Doctors Concerned About Neuralink's First Patient

catculation@lemmy.zip to Technology@lemmy.world – 629 points – Doctors Concerned About Neuralink's First Patient
futurism.com

• Concerns rise as Neuralink fails to provide evidence of brain implant success, raising safety and transparency questions.

• Controversy surrounds Neuralink's lack of data on surgical capabilities and alarming treatment of monkeys with brain implants.

• While Neuralink touts achievements, experts question true innovation and highlight developments in other brain implant projects.

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Imo Musk is going to struggle in this space. He's no stranger to opening companies in highly regulated industries, but the medical device industry is a whole different level. The government can easily prevent him from selling anything if his company isn't forthcoming with data, and if he starts mutilating people, civil courts aren't going to care if they signed a waiver if that waiver was signed based on false expectations built on incomplete or false data by the company

Plus, he likes to pretend he's an expert on the industries of the companies he runs. That's already potentially dangerous with Tesla and Space X, but in this case his hubris is very directly dangerous to the people receiving his services.

The difference is with Tesla and Space X he has actual experts doing the work, with Neuralink he gets the worst of the crop - no successful or ethical medical professional is going to want to work with him on this.

Teslas are already directly dangerous to his customers but our society is numb to traffic violence so people don’t care as much as they should. But “full self-driving” has already killed people.

Edit: removed “a lot” because while I suspect it is true, it remains unproven.

But “full self-driving” false advertising has already killed a lot of people.

Sure, that’s what I was referring to. But I’m realizing not everyone is as aware of the whole story here.

“full self-driving” has already killed a lot of people.

There's only one death linked to FSD beta and even he was driving drunk.

In a recent interview, Rossiter said he believes that von Ohain was using Full Self-Driving, which — if true — would make his death the first known fatality involving Tesla’s most advanced driver-assistance technology

Von Ohain and Rossiter had been drinking, and an autopsy found that von Ohain died with a blood alcohol level of 0.26 — more than three times the legal limit

Source

However there's approximately 40 accidents that have led to serious injury or death due to the use of the less advanced driver assist system "autopilot".

You’re right, I was conflating the two. However, I suspect there are more cases than just this one due to Tesla’s dishonesty and secrecy.

(Why would the human's inebriation level matter if the vehicle is moving autonomously?)

Because it's not autonomous, nor "full self driving". It's a glorified adaptive cruise control. I don't think it's even in the L3 category... (I'm not the biggest fan of the autonomy "levels" classification but it's an ok reference for this).

Tesla would just get up and lie to the public like that?

Agreed. Also while it’s impossible to say in any individual case I suspect people might be more likely to drive while inebriated if they believe the autopilot will be driving for them.

This kind of thinking is why these accidents happen. The goal of autonomous driving is for it to one day be better driver than the best human driver, but this technology is still in its infancy and requires an attentive driver behind the wheel. Even Teslas tell you this when you engage these systems.

Source, please.

Tesla’s secrecy around its safety data makes it hard to do a robust analysis but here’s a decent overview: https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2023/06/10/tesla-autopilot-crashes-elon-musk/

What if we compare that to human related injuries?

I bet more people were killed by other human drivers today. Probably another right now...

I'm not excusing lack of tech safety, but I think there's a double standard not in context.

So I hear what you’re saying—what we really want to measure is deaths avoided versus those caused. But it’s a difficult thing to measure how many people the technology saved. So while I’m cognizant of this issue, I’m not sure how to get around that. That said, the article mentions that Tesla drivers are experiencing much higher rates of collisions than other manufacturers. There could be multiple factors at play here, but I suspect the autopilot (and especially Tesla’s misleading claims around it) is among them.

Also, while there may be an unmeasured benefit in reducing collisions, there may also be an unmeasured cost in inducing more driving. This has not been widely discussed in this debate but I think it is a big problem with self-driving technology that only gets worse as the technology improves.

Yeah, I'm hoping though it progresses to the point that we can reasonably reduce vehicle related incidents.

Between drunk driving, texting, and generally not paying attention, I'd love more people using automated driving if it became statistically safer.

Some people are scared to fly even thought it's statistically safer. They don't want to be the rare happening. Unless Boeing, then check your doors...

Edit, I also agree you can't easily track or correlate things that didn't happen with all the factors here.

That didn’t work out for Elizabeth Holmes either.

She exploited and got rich off rich people though, like SBF, so she went down. Musk exploited and got rich off the working class and apartheid exploitation in SA. So that's ok. He's one of them.

I think the government will be on his side

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Finally some news about the first human trial.

The part about them not issuing regular progress reports since day 1 (a month or so ago) is, how these doctors put it, concerning.

Apart from that, I think jumping from monkeys to human experiments when the success rate is low feels either rush work or some high person in charge decided to go all-or-nothing.

or some high person in charge decided to go all-or-nothing

I don't see what Elon's drug use and increasingly irratic decision-making have to to with this.

Agreed. And seems wild to allow that kind of coercion from powerful people to move into the human body stage without air tight everything.

I think it is unethical to test this technology on anyone who does not consent. It is too invasive and damaging. Our testing framework should be revised for brain interfaces.

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Damn, and no.

Stupid article as it implies that doctors are concerned for a specific reason related to the subject’s health but it’s just background about this shitty experiment and how it can be dangerous. Regardless, I can’t believe someone volunteered for this and am unfortunately expecting documented issues in the future.

Remember how they couldn't get the cyber truck to not rust? Or the bullet proof windows to work? Or how the milage for most Tesla's was impossible, so people thought their cars were broken, and instead of either confessing or fixing the mileage they created an elaborate scheme to cancel appointment so people couldn't get their batteries looked at? These are the people you trusted to put a chip in your brain...

I'm not using it, might as well sacrifice for the good of the many

I think it would be a lot more reasonable to expect undocumented issues. They have a lot to lose and it's controlled by a billionaire. As if they're not going to try to cover it up.

They will try to cover it up for sure. IMO Either it will “silently end” after myriad health issues or there will be big public exposures.

I doubt you'll hear any docs about failures. I think that's what this article is about? I.e. a lack of transparency?

i'd do it for money. Not much to fuck up with my brain

If my option was never move again and this would let me control a computer then I wouldn't care about the risk

The results are in. You now feel as if you are constantly moving. You aren't, but it sure feels that way. Forever.

I'm sure the guy who had a pig heart transplant thought similar. He died less than a year after.

So the gov wants to claim the FDA did not regulate mifepristone hard enough, but this is perfectly fine. What a world.

"The government" doesn't want to argue that. Some idiot politicians do.

The courts gave the idiots an injunction, so while you are right they are not exactly claiming it, they are claiming it is likely true.

And the courts are (a part) of the gvt last time I checked.

Claiming the schizophrenic US govt WANTS anything is dubious. Most of their attention is focused on fighting each other

I love how no one is ever going to start calling it "X" because it's just dumb. It will forever be "X-formerly-Twitter".

That was my thought when I started reading the piece. "Are we just going to call it XFT?"

You know you can just use twitter anyway, right?

Nobody wants to use Twitter.

I've been online since the days of dialup and never signed up for a Twitter account. It's just not worthy of my time

Been here since Europe got flooded with AOL CDs, same.

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I still can't forget the Monkeys.

JFC

Additional veterinary reports show the condition of a female monkey called “Animal 15” during the months leading up to her death in March 2019. Days after her implant surgery, she began to press her head against the floor for no apparent reason; a symptom of pain or infection, the records say. Staff observed that though she was uncomfortable, picking and pulling at her implant until it bled, she would often lie at the foot of her cage and spend time holding hands with her roommate. Animal 15 began to lose coordination, and staff observed that she would shake uncontrollably when she saw lab workers. Her condition deteriorated for months until the staff finally euthanized her. A necropsy report indicates that she had bleeding in her brain and that the Neuralink implants left parts of her cerebral cortex “focally tattered.”

So they fuckin shredded the poor girl's brain.

To think humans cause such pain to other sentient beings due to hubris...

I don't find it shocking in the slightest. Someone like Musk would happily burn everything down if it meant he'd get his own way.

I’m wondering how this got IRB approval. I’ve had to get it before and it’s not easy. From the sounds of everything everyone involved needs to have a lifetime ban on animal or human testing.

Damn... I've heard that it was bad but I've never read it until now...

Wait til you find out about animal testing at large.

Yeah, I wouldn't want monkeylink in my head if it was done by musk's people. I'd rather have an expert neurosurgeon and the ones I know, who work in deep brain stimulation, they wrote off neuralink as bad tech a decade ago.

Writing off a huge research project you know nothing about before it's even started is a clear sign that their opinion is worthless.

Musk has hired incredibly well educated people, I don't blame you for hating him but that doesn't tarnish the quality of anyone else

Educated does not mean skilled.

No but they're also very skilled, look at who's on the team they're incredibly well respected in their fields.

You hate Elon that's fine, it doesn't mean everyone even tangentially related to anything with his name attached is bad.

The subject is hunched over and drooling inside a padded cell, mumbling "we hope this email finds you well", over, and over, and over again...

This is the best summary I could come up with:

Neuralink founder Elon Musk claimed this week that the first human to receive one of his company's heavily scrutinized brain implants was already able to control a mouse cursor with their mind.

"[Neuralink is] only sharing the bits that they want us to know about," Sameer Sheth, a neurosurgeon who specializes in implanted neurotechnology at the Baylor College of Medicine, told Nature.

Leaked documents detailed how the implants resulted in a myriad of grotesque injuries, including rupturing a monkey's brain and causing severe cerebral swelling.

A relevant detail that raises questions about Neuralink's surgical capabilities is another report of a monkey with a botched brain implant.

"A human controlling a cursor is nothing new," Bolu Ajiboye, a brain computer interface researcher at Case Western Reserve University, told Nature.

Meanwhile, other brain implant projects have allowed fully paralyzed patients to communicate through a digital avatar using only their mind, or to control life-changing robotic prosthetics.

The original article contains 480 words, the summary contains 154 words. Saved 68%. I'm a bot and I'm open source!

Does this remind anyone else of Theranos?

Somewhat, but theranos at least didn’t do brain surgery. This is theranos with far higher stakes

I am scered about future. Humanity is developing too quickly, I cant can't caught up.

There is no such thing as too quickly. People went from shitting in wooden outhouses with no electricity to man landing on the moon and harnessing the power of atoms in one life time, things have slowed down considerably since.

And you don't have to get a brain implant, nor will such a thing realistically even be available for decades still.

Of course there's such a thing as too quickly. Plenty of railroad workers died because people didn't realize that there's a huge difference between falling off a horse running ten miles an hour and a train going thirty. How many people got sick because someone thought putting lead in gas was a swell idea? What about Thalidomide? Heck, people thought heroin would cure opium addiction.

Just because people are reckless doesn't mean that it's a good thing.

I'm sure we'll keep racing ahead, but don't confuse activity with progress.

Falling from a horse at 10mph is dangers, falling from any height is dangerous.

We knew lead was poisonous before it was put into petrol, it was chosen because GM could patent it whereas they couldn’t the already known superior additive, ethanol.

We knew about man made climate change over a hundred years ago, it was buried and suppressed for profit.

Thalidomide wasn't tested and sold freely.

Heroine was a good drug for many uses, lack of regulation and care about addiction was the problem. Even today many medications can have adverse effects or cause addiction if not properly used.

These things have nothing to do with the speed of advancement and all to do with deliberate failures. You can advance rapidly and still test and regulate, but obviously thats less likely in a capitalist system that values money over everything.

Sounds to me like we basically agree on the main point and are arguing terms.

People are going to discover/invent new tech; that's a given. The question is how fast it gets out of the lab and into people's hands.

The question is: why don't our governments regulate effectively?

The answer is: money.

The question is why do we let it get out when we know its harmful or that we haven’t even looked into it despite being fully capable of.

Those weren't about speed of technology, it was capitalism being capitalism without being held back by regulation or worker protection.

How many people died designing the Internet? How many died to figure out how to land a rocket booster on a barge? How many people died figuring out mRNA vaccines?

How many people died designing the Internet? How many died to figure out how to land a rocket booster on a barge? How many people died figuring out mRNA vaccines?

A lot of people died designing the internet, because the original digital computers were created as a result of code breaking in WW2 and work done by the defense industry to make better missiles.

Same with space flight. You couldn't have landed that rocket without the V1 and V2 rockets the Nazis dropped on London.

You seem to have some idea that scientific progress can occur in an ivory tower, untouched by base ideas like money or war.

Like it or not, technology grows out of the larger society. If there's capitalism, capitalism will guide what gets built. Anything else is putting the cart before the horse.

Might want to catch a few episodes of this series that deals with the history of technology and how ideas become actual inventions.

https://youtu.be/XetplHcM7aQ

See how I picked specific, more recent examples? Ones where OSHA existed?

That's the difference. You can't just damn the whole tech tree because the primitive precursor came about during WW2.

The turing architecture, which laid the groundwork for everything, wasn't even about war - it came from a man who was aiming far over the horizon, and used code breaking to fund his dream. His dream was a true AI.

Same with the rocket - it wasn't created to kill, it became a tool of death first because that's how it was funded.

We can do technology safely. Capitalism and war are both just incentives to do it recklessly. They also shape the form it takes, usually not for the better

I don't know why you're saying technology is responsible for war deaths either... The war drives the technology, not the other way around. Technology changes society and changes war, but you can have both with stagnant technology. At worst, technology magnifies the scale we act on, but it's not the source.

Technology comes from people who like to push limits. If you give the right type of people the resources they need, they'll create it.

I've watched plenty of YouTube videos about the development of tech. It's interesting, but I prefer the YouTubers who push the limits in their garage... Especially the things that exist but aren't economically viable, like paint that passively cools or diy algae bioreactors

Where did I damn all tech?

I just pointed out that tech doesn't exist in a vacuum.

It doesn't matter how noble the first rocketeers were, their toys ended up as weapons.

The existence of OSHA proves my point; we only got OSHA because things were so bad that workers started forming Unions, and the Unions had the power to force the government to start protecting the workers.

If you actually watched the video you'd see what I am saying.