Neuralattepunk
Lattepunk
Last week I heard not one, but two podcasts cover something absolutely remarkable. Jennifer Lopez is breaking up with someone… I KNOW!!! Draaaa-Maaaa. It made me really sit back and reflect on myself (as one does when a famous person’s relationship doesn’t work out), it lead me to this question:
Would you put a computer chip in your brain?
Neuralink made that happen in January, and the first ever patient was doing interviews. First podcast I heard him on was Hard Fork. Huge fan of both these journalist (I pay to read Casey Newton’s work) and of the podcast itself. They talked about the slight setback Noland Arbaugh is having.
Then, Wall Street Journal’s “The Journal” podcast also covered him. This is another podcast I’m a huge fan of. Two podcasts on the same day. This put the topic to the forefront of my mind. We’re living in a world, today, where someone has a computer chip in their brain and it’s actively helping him use a computer without anyone’s assistance. They’re still only in the testing phase. You thought Apple was slick trying to get a Vision Pro on your face to experience using computers with your eyes (Spatial Computing), how about using computers with your brain?
This is called Brain-Computer Interface (BCI). This, in the short term, could help a lot of people who have a disabilities. In the long term, this could change how you and I operate within the world. This world changing technology can only come from one person…
Jennifer Lopez?
Correct! Wait, what!? NO! It’s Elon Musk!
Between running the best rocket company, and helping citizens connect with his satellite internet service, and having his car company’s shareholders give him a raise, and killing the woke mind virus with his porn sounding social media site, he’s helping people by putting computer chips in their brains.
I have many opinions on, at the time of writing, the third richest person in the world. Maybe that’s an email for another day. But whatever opinion you have of this man, let’s come back to that later. He’s the one running the show at Neuralink.
This is seriously amazing stuff! I get excited when technology gets used for good. I take the use of my hands for granted, but hearing stories like Noland’s really puts the little things in perspective. One of the first things he did was play video games on his computer. You may not know this about me reader, but I’m passionate about video games. I think it’s an art form that everyone should be able to enjoy. I can’t express how much joy I had when Xbox (microsoft company btw) released their adaptive controller. Sony finally caught up with their access controller too. So hearing how a computer chip helped someone enjoy something I wish I did more often, just really opened my eyes to how useful this is.
Side note: I’m so passionate about video games being available to everyone, I helped a team of people at one of my previous employers raise money via Gamers Outreach to build one of their units for a local hospital here in Connecticut. Proof (in case you think I’m a fucking liar):
If this is such a positive in patient number 1, what could the future look like? Could we regain movement in limbs? What if we put it in ourselves? This has SO MUCH potential. Apparently Neuralink has some competition. Like all technology, this is going to move fast.
This all reads too positive. Not at all like you, what am I missing?
😈 You know me well reader!
Our computer devices steal our data now. Push ads to our computer devices, now. Get hacked…NOW. This computer is in our brain, controlled by a private company, run by Elon Musk. This is the part where you insert your opinion of him. Is this where we want to go? I’d love to be able to control random devices with my thoughts, but at what cost?
That private company thing is important too. What happens if Neuralink runs out of money after you have a chip of theirs in your head? Spoiler alert: You’re fucked. I, to my own surprise, read about a very similar company that had it happen to them. The company was called Second Sight and they used technology to help restore people’s eyesight. Look:
Barbara Campbell was walking through a New York City subway station during rush hour when her world abruptly went dark. For four years, Campbell had been using a high-tech implant in her left eye that gave her a crude kind of bionic vision, partially compensating for the genetic disease that had rendered her completely blind in her 30s. “I remember exactly where I was: I was switching from the 6 train to the F train,” Campbell tells IEEE Spectrum. “I was about to go down the stairs, and all of a sudden I heard a little ‘beep, beep, beep’ sound.”
When the device died after the company ran out of money, no one could help them. They had devices embedded in them that no doctor could get insurance to cover the cost of removing. Here’s the whole article. Elon Musk spent $80 billion on a whim to buy Twitter. He declared that Tesla is now an AI company. You can stop using Twitter. You could sell your Tesla. How easy is it to get a computer chip out of your brain?
I didn’t give you enough links to click, here’s more:
If the idea of the online pharmaceutical store intrigued you from the recommendations last week, Wired has a full story on it. Imagine running an illegal drug market AND teaching cops how crypto works.
Ever heard of perfluorooctanesulfonic acid? Ever use a 3M product? They are probably the reason we have that first thing in our blood. ProPublica did a hell of job on this story.
I was reminded that Riot Games is making a fighting game. It made me think fondly about how much I enjoyed fighting games in my younger years. So simple yet so complex. I remember building the courage to leave my bubble and enter my first tournament in my local area in 2014. I played this little indie fighting game called Skullgirls. I trained and practiced so much! This game is so indie that the tournament I went to was considered a big tournament for the game. Online net play was key for my training. 2XKO is the first fighting game in a while that’s got me excited. Made me want to share with you an old article about netcode in fighting games. Super technical and super nerdy, but super informative.
Wondering how I did in that tournament? I made it to top 8 on the losers side and immediately got knocked out. I played clean the whole tournament, then top 8 was played on stream in front of a huge crowd. I can’t lie to you, I folded under pressure. Proof (in case you think I’m a fucking liar):
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