Elon Musk's Neuralink Gets $27 Million To Build Brain Computers (bloomberg.com)

An anonymous reader writes: Neuralink, the startup co-founded by billionaire Elon Musk, has taken steps to sell as much as $100 million in stock to fund the development of technology that connects human brains with computers. The San Francisco-based company has already gotten $27 million in funding, according to a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. Musk said via Twitter on Friday that Neuralink isn't seeking outside investors. In June, Musk said Neuralink is a priority after much more demanding commitments to his automotive and rocket companies. "Boring Co. is maybe 2 percent of my time; Neuralink is 3 percent to 5 percent of my time; OpenAI is going to be a couple of percent; and then 90-plus percent is divided between SpaceX and Tesla," said Musk at the electric-car maker's annual shareholder meeting.

Comments

Nice headline

[philmarcracken]

I thought they might have ditched the idea of building an interface that connects directly to your brain(avoiding slow ponderous hand motions of keyboards/mice) and just jumped straight in the brain computer.

Whatever that is.

Re:Nice headline

[Anonymous Coward]

It would be nice if your Tesla could at least send your brain an apology message after it realizes it fucked up but can't correct, in the split second before you impact the concrete support structure.

Re:Nice headline

[SCVonSteroids]

It's a computer that looks like a brain, duh!

Re: Nice headline

[dougdonovan]

talk to your local neuro.

computers already interface with the brain

[FudRucker]

via the keyboard & mouse and monitor

all joking aside, there is no way in hell am i going to allow ANY connections directly to my brain, they got to be crazy to go mucking around with connecting things directly to the brain like that

Re:computers already interface with the brain

[mattr]

Yes I can't imagine any software engineer who would willingly connect anything to your brain, poof you've been owned. Though you might be willing if you are a:
- parapalegic physicist
- fighter pilot (remember the movie Firefox? you have to think in Russian. https://www.youtube.com/watch?... )
- ???

Re: computers already interface with the brain

[Actually, I do RTFA]

I can search Google with a screen, keyboard and mouse, you know. At Quantum Mechanics is just differential equations, so "doing them in your head" isn't terribly interesting. Certainly, it's easier to do them by by having a computer solve them, but then again, I can do that with keyboard and mouse.

Electric shocks please

[cyber-vandal]

For people that can't use your and you're correctly

Re:Electric shocks please

[Rei]

Can it apply to "lose" and "loose" as well?

Re:Electric shocks please

[CustomSolvers2]

Additionally to my numerous posts with tons of grammar/spelling mistakes in both English and Spanish (my mother tongue), I do intentionally write non-existing words like "unmotivatedly". My question for you and the other supporters/executioners in the comments below: will I also be electro-shocked or should I expect a more painful punishment? BTW, nice full stop at the end of the sentence over there.

Re:Electric shocks please

[CustomSolvers2]

Ups! Almost forgot about the non-serious tag for that post. Here you have it: ;) (+ extra help for individuals with extremely-poor-understanding skills: no, I am not afraid of being electro-shocked).

Re: Electric shocks please

[fluffernutter]

Yes that must be very problematic for people too stupid to work out the meaning of a sentence from the other words in it.

Re:Electric shocks please

[John.Banister]

Reading your suggestion makes me think you're like the phone company making me hang up and dial a "1" or hang up and dial without the "1." If they're computers connected directly to the brains of these people whose usage is habitually improper, they can just ensure that the words that get out henceforth are correct and not bother with trying to train monkeys.

Re: Electric shocks please

[Anonymous Coward]

Just send the one they asked for incorrectly. Hilarity ensues

Re:Electric shocks please

[CustomSolvers2]

trying to train monkeys

Describing someone as a monkey usually implies that this person has a somehow limited comprehension ability or isn't even able to perform complex, human-like thoughts/interactions. In programming, "code monkeys" are the ones who blindly copy-paste/type what is written somewhere else, without properly understanding and without a real knowledge; basically, what a monkey or another animal would do in case of being in front of a computer: repeating simple actions, not precisely for a too sensible reason (because the sound is nice or because someone told them to do so).

What do you think that is more monkey- (irrational, arbitrary)-like? Blindly applying certain abstract rules with no real intrinsic purpose other than helping to better fulfilling a given goal (= proper communication) + acting aggressively against anyone not doing so; or adequately understanding the situation, the importance of each bit and actually accomplishing the intended goal of adequately understanding regardless of irrelevant details? What do you think that a monkey would do in a similar situation? If you train a monkey to know that "food" means that it will eat, do you think that it would understand "foud"? Or might perhaps get angry and act aggressively because of feeling frustrated with a world which is too complex for it and which can barely understand?

The funniest thing of people like you or the electro-shocker above is that you seriously think that any kind of ridiculous errors are associated with lack of knowledge (what BTW denotes your own limitations)! You don't seem to understand that not everyone else might share your scale of priorities ("I have to make sure that each single word I write is fine such that nobody can criticise me"); other people might prefer to adequately understand and to care about what really matters/is really indicative of whatever issue rather than getting lost in irrelevancies; there might even be some cases where people intentionally break those rules to somehow criticise whatever fanatic behaviour. There are always many possible reasons for reaching the same outcome, no sensible person should ever blindly assume otherwise.

In case it isn't clear, I am not supporting the lack of care in writing (online or anywhere else) or minimising the importance of the rules of the English language (or of any other language). I am plainly criticising fanaticism: supporting electro-shocking or calling someone a monkey over this?! Not because of not properly understanding something, but because of not perfectly respecting a set of abstract rules meant to facilitate that understanding process!! Not just feeling internally bothered or suggesting an improvement or teaching that person; not even focusing on cases where the error is truly relevant to accomplish the given goal because of actually avoiding a proper communication! These arbitrary attacks were exclusively motivated by abstract rules not fully respected and not even in a very specific context where this is a very relevant issue! And the best part is that a big proportion of people so concerned about these issues (mainly the most aggressive ones; aggressiveness when used to arbitrarily and unfairly attack others is undoubtedly bad) have serious understanding problems! They are so concern about making sure that all the words follow a certain set of rules that forget about properly understanding the transmitted message! Pffff.

Re:Electric shocks please

[John.Banister]

My thought was that, in comparison to AIs, we are all monkeys, on account of genetics, biological evolution and such. No wanting behavior modification practiced on me, I'm also not favorable towards it being practiced on others.

Re:Electric shocks please

[CustomSolvers2]

OK. My apologies for having misunderstood your intention.

Re:Electric shocks please

[John.Banister]

No offence taken. Communication is often imperfect for me as well.

Re:Electric shocks please

[Whibla]

I do intentionally write non-existing words like "unmotivatedly".

The other day I wrote the word "unprovable" in a post, and was puzzled at the red underlining. I checked elsewhere and apparently, while improvable was ok (though clearly meaning something completely different), "unprovable", up to that point, was not a word.

Well, it is now!

Moreover, like all the best new words its meaning is / was clear not just from the context in which it appeared but also by simply reading it.

Language is not some fixed unchanging thing, forever set in stone. There are over a million words in the English language, and someone had to 'invent' them. Might as well be you or I...

Re:Electric shocks please

[CustomSolvers2]

"unprovable" in a post, and was puzzled at the red underlining

Automatic spell/grammar checks have surely become a very helpful tool to avoid problems on this front, but I also ignore their suggestions relatively often. I agree with you in languages being variable realities which should adapt to how people use them rather than the other way around.

Re: Electric shocks please

[cyber-vandal]

Only for native speakers I'm afraid. You'll have to do a bad Spanish version if you want the same.

Re: Electric shocks please

[cyber-vandal]

While I agree with you, the language has not changed with regards to your and you're, it just seems too hard for a lot of people to type that extra 'e'.

Re: Electric shocks please

[CustomSolvers2]

You'll have to do a bad Spanish version if you want the same.

What about "malo eh de pedí peo má malo eh de rová"? Come on! Spare some electro-shocks! LOL

Re: A little too late

[Anonymous Coward]

A.I. cars are an IQ Test. If you are stupid enogh to bet your life on California Software, the Darwin Award is yours for the taking.
And what happens if a political group, like ISIS, hacks ALL Teslas and rams them into crowded markets ? Single source controlling all Vehicles with automated updates is a cyberattack terrorist mass casualty opportunity too good to pass up. Thanks Musk, but I'll keep my head attached to my neck, and my car under my control.

hypocrisy

[Anonymous Coward]

Wasn't this motherfucker just in the news about banning some shit about "AI" so the skynet overloads wouldn't enslave us all, and now here he is building "Brain Computers."

Re:hypocrisy

[__aaclcg7560]

He's afraid of other AIs because he wants the entire market for his AIs.

Re:hypocrisy

[JoshuaZ]

Actually, Musk's interest in neuralink is in part to help make sure that we do end up with safe general AI and that we don't have substantial problems with unfriendly AGI. See https://waitbutwhy.com/2017/04/neuralink.html which gives a detailed breakdown of the goals and likely obstacles.

Re:hypocrisy

[sysrammer]

Ai yi yi.

When choosing the brain to interface with...

[LordHighExecutioner]

...please use some care.

AI, brains and computers

[LynnwoodRooster]

You know, for a guy who's publicly terrified of AI and robotics taking over, he certainly is investing a crapload of cash into such ventures. I guess he really does want to sell the rope that's going to be used to hang him...

Re:AI, brains and computers

[freeze128]

Elon Musk: "No, no, no! AI will doom us all (unless it's the AI in a self-driving Tesla Model X). Instead, we connect HUMAN brains to the machines! Yeah, that's the ticket. That way, a human will be in control of the deadly robots at all times (Unless it's a self-driving Tesla Model X)."

"BTW: It doesn't matter anyway because we're all living in a simulation."

What next

[AlanObject]

My god you can't get that boy to sit still can you.

Someone tell me if he has a market-disrupting sex toy investment. He has to have one by now he has pursued just about everything else.

Re:What next

[Rei]

To the point of parody. ;)

That said, Neuralink is not new. It just hasn't made the press as much. I definitely recommend the earlier-linked Waitbutwhy article, which is based on interviews with people involved in Neuralink. It's a very long article, but very detailed and thought provoking.

Neuralink is probably Musk's most ambitious project - the least likely to succeed, but with the most profound impacts on the future of humanity if it does.

Siri, lower my blood-pressure

[nospam007]

Would be nice

Time is money...

[__aaclcg7560]

Sorry, Slashdot, you're only worth 0.005 percent of my time.

Re:Time is money...

[__aaclcg7560]

.005%? It's 10:10 on a weekend morning, you have posted 20 times

This is the 14th comment for today.

literally nothing you've posted is of interest to a technically minded person; it's all drama.

You must have missed reading this thread then: https://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=11037471&cid=55089687

Re:Time is money...

[__aaclcg7560]

Go to https://slashdot.org/~creimer and count.

This is the 15th comment for today. Your point?

Needs neuroscientists, not just engineers

[notil]

From this article: “No neuroscience experience is required: talent and drive matter far more,” the company says on the site. “We expect most of our team to come from other areas and industries.” Eh...sounds like the bottleneck here will not be engineering machines, but getting them to produce meaningful changes in the brain at a neurological and psychological level. It doesn't matter how sophisticated your implants are if you don't have a way of reliably changing brain activity in a way that benefits a disease, which involves an incredibly sophisticated understanding of pathology at a molecular, cellular, and systems level, etc. etc. It's not really "plug and play"

A Brainless Ant...

[antdude]

For me, I have no brain. I would like a computer in my head. :P