The first invasive brain chip that Neuralink embedded into a human brain has malfunctioned, with neuron-surveilling threads appearing to have become dislodged from the participant’s brain, the company revealed in a blog post Wednesday.
It’s unclear what caused the threads to become “retracted” from the brain, how many have retracted, or if the displaced threads pose a safety risk. Neuralink, the brain-computer interface startup run by controversial billionaire Elon Musk, did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Ars. The company said in its blog post that the problem began in late February, but it has since been able to compensate for the lost data to some extent by modifying its algorithm.
Wait, is that what these brain chips are for? Well now I can’t hate on them as much as I used to if they’re meant to help people learn how to walk again. I thought it was just supposed to help you process thoughts more quickly or something, like a math coprocessor in an old 90s PC.
It’s one use, I’ve heard their designs described as opening the brain’s io processes. Once the “data lanes” are available, it’s then the “applications” implement the uses over it. That could mean adding a math coprocessor, or correcting vision issues, or getting tweets beamed into your mind. Roll the dice on a musk project 🤷
There’s a ton of potential uses for the tech, if they can get it functional, but it’s going to require too much trust for me to realistically consider it.