RISK
In addition, superintelligence can accidentally destroy us. Just like stepping on ants that we are not aware of while walking on the road and killing them. It is possible for the superintelligence, which has an intelligence 1 billion years more advanced than us , to crush us like insects by not even perceiving our existence.
Other than that, it's possible that the superintelligence just doesn't care about us. Indeed, companies want to develop superintelligence to increase their competitiveness by knowing more than other companies . In this context, we expect robots and computers to solve our problems such as environmental pollution and poverty.
However, super-intelligent robots can stare at the secrets of the Universe and leave Earth, leaving us destined to be destroyed by the pollution created by our own corrupt civilization.
MORAL ROBOTS
Of course, there is also an interview I made on behalf of Popular Science Türkiye in 2015. In this interview, Oxford University Philosophy Professor Nick Bostrom talked about the super-intelligent paper clip . Bostrom sayswe can also build a super-intelligent paper clip that doesn't understand humanity.
He too can turn all humans into jelly and use it as raw material to maximize paper clip production! This shows us that in order to help humanity, we must first develop robots with morality like humans. Otherwise, the immoral superintelligence will end us.
Of course, robots that can think like humans also have a problem: They can be Buddhas, Gandhis, and Mohammed Iqbal, just like real humans. On the other hand, they can be Hitler and Saddam.
SAVE US NEURALINK?
In order to reduce all these risks, Elon Musk wants to close the gap between humans and machines and connect the human brain directly to computers with digital nerve laces developed by Neuralink company. For this, we need to go in order:
Before connecting our brain to a computer , we need to understand how the human brain works , and answer questions such as whether there is free will and what is human consciousness . Perhaps you will learn the answers to these questions as you try to develop super-intelligent people.
In any case, Elon Musk is hopeful; Because in order to develop robots that think like humans, we already need to understand how the human brain works. He also wants to speed up this process by connecting the human brain to a computer.
WILL NEURALINK WORK?
Not all futurists agree with Musk. If superintelligence is dangerous, they think that turning humans who have committed many genocides into superintelligence will increase the risk of extinction of the human species. According to this view, man is a selfish and flawed being. Being smarter will only make him more selfish and flawed.
However, taking this into account, Elon Musk has developed two contingency plans to save humanity: the replacement world to settle on Mars and the open source artificial intelligence research initiative Open AI. Let's see these plans briefly:
Musk, the founder of SpaceX, announced that he plans to send 1 million settlers to Mars in the next 40 years . He said that if something happens to the Earth we live on, we must settle on the red planet to ensure the continuation of the human species.The idea of settling on Mars arose in a conversation between Elon Musk and Demis Hassabis, co-founder of the London-based artificial intelligence company DeepMind. The two buddies met in Los Angeles a few years ago to discuss their superintelligence plans. Then, as you know, Musk's SpaceX company began designing the Sweating Starship that would send humans to Mars.
NEURALINK AND THE CITY OF ANGELS
Los Angeles is an interesting city; because while you are talking in the corporate cafeteria, not only an airplane but also a rocket launched into space can pass over you. In any case, when Musk told his friend that he wanted to settle on Mars, Hassabis said, "This is the most important project in the world," and then added that DeepMind also plans to develop superintelligence.
However, when Elon Musk heard this, he got very worried and began to insist that it is a really good idea to settle on Mars in case the superintelligence destroys humanity; but Hassabis just laughed at this: “Superintelligence will also come to Mars via the internet, Elon.”
From that point on, Elon Musk began to develop ways to live with it safely instead of preventing the advent of superintelligence. This is how the Neuralink company was born in 2017.Indeed, one of the biggest reasons why we will not be able to control the superintelligence is that it will upload itself directly to the internet, and this possibility has been discussed several times in many science fiction works, especially the Terminator. Now let's see the dystopias and bad future scenarios in question. Let's look at the risks of developing not only superintelligence, but also superintelligent humans:
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