Neuralink: Elon Musk presents the pig with a chip in his brain

Elon Musk introduced a sow named Gertrude, who had a coin-sized chip attached to her brain. Musk thus explained the progress he made in his work to interact between the brain and the machine.

In an online post, Musk stated, “It’s like a kind of smart bracelet with little wires connected to your brain.”

Startup Neuralink submitted an application last year to start human trials. This interface will allow people with neurological problems to control their phones and computers with their mind.

Musk says these chips will cure dementia, Parkinson’s disease, and spinal cord injuries over time.

But the long-term goal is to combat artificial intelligence, which Musk calls “superhuman cognition,” which he says “can destroy the human race.”

Gertrude is one of the 3 pigs featured on Friday’s broadcast. Although it took some time to act, the neurological activity in her brain could be tracked on a graph as she began to smell and eat hay.

The processor in his brain sent wireless signals to report the neurological activity that occurred in his nose as he searched for food.

The original Neuralink device, the details of which were made public about a year ago, has been further simplified and reduced in size, according to Musk:

“It can fit perfectly on your skull. You can stay under your hair and you won’t even notice.”

Founded in 2017, Neuralink has been working for 3 years to recruit the best scientists. Musk continues to advertise scientists on social media for recruitment. The reason for Friday’s publication is to attract the attention of scientists.

The device developed by the company consists of a small control bar that contains more than 3,000 electrodes. The electrodes are attached to fibers that are thinner and more flexible than a human hair. In this way, the joystick can monitor the activity of more than 1000 brain cells.

Ari Benjamin of the Kording Laboratory at the University of Pennsylvania said in an interview with the BBC after Musk’s broadcast that the real challenge with this technology will be the completely complex structure of the human brain:

“Once we get the recordings, Neuralink will have to decipher them and one day it will run into this hurdle: no matter how many brain cells it records, our basic understanding of how the human brain works is missing.

“The goal of deciphering and planning the movement is very difficult unless we understand the codes of the brain cells, because they are all interconnected.”

Musk’s SpaceX and Tesla companies have become known around the world for their advancements in space travel and the production of electric vehicles.