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Monkey MindPong

neuralink.com

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Re: Monkey MindPong

#261

Post by dang »

mlindner wrote: post #37
jm4 wrote: post #35

That was difficult to watch. While the technology is impressive, it is sickening to watch. The part where they can pair the phone via bluetooth made me want to vomit. It is obviously unnatural, but I can't quite put my finger on it. Something about seeing that animal, oblivious to what's happening, and that implant with the ability to directly record thoughts and/or remote control. The whole thing doesn't sit well wi…

I'm confused why you'd even feel that way? Neuralink goes into a LOT of effort for animals to feel good. Animal studies happen all the time for medical testing, and from what I hear Neuralink is much better than the average. As they said in the video, the animal is doing the activity of it of it's own free will. They don't harm the animal if it refuses to participate. Are you familiar with the term "luddite"?

Please omit snark and name-calling from your comments to HN. Your comment would be fine without the swipe at the end.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

Re: Monkey MindPong

#262

Post by natosaichek »

etrautmann wrote: post #153
cyrux004 wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can somebody who is knowledgeable in this field of work explain how/if neuralink is better to the previous approaches and if its easier to "scale" this tech compared to previous works ?

This is primarily an advance in the systems integration required to make such a sensor fully implantable abs capable of wireless transmission. It also ~10x’s the number of channels of the Utah array, which is the primary point of comparison as a product that can currently be used in human patients (in an investigational context as part of clinical trials). The Utah arrays do not have any active electronics however, a…

This is a great summary. I will just add that my understanding is that Neuralink is heavily focused on surgical speed, and a few seconds per thread is the slowest it will ever be. It will likely be much faster than that.

Re: Monkey MindPong

#263

Post by natosaichek »

KineticLensman wrote: post #172
the_dripper wrote: post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The monkey probably won't be sad. I think it is entertained all day by the researchers. Playing its games, and drinking its delicious banana smoothie. As you say; Ignorance is bliss.

> The monkey probably won't be sad. I think it is entertained all day by the researchers. Playing its games, and drinking its delicious banana smoothie. Rhesus Macaques [0] have a lifespan of thirty years. Thirty years. Thirty years in a massively controlled environment, often sedentary, with limited opportunities to socialise with peers, and the simple pleasures of mutual grooming, lying in the sun etc. Lab animals…

Neuralink monkeys are housed with at least one other monkey for grooming / social activities, and are in the same room with visibility to other monkeys. Are they as happy as zoo monkeys? Probably not. But they're probably much happier than most other research monkeys.

Re: Monkey MindPong

#264

Post by natosaichek »

neolog wrote: post #123
natosaichek wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's legally prohibited until a certain amount of animal testing has been performed. They're aiming to do the first human implants within a year.

> It's legally prohibited until a certain amount of animal testing has been performed. Link?

You have to conduct testing to show that the device is safe and effective before you can begin marketing it.

https://www.fda.gov/medical-devices/premarket-approval-pma/p...

If you've never gone through the process of bringing a medical device to market, well, I'm not sure there's an easy FAQ that will answer your scepticism. But the basic idea is that you have to do a bunch of testing in the lab, then probably a bunch in animals, then finally a bunch in human clinical trials, then you can actually market the device to the public.

Neuralink is in the 'animal testing' phase, and it sounds like they're likely to start human testing soon.

Note that once they've gotten a device approved for humans, that doesn't mean they will stop testing on animals. There will likely be improvements to the device, new protocols, etc. that will necessitate continued testing as new features are brought to market.

Re: Monkey MindPong

#265

Post by natosaichek »

anonytrary wrote: post #115
yurielt wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>When the electrodes are inside the brain and thus in the cranium, they are effectively protected from outside EM activity since they're in an effective Faraday cage, so your signal has much higher fidelity. Pretty much this on a different and somehow related note I would still try to check if the algorithm does not just trick us into thinking that it is doing what the monkey wants it would be nice if they post some…

True, the post-processing algorithm could just be doing a randomish walk towards the answer, but I highly doubt that is what's happening. 2D cursor movement is well understood to be within the realm of possibility for EEG, so I imagine it is actually much easier with an in-vivo device. From what I understand, this is entirely supervised learning. The monkey is "telling" the device what neural pattern corresponds to m…

the chip is implanted in the motor cortex, I believe, so the training consisted of rewarding the monkey for moving the cursor to a target.

After the monkey has played the game a bunch, you can correlate the neuron firings generating motor signals to the arm with the motion of the cursor on the screen. Later, the monkey's arm need not actually move the joystick.

The hippocampus is pretty deep in the brain, and the Neuralink surgery can't go deeper than a centimeter or two.

Re: Monkey MindPong

#267

Post by natosaichek »

nexuist wrote: post #145
throwaway743 wrote: post #54

As this evolves and inevitably becomes an internet connected communication device, how will it impact the labor market?

Data entry will probably be obliterated as you will just be able to insert rows into databases or spreadsheets in a few milliseconds rather than needing to type out entries from papers or receipts. There are already ML solutions to this but none are as perfect as a human brain that can correctly decode arbitrary formatting. Keyboards and mice will be phased out very quickly since you can just thought type, so the com…

I think you're overestimating the speed at which these changes will happen. It will likely be ~a decade before the first non-paralyzed person uses this device. It'll take many more decades before they're widely available, much less widely installed.

Re: Monkey MindPong

#268

Post by HKH2 »

RobertoG wrote: post #246
vsareto wrote: post #231

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think we necessarily have to sacrifice something. We learn new skills and knowledge all the time. Using the new limb could be a skill. Maybe it's not as dexterous as the motor cortex and real hands at first, but there might be some benefits over natural hands.

I think that you sacrifice something when you learn a new skill. The brain have a finite capacity and it just forget not used facts or skills, and the reason it's forgetting is because it's always learning. For instance, I'm learning German and I can feel how is messing with my English, specially with the spelling (English is not my first language).

I think memory retention has more to do with simplicity / emotional consistency.

The new skill you learn may reinforce existing areas if its components are transferrable. Also, I see schemas as compression in the brain; eidetic memory shows how much some brains are capable of.

Forgetting is very good for clarification. I think your example suggests that your spelling in English hasn't been established deeply enough; I understand why you might have an adverse reaction to learning it though (German spelling is far more reasonable).

Re: Monkey MindPong

#270

Post by neolog »

natosaichek wrote: post #264
neolog wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It's legally prohibited until a certain amount of animal testing has been performed. Link?

You have to conduct testing to show that the device is safe and effective before you can begin marketing it. https://www.fda.gov/medical-devices/premarket-approval-pma/p... If you've never gone through the process of bringing a medical device to market, well, I'm not sure there's an easy FAQ that will answer your scepticism. But the basic idea is that you have to do a bunch of testing in the lab, then probably a bunc…

Nice link, thanks.

Relevant section:

> Among the types of evidence that may be required, when appropriate, to determine that there is reasonable assurance that a device is safe are investigations using laboratory animals, investigations involving human subjects, and nonclinical investigations including in vitro studies.

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