With Kernel, Bryan Johnson also invested millions in the integration of artificial intelligence in the brain

Last week, The Wall Street Journal announced the launch of Neuralink, a medical research company and the new venture of Elon Musk that by implanting electrodes in the brain would allow people to connect with electronic devices, without having to pass by an interface. This way you could load and download thoughts, as if the Brain were a cloud.

This initiative of the creator of Tesla and SpaceX seems to be a pioneer in the field but it is not. There are already competitors in the race to achieve the symbiosis with the machines.

Last year, Bryan Johnson, a Silicon Valley entrepreneur and founder of electronic payments Braintree, created Kernel, basically with the same goals. The startup already has an investment of US $ 100 million to investigate neural connections.

As well as enhancing cognitive (memory) capabilities, Musk and Johnson also want to endneurodegenerative diseases, being able to collect neural data from various regions of the brain opens up a myriad of possibilities.

With a similar project on the way, IBM researchers are developing a chip that can predict when to have an epileptic seizure.

Symbiosis

By implanting electrodes in the brain, people could upload or download their thoughts to a computer, creating a symbiosis between the machine and the person. It may seem like science fiction, but in the not so distant future, and thanks to these projects, this can become a reality.

According to The Wall Street Journal, the first objective of Neuralink is to end neurodegenerative diseases, focusing on the treatment of brain disorders: epilepsy, depression or Parkinson’s.

However, the detection and resolution of pathologies will not be their only function. Already in the future, and if the technology is effective and safe, implants could be used for other purposes, such as to enhance human capabilities. Futuristic theories that will make people’s brains begin to function as a perfect machine, processing and generating information with the same speed that is absorbed.

For the time being, Musk has begun recruiting engineers and scientists such as Max Hodak, founder of Transcriptic, a robotics startup, engineer Vanessa Tolosa, and professors Philip Sabes and Timothy Gardner.

Visionary

Advances in artificial intelligence have attracted Musk for a long time. During the World Government Summit, the creator of Tesla and SpaceX predicted that in the future there will be “a greater merger between biological and artificial intelligence.”

Musk has warned on several occasions, like other experts like Steve Wozniak (Apple co-founder) and Bill Gates (co-founder of Microsoft), about the possible dangers of artificial intelligence. According to some studies, this technology is reaching the brain of the mouse today.

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