The demo was impressive. Did the author not see the part where they were predicting the body position of the walking pig?

I don't see how that is going to be done with stick on sensors.

And yes, some implantable BCI devices have better capability. The point is to make this as cheap as possible... so that it doesn't require a brain surgeon to install. Because brain surgeons are expensive.

To me (neuro undergrad, comp sci masters), the demo seemed underwhelming but encouraging. As far as I can tell the tech was not doing anything particularly novel and the 'fitbit in your skull' analogy was personally uninspiring. [edit: the volume of reads /form factor is a step forward]

That said, the demo was mostly for attracting talent - lots of money and a great team will likely get them somewhere. In terms of their long term goals I expect the area that will give them the most trouble is reading/writing interesting stuff on the cortex. Neural coding is really hard and poorly understood.

Prof Andrew Jackson, Professor of Neural Interfaces, Newcastle University, said:

> “Neuralink are progressing through the steps that have been taken with previous neural interface technology. They have moved from rodents to a large mammal (pigs), and are apparently seeking FDA approval for a human trial. I had some sympathy with Elon, having also had experience of animal experiments that don’t work perfectly the day we have visitors in the room! But proving the safety of new biomedical implants in animals is always a vital step towards a clinical trial.

> “I don’t think there was anything revolutionary in the presentation, but they are working through the engineering challenges of placing multiple electrodes into the brain. In terms of their technology, 1024 channels is not that impressive these days, but the electronics to relay them wirelessly is state-of-the-art, and the robotic implantation is nice.

> “But the biggest challenge is what you do with all this brain data. The demonstrations were actually quite underwhelming in this regard, and didn’t show anything that hasn’t been done before (e.g. decoding limb position during walking). There is a big difference between recording brain cells and ‘reading thoughts’, especially when it comes to higher-level cognitive functions that we don’t understand as well. The idea of ‘writing to the brain’ is even more questionable – there are fundamental limitations to targeting specific networks of neurons in a meaningful way using electrical stimulation.

> “So in summary I would say this is solid engineering but mediocre neuroscience. Finally, I think it is unfortunate that they are presenting their work in this way, rather than publishing peer-reviewed papers that would allow their claims to be scrutinised, but I guess this is something that we will have to get used to as neural interfaces move from the academic to the commercial sector.”

https://www.sciencemediacentre.org/expert-reaction-to-elon-m...

I am not an expert, but what I thought was remarkable is the 12000 channels Musk talked about. New cochlear implants have 120 channels - one channel is one neuron (AFAIK) - more neurons is better results.

I would love some expert take on this, but my first reaction was „12000 sounds like a lot - they all work? That’s cool“.

Also check out this wait but why article which I think explains the resolution pretty well: https://waitbutwhy.com/2017/04/neuralink.html

They stated explicitly that this was a recruitment event, so personally I feel like some of the hype can be forgiven.

The tone of this article is negative and I instinctively want to defend Neuralink because I hope that we can eventually achieve all of those sci-fi ambitions. But I think that's the wrong approach, and possibly insulting to researchers who have been working on these problems for decades only to be overshadowed by what I have to admit was not the most impressive demo.

However, this event does attract attention, so what I'm really hoping for is an influx of long-read articles and in-depth analyses coming from experts in the various fields surrounding Neuralink's aims as a result of the hightened interest in the topic.

The "tech demo" was less than impressive. 3 pigs all acting normal, one (supposedly) had the implant and then had it removed, one (supposedly) had the implant and made a lot of beeping sounds, and one was, well, just a normal pig.

If they handle the software for this in any way like the Tesla I wouldn’t want it near my head.

These various networked computer components being attached to our bodies make me very nervous. See: hackers control pacemaker shock cycles with malware. [1]

Software will always be vulnerable and it’s just a matter of time until someone gets eliminated by this vector - or worse, think about a wormable exploit aimed at mass adopted Neuralinks to mass fry people..

[1] https://www.wired.com/story/pacemaker-hack-malware-black-hat...

    - Change of opinion of critical lynch-pin individuals.

    - Thought Policing

    - (Corporate) Espionage

Neuralink is not a startup, it is a research lab dabbling in a very speculative area. Something might come out of it in the very long run, or it might not. The demo showed essentially a tool they are using in this research, a miniaturized brain implant which is technologically superior to what competing researchers are using. They showed an application of that research tool, a recorded session (not included in the actual demo, probably hard to reproduce) where they claim to have "predicted" the movements of a pig. "Predicted" is probably a strong word since the brain controls motor functions.

So they showed progress and proved they are actually a lab and actually perform research. That being said, there was absolutely nothing in the demo remotely related to a "brain-computer" interface, nor are they likely to get there for many, many years. That's the speed when doing hard science, and pumping more money only has a marginal efect.

>But that didn’t stop me from getting hyped up to the point of forgetting that Musk is a con-artist at worst and just some dude with a bunch of money and charisma at best.

Seems a bit harsh.

one feature i dont understand about neuralink is the promised transmission of thoughts.

lets say i have a device that can encode activity of every neuron in my brain simultaneously. i think some variation of the thought "elephant," and the neuralink creates some digital representation of these signals.

then i send that digital encoding to your brain's neuralink.

how on earth are you going to think of ANY elephant, let alone my elephant? the structural nature of our brains is certainly different, the network of activated neurons aren't isomorphic, certainly not identical, right?

i am by no means an expert, but i dont see how you can ever take a digital signal and turn it into a conscious meat thought.

motor signals seem somewhat more tractable

> Elon Musk preys on the hopeful and optimistic

Yes but he also launches rockets into fucking space; that is to say, he may be selling snake oil, but he’s also selling legitimate magic beans.

I think the author calling Musk a conman is too strong a reaction to what goes on. I think Musk has a tendency to oversell already great technology with science fiction. Teslas are amazing cars but full self driving has been 6 months away for years now.

Like the author, I would also be upset if I believed Musks promises of a brain-computer interface, only to see them dashed. But Neuralink is already an amazing improvement, and I am still excited to see what will come of it.

This article is completely wrong and celebrates ignorance.

> Elon Musk preys on the hopeful and optimistic.

Drama queen.

This reads like a teenage girl rolling her eyes wrote it.

Why is this article even being shared on HN let alone end up on the front page within minutes of posting? Anyone with the slightest understanding of this topic can poke holes in every single sentence in this ridiculously uninformed article. I stopped reading half way as it was making me dumber. HN can be so demoralizing sometimes. You'd think this would be the last place to find innovators being smeared but here we are...

> “So in summary I would say this is solid engineering but mediocre neuroscience. Finally, I think it is unfortunate that they are presenting their work in this way, rather than publishing peer-reviewed papers that would allow their claims to be scrutinised, but I guess this is something that we will have to get used to as neural interfaces move from the academic to the commercial sector.”

Well, and this is exactly what needs to be done to further this area as it is the part that's not completely addressed by academia. Any kind of academic research obviously focusses on generating one-time results for publication.

There will likely need to be translation layer. Motor signals aren't necessarily tractable either, people can learn to walk again after even if the parts of the brain that govern walking are damaged.

The promise seems more that ideas can be transmitted with higher bandwidth. My signals -> word1, send word1 to you, word1-> your signals for word1 would be likely. Both of us would have to the system for word1, but if we could exchange it much faster than speaking, maybe even reading.

My issue with the system is that the line between reading and writing signals is very thin, and this these are hackable devices. Once the device learns a person's brain signals to make the legs run, it's easy to replay them on a bridge when facing sideways. There's no technology right now that's foolproof, and I'm not sure how any company can boast that it's secure enough — even if encryption is strong laws can still be enacted to force companies to hand over keys or install backdoors.

> how on earth are you going to think of ANY elephant, let alone my elephant?

Both brains sensors are calibrated on the same images, then a common representation can be found as intermediary. It has been done with neural nets translating into a common intermediary language, thus needing N encoders/decoders instead of (N-1)^2 separate networks. In the easiest case it can be a simple linear transform to map one vector space into another.

There's so much handwaving about this part, even at the functional level (how is it supposed to work at the most basic level for the user? what's it supposed to look like?), that I kinda tune out every time that comes up.

I'll start listening when they have a working definition of what a "thought" is or what "translating" it into a "universal language" even means.