Elon Musk and Neuralink are working fervently to have their brain chip operation, which means inserting technology into people's heads, kicked off by this year's end. But with Neuralink’s launch event and the accompanying paper on their underlying technology, these and larger ethical questions have taken on a new urgency. This could spell disaster if people become dependent on the technology before the long-term impacts are fully understood. Instead, despite the temptation to sensationalize and even fictionalize potential risks, there’s an urgent need for informed thinking about plausible issues, and how to navigate them. They are sufficiently basic that they’ve allowed breathing space for accompanying conversations around their ethical development and use. "There will be ethical and safety issues to work through, and for a long time, it's likely that you'll have to have a real medical need to access this technology," he said. Imagine ads that trigger an emotional response, news feeds that can manipulate how you feel, or apps that allow others to alter how you behave with a simple text. We can all speculate about the potential psychological harms of advanced brain-computer interfaces, or the dangers of brain-hacking or mind-jacking. When a new technology has the potential to change collective behavior, disrupt social norms, or undermine established values, there are broader ethical questions around where the boundaries between “can” and “should” lie. In 2019 Musk invested $100 million Neuralink, according to The New York Times. Future Of Neuralink – Future of neuralink is predicted be in 3 stages: stage one is to understand and treat brain disorders starting with people with serious medical needs. The process of getting access to funding in academic or government research is much more laborious and slow, Kozai says. There are 7 money personality types, says psychology expert. Neuralink’s brain-machine interface technology is deeply impressive. Without that, SpaceX and Tesla would have failed long ago. Though the livestreamed event got a lot of attention, according to the MIT Technology Review's Antonio Regalado, it was simply "neuroscience theater," only impressive to the uninitiated. “We could probably build jurassic park if we wanted to. But now that the future is a little closer, I have some more thoughts on the potential risks and ethical issues surrounding Neuralink. “Maybe 15 years of breeding + engineering to get super exotic novel species”. wouldn’t be genetically authentic dinosaurs but [shrug]”, Hodak tweeted. "When someone with 'star power' pushes an idea, it has the ability to raise awareness of the potential benefits of neurotechnology. It shows that innovators like Musk believe in the ability for the field to deliver," Donoghue says. Here are the... How this 38-year-old teacher earning $47,000 a year in Hawaii spends his money, NASA astronauts to the International Space Station, with a half dozen researchers, professors and industry experts, Musk told New York Times journalist Kara Swisher, brain computer interface (BCI) technology, shopping online by just thinking about moving a computer cursor. Maybe Social Media Isn’t Making Us Depressed, After All. In total, Neuralink has raised a total of $158 million and is estimated to be valued at just over $500 million, according to PitchBook. However, he has put one into a pig and talks about, ultimately, a symbiotic relationship between neurotechnologically enhanced humans and AI. God knows there are hundreds of tech companies selling SAAS software for domains that have negligible research. Unless ethical questions like these are addressed early on, we’re either looking at a future where brain-computer interfaces create more problems than they solve, or one where Neuralink has gone bust because it didn’t take the social and ethical concerns seriously enough from the beginning. The couple founded their philanthropic organization, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, together in 2000.Since then, the foundation has spent $53.8 billion on a wide range of initiatives related to global health, poverty alleviation and more, according to its website. This is an audacious goal that is very overtly aimed at changing society. We might be looking at a future where mandatory auto-updates rewrite your hardware as well as your physical mind. "It's less about Musk's breakthrough in messaging as opposed to the spotlight already being on Musk, and he's bringing that spotlight to BCI," Kozai says. This may seem fine, until the company who owns the device threatens to deactivate it unless you pay for the latest upgrade, or you find yourself vulnerable to hackers because you didn’t buy into the upgrade plan. (Neuralink did not respond to CNBC Make It's request for comment.). But now that the future is a little closer, I have some more thoughts on the potential risks and ethical issues surrounding Neuralink. All Rights Reserved. Kozai, an assistant professor at the University of Pittsburg's Department of Bioengineering, who says he interviewed with Neuralink in the company's early days, was told by a former Neuralink "insider" that the company spends generously. This, however, is just a taste for what’s coming down the pike. But there difference is, 'rocket science' and the science behind electric cars have been written. Here’s Exactly What You Need to Know About Apple’s App Tracking Transparency, Here’s How Apple’s New Anti-Tracking Tech Really Affects Facebook, How the Government’s Multibillion-Dollar Plan to Modernize Its Tech Could Go Horribly Wrong. ", "It takes several decades before a technique that is well understood in laboratory animals such as rodents and non-human primates (monkeys), is clinically deployed in patients," says the Allen Institute's Koch. (Neuralink did not respond to CNBC Make It's multiple requests for comment.). Where the technology is being used for medical purposes, there will always be tradeoffs between the benefits of neural interfaces, and how these might affect a person’s mental state and behavior. The good news is that there’s still time for Neuralink and others to develop a robust strategy for ethical and responsible innovation, so everyone can realize the full benefits of the technology. For instance, if at some point in the future you get a Neuralink implant to enhance your mental abilities, or for recreational purposes, who owns that implant and has access to its data and functions? "A.I. Then there’s a third area of ethical concerns, and the potentially broader, societal impacts of the technology. I felt this theme was a recurring one which almost all talks touched on at one point or … Most fundamentally, a BCI device detects a brain signal than analyzes and translates it into a message that can be carried out by a device external to the brain. Already, there is social disparity around who gets to benefit from new technologies that increases the divide between the privileged and the marginalized in society. Here’s What Likely Is. These are placed using cutting-edge precision robotics, and will eventually be wirelessly controlled from a smartphone app to combat neurological disorders. Kozai heard from the insider that if ever they wanted a piece of equipment to try something out, "'we would have it at our building the next day, even if it was a multimillion dollar piece of equipment, and even if we only use it once or twice.'" We are talking about brain surgery after all.". For example, is there a likelihood of personality changes or addictive behavior, or the emergence of chronic psychological disorders, as people begin to use these devices? But unless we start a wider, deeper, and more informed set of conversations, the future of Musk’s vision doesn’t look quite as rosy as he might hope. According to The Sun, Neuralink is "developing implantable brain chips that are inserted into regions of the mind that control movement." This neural “write” capability of Neuralink’s technology raises a number of other issues. The second area is more tricky, and concerns potential psychological and behavioral impacts. Using the platforms they’ve developed, Neuralink’s long-term objectives are to enhance how our brains function by adding a third artificial processing layer to them, an easy surgery that might take only a few hours. This is where the roots of our sense of self and identity lie, where we receive and process data, where our intellect and reason are seated, and where our deepest feelings and aspirations reside. This is, in part, why ethics are so important in the development of responsible neurotechnologies. Yet this type of speculation is rarely helpful when trying to navigate the landscape between a powerful technological capability and its ethical and socially responsible development. Based on current progress, this ambition is well within the bounds of possibility. "I admire them for their long-term vision, drive and ambition. Let’s suppose that none of the aforementioned negatives come to pass. In my 2018 book, Films from the Future, I wrote about what we then knew about Musk’s creation of a neural lace, a term that comes from the science fiction of Iain M. Banks and describes a future brain-computer interface. This tech will takes years and years to master. And on top of this, the dangers of having your smartphone stolen or hacked take on a whole other dimension. For the demo, a pig named Gertrude, who was implanted with the Link three months prior, had her brain activity projected onto a screen. And we don't need to solve all of those scientific problems in order to make progress. But at the same time, they’re going to have to be open to new ideas as the technology breaks new ground. It will take time though.". He can out-engineer tradition (traditional rockets and cars)," Kozai says. Neuralink a science company. The chip, which Neuralink calls the "Link," will wirelessly connect the brain to the digital world, starting by connecting to a smart phone. "It's hard to out-engineer the brain if you don't understand how the brain works.". But it’s easy to imagine people wanting to use the technology for enhancement — to increase cognitive ability, physical dexterity, perceptions, mood, and even personality. "You can literally rub the pig on its snout and we can detect exactly where you touch the snout" with brain data collected by the Link, Musk told Swisher. Indeed, such is the focus of certain commercial ventures like Neuralink that aim to develop technologies to allow for humanity to "keep up" with artificial intelligence [33]. The South American nation of Chile is taking the changes very seriously and aims to be the first to protect its citizens “neuro rights.” You could integrate Neuralink into gaming systems so you could viscerally feel the action as well as see it. However, "the brain is where that begins to fall apart," says Kozai. Let's sum up: The Promise: Faster, seamless access to information and to interaction with our machines. This is not an idle question. In the nearer term, Musk sees the Link as also solving for brain ailments and injuries from depression and anxiety to memory loss or Dementia and paralysis. Now we’re heading into speculative territory. Stage three full brain machine interfaces.. Who owns the device also raises questions around who owns your brain signals and even who has the right to write data to your brain. Here, there is a risk that long lag times between the widespread use of the technology and the emergence of psychological issues could further complicate things. But Neuralink also faces another reality: There is still so much that even neuroscientists do not know about the brain. (If you tell Musk something is not possible, it "better be limited by a law of physics or you are going to end up looking stupid," Neuralink's president, Max Hodak, once said.). There’s still the question of who gets access to the technology, and who does not. Update: Elon Musk and Neuralink’s paper “An Integrated Brain-Machine Interface Platform With Thousands of Channels” was published in the Journal of Medical Internet Research on October 31 2019. A neural implant could also be used to amplify on-screen emotion when watching movies. "The brain is the most complex piece of highly organized active matter in the known universe," says Koch. Disclaimer: This form is provided to facilitate effective family due diligence, communication, and planning. Basic neurotechnologies have been around for a while — including technologies like cochlear implants and deep brain stimulation and more complicated brain-computer interfaces. The undercurrents of the future. TK (Takashi D.Y.) Elon Musk's brain-computer interface company Neuralink has money and buzz, but hurdles too ... there are also privacy and ethical issues — hackers, could, in … This type of speculation is rarely helpful when trying to navigate the landscape between a powerful technological capability, and its ethical and socially responsible development. The advances in brain technology, led by Elon Musk’s Neuralink, have created a number of challenging new ethical questions. And because of this, it raises questions around ethics and responsibility that have to be grappled with while there’s still an opportunity to steer the technology toward responsible ways of using it. And while Musk's ambition with Neuralink — to make connecting the brain to a computer as simple as LASIK surgery to cure brain ailments and someday even help humans compete with AI — is bringing money and the spotlight to the space of brain computer interfaces (BCIs), industry insiders say his goals are exceedingly optimistic and depend on some ambitious developments in science and engineering being fully wrought. A publication from Medium about technology and people. Until this past week, these were largely theoretical questions. This isn’t vaporware — the tech the company is working on appears to be grounded in solid science and engineering. Although we’re still discovering how important our whole body is in influencing who we are, we still think of our brain as the organ that ultimately defines us. In the future, there could even be a kind of app store for program that you can download and control with your brain. "Media coverage will also help bring new talent into the field and investors to provide the money for the very expensive translational process. Imagine being able to sharpen your mind or increase memory retention with an app on your phone, or change your mood at the flick of a switch. Neuralink shouldn't be like that. Stage two preserve and enhance one’s own brain. "Being able to understand its origin and the organization of the neurons in fine detail in a way that would satisfy a neuroscientist to the core—that's a separate problem. We must consider the possibility that neural implants could massively widen this gap. A Division of NBC Universal. While Neuralink is currently focused on using its technology to address medical conditions, the company’s long-term goal is to create an artificial internet-connected overlay to the brain that enables users to interface with future intelligent machines. The resulting computing power, according to Musk, will allow humans to be broadly competitive with rapidly developing AI. There are resources that can help here — the Risk Innovation Accelerator that’s a part of my Risk Innovation Lab is just one of them. "We would roll over an anthill that's in the way of a road. And this is where Neuralink and others in the field need to be thinking critically about how to innovate both responsibly and ethically. “The reality is that we can’t anticipate or solve all the ethical issues associated with this technology on our own,” noted Sean Keller, research science director for Facebook Reality Labs. The World Ethical Data Forum was held in Barcelona and covered a range of topics relating primarily to ideas of digital freedom. Musk "has a track record for not accepting 'that's impossible' and pushing for unreasonable timelines. "We implanted a very similar brain computer interface system [to Neuralink's] in humans in the early 2000s," says John Donoghue, a Brown University professor of neuroscience and engineering. And there are more than 300,000 people who already have some form of neural interface, says Donoghue, like those with a deep brain stimulator (DBS), which is used to treat Parkinson disease. Experts point out Neuralink has something going for it: Musk's deep pockets and star power. What makes Neuralink’s advances so potentially disruptive are their technological feasibility. It’s a capability that’s essential for planned medical applications. He didn’t. Yet at a launch event this past Tuesday, the company Neuralink — founded by Elon Musk — claimed they were on track to achieve this and more over the next few years. Neuralink co-founder Max Hodak, who started the brain-computer interface company with Elon Musk, has claimed that humans have the technology to recreate Jurassic Park. It is essential that each person and each family take responsibility to identify and access the information they believe to be most relevant to their situation and decisions, and take responsibility to assess and manage their individual and collective risk as they believe best. These are issues we are already struggling with just because people spend a lot of time squinting at hand-held electronic devices. Based on current law, it’s almost definitely not you. Ensuring the safety of this tech is far from trivial. In addition to regulations (including FDA approval, among other things) and legal and medical concerns, there are also privacy and ethical issues — hackers, could, in theory, gain access to other people's brains through a BCI, for example.