Neuralink, Elon Musk's brain-machine interface company, finally set to reveal details

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You probably know Elon Musk as the CEO/founder of [Tesla][2] and Space X, but the tech billionaire is hoping there will be yet another name that soon rolls off the tongue; Neuralink.

Founded two years ago by Musk, the company, which has been in "stealth mode" since its inception in 2017, took to [Twitter][3] to detail that it is planning an event on Tuesday 16 July to "share a bit" about what it's "been working on the last two years".

Details on the company and what it's trying to achieve are scant with the company barely making the news over the last two years.

The company's [website][4] merely states that:

"Neuralink is developing ultra high bandwidth brain-machine interfaces to connect humans and computers."

The rest of the site details job openings from accountants to talent acquisition suggesting the company is "looking for exceptional engineers and scientists," and that "No neuroscience experience is required."

That's lead some to question as to what Musk and the team are up to.

In 2018 Musk appeared on the Joe Rogan Experience Podcast. In the now infamous episode where Musk talked about a number of things, the Tesla CEO detailed that Neuralink would have something to show in a few months and that it was a product that would allow humans to effectively merge with artificial intelligence to help fight the rise of AI in general by machines.

In the interview Musk states that the ultimate goal would be to allow anyone that wants superhuman cognition to be able to have that and that while we are already somewhat there with our phones, a device by Neuralink could radically increase the "bandwidth" between humans and technology.

Other details gleamed so far are that several websites reported in 2018 that Neuralink had sought to open an animal testing facility in San Francisco, but that it ultimately settled to pay UC Davis's National Primate Center to conduct research on its behalf.

Musk's comments and internet hearsay align with in an in-depth article by Tim Urban on a site called [Wait But Why.][5] In 2017 Urban wrote a series of interviews with Musk about his various companies, one of which was a closer look at Neuralink at its starting point.

The post, which is some 35,000 words long, tries to set the scene and explain at the same time what Musk is trying to achieve with Neuralink, something Urban called the Wizard Era, and the device that Neuralink is making, the Wizards hat, for a lack of a tangible product to reference.

According to Urban:

"Elon's vision for the Wizard Era is that among the wizard hat's many uses, one of its core purposes will be to serve as the interface between your brain and a cloud-based customized AI system. That AI system, he believes, will become as present a character in your mind as your monkey and your human characters—and it will feel like you every bit as much as the others do. He says:

'I think that, conceivably, there's a way for there to be a tertiary layer that feels like it's part of you. It's not something that you offload to, it's you.'

This makes sense on paper. You do most of your "thinking" with your cortex, but then when you get hungry, you don't say, "My limbic system is hungry," you say, "I'm hungry." Likewise, Elon thinks, when you're trying to figure out the solution to a problem and your AI comes up with the answer, you won't say, "My AI got it," you'll say, "Aha! I got it." When your limbic system wants to procrastinate and your cortex wants to work, a situation I might be familiar with, it doesn't feel like you're arguing with some external being, it feels like a singular you is struggling to be disciplined.

Likewise, when you think up a strategy at work and your AI disagrees, that'll be a genuine disagreement and a debate will ensue—but it will feel like an internal debate, not a debate between you and someone else that just happens to take place in your thoughts. The debate will feel like thinking."

He goes on to add:

"He [Elon] started Neuralink to accelerate our pace into the Wizard Era - into a world where he says that "everyone who wants to have this AI extension of themselves could have one, so there would be billions of individual human-AI symbiotes who, collectively, make decisions about the future." A world where AI really could be of the people, by the people, for the people.

Regardless of how far-fetched that all sounds, Musk is renowned for creating companies that push the boundaries of what we believe is possible on a wide scale before showing that it is possible, and more importantly, convincing entire industries to follow suit.

While it's easy to get carried away thinking about the Science Fiction possibilities of an AI implant and how it could help create super humans that are radically more intelligent that we are currently, it could have huge ramifications for those with fighting cognitive impairments and neurological diseases.

Could all be answered on Tuesday 16 July? With so much secrecy still surrounding the launch and the company, we'll have to wait and see what's in store.

[1]: https://cdn.pocket-lint.com/r/s/748x/assets/images/148679-gadgets-news-neuralink-elon-musks-brain-machine-interface-company-finally-set-to-reveal-details-image1-dfuvisttuv.jpg?v1
[2]: https://www.pocket-lint.com/cars/news/tesla
[3]: https://twitter.com/neuralink
[4]: https://www.neuralink.com/
[5]: https://waitbutwhy.com/2017/04/neuralink.html

URL: https://www.pocket-lint.com/gadgets/news/148679-neuralink-elon-musk-company-detailed