World's first Neuralink patient enjoying online chess, long Civ 6 sessions Neuralink's first human patient is now a public figure, with the company publishing a video yesterday showing him playing chess on a laptop and talking about how "freakin' lucky" he is to be involved in the tests. Noland Arbaugh, 29, was paralyzed from the shoulders down in a diving accident several years ago. Thanks to his …
I take it you haven't tried those. You can move a mouse cursor but, unless they've massively improved in the decade since I tried one, it requires you to make large voluntary changes to your brain activity (e.g. internally screaming or the same effort as tensing every muscle to the point of pain). They're also very limited for locomotion, since significant movement upsets the sensors (though this can be mitigated with skull implants).
It may be an exaggeration but if the description of the mental load required to operate this is true, it's a massive upgrade. Looking at the video, he's far more animated than any person I've seen doing much more rudimentary control with an EEG skull cap.
But I have, it was non-trivial to use granted, but, I tried it for like ten minutes in a pub (weird bar that does neuroscience as entertainment, but I wasn't complaining, it was also dog friendly).
I found it certainly easier than you mentioned, and it was 2017, sure there's been a couple of updates since then.
With experience and training I'm sure it'd become easier too, if you were reduced to the quadriplegic state of our guineapig here, there may be additional benefits as with the neurolink, he mentions imagining moving his arm and the cursor moves, which he could still do with the same helmet I used (with the added bonus it can be plugged in, so he doesn't have to curtail his gaming session) given if I go to move my arm I'll be waving it around. (that reads harsh, I don't mean it be, just, you get the point).
That has been possible for a long time; like decades. There are skull caps that can pick up the brain waves that leak out of your skull. Catch is, they tend to be an ungodly mess of wires. Also pretty sure most of the other implant companies are well ahead of Xitler's little venture, where he seems more interested in sexually harassing the female employees than anything else.
Of course, the video has to be taken at face value as no evidence that Arbaugh has the implant, or was using it when the mouse cursor was shown moving on screen, was provided.
Given the hamfisted efforts to make the Optimus robot thing seem like it's further along than it is, not to mention the faked FSD videos, this is ever so important. And just so I'm not picking only on Xitler, there's also the Nikola video of the EV semi that was actually just rolling downhill under the power of gravity, not its own motive force.
Still, if we suspend belief for a moment and assume everything said here is completely accurate. This could put a lot of people out of work. All those people whose whole job is dealing with ergonomic issues in an office won't have as many carpel tunnel type issues to deal with. Won't anyone think of the EH&S people!?
"Still, if we suspend belief for a moment and assume everything said here is completely accurate. This could put a lot of people out of work. All those people whose whole job is dealing with ergonomic issues in an office won't have as many carpel tunnel type issues to deal with. Won't anyone think of the EH&S people!?"
Much of a leap?
I suspect we are still a very long way away from this being any real way "better" than a keyboard, unless of course there is some reason you can't use a keyboard.
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