By: Jack Nevins
Elon Musk can now be dubbed as the father of technology in the 21st century, more specifically over the past decade. Musk is the CEO of several tech companies, including Tesla and SpaceX. Most recently, Musk bought Twitter, changing it to its new name, X. Musk is known for his outlandish thoughts and ideas, as well as ambitious pursuits whether that includes changing the automotive industry, or the space industry. Now, Musk has a new creation in the palm of his hands, Neuralink. This is a startup that Musk created, and Neuralink has implemented a chip in a human brain for the first time after a post surfaced on X by Musk.
This new chip can be seen as revolutionary for the future of humans and the field of neurology. The operation took place on Sunday, January 28th. The patient that underwent this surgery is in good condition, where they are now recovering. Although this announcement brings a very innovative, life-transforming piece of technology out of the lab and into the real world, Musk has not offered many details, making it unclear how significant of a scientific method this process and chip really is. Musk is very proud of his accomplishments, and the new product from Neuralink seems to be his most influential according to Musk, after a post on X, “Initial results show promising neuron spike detection.” This indicates the chip is working on the patient.
Neuralink’s first product will be called Telepathy. This is unusual for Musk, as we will not see a weird and unusual name, or obscure meaning to the word. The initial users of Telepathy will be those who have lost their limbs. Musk wants those who are living without their limbs, and experience challenges everyday, to have the chance to forget about the disability and have Telepathy act almost as a steroid. Musk asks, “Imagine if Stephen Hawking could communicate faster than a speed typist or auctioneer?” Musk’s creation of Neuralink has been working towards implanting chips to connect the human brain to a computer. This idea was short-lived in 2022 when a monkey died after attempting to play the video game, Pong. Neuralink finally received FDA clearance for human clinical trials in May of 2023. After this clearance by the FDA, Neuralink began to recruit patients with spinal injuries and patients that suffer from ALS. Patients going through the trial phase, will have a chip surgically implanted into the section of the brain controlling the movement of the body. The chip records and sends the brain signals to an app to allow people to merely have the ability to control a computer mouse or keyboard just through their thoughts and ideas. Neuralink will need approval before their revolutionary implants can be seen for sale.
