According to Elon Musk, his company Neuralink is making good progress towards allowing people to control various devices with their thoughts.
The world's first patient has received Neuralink's brain implant chip, announced on X-page by
Elon Musk. Musk states that the initial results have shown promising neural spikes or nerve impulses, and the patient is recovering well.
The BBC reminds us that Neuralink received permission back in May 2023 to conduct clinical trials with the brain-implantable chip, allowing humans to receive the implant. This marked the beginning of a six-year study period, during which patients will have 64 threads, each thinner than a human hair, implanted into the part of the brain responsible for the intention to move.
Musk suggests that this will allow them to capture these signals and transmit them wirelessly to an external device that decodes the person's intended movements.
As a result, the first device has been named Telepathy, as it will allow people to give instructions to their phone and computer merely with thought, and through these, practically any device. This will first be provided to those who have lost their limbs.
There is huge competition in the United States for brain-computer interfaces. Over the past few years, Neuralink has acquired significant rivals in the form of companies like Synchron and Precision Neuroscience, with the former receiving backing from
Bill Gates.
While Neuralink's current achievement is certainly a significant milestone, it has not yet been confirmed by an independent source, such as the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, that the implantation has indeed been successful. However, the company has previously faced substantial criticism after it was revealed that experimental animals went through extreme suffering.