Not totally surprising, I feel bad for the person who was in a desperate enough situation to become a con man narcissist’s guinea pig.
It looks like we’re learning the lesson we already learned back when Bill Gates tried to mess around with the education system and faceplanted; just because billionaires made a bunch of money selling a fancy toaster they invented or whatever, doesn’t make them experts on anything else.
I’d sooner put a bullet in my head than something Elon Musk had a hand in.
The Gates Foundation has been working in education for over two decades, and still is
And has produced mostly expensive failures which they simply abandoned.
This is because Bill Gates is just a guy who helped cobble together a computer in his garage with his dad’s money, he doesn’t know jack about education and has repeatedly ignored the advice of experts because it wasn’t what he wanted to try.
We place too much virtue on wealth in this country, just because someone has accumulated a lot of wealth doesn’t mean they should be allowed to tinker with our society and try out ideas they had in a dream or w/e.
Instead they should just pay their taxes.
To be fair, that article’s only about one of their education initiatives, and they’ve had many
They mention two, but it’s enough to make the point. There’s no justification for Gates to be at the helm, if he wants to help he can donate money to the groups and institutions that actually know what they’re doing or, as I said, just pay his taxes.
There’s no reason for him to be meddling, his ignorance is actually making the money less effective.
No use of your body is a pretty desperate situation. Before the procedure he had to yell for his parents that he wanted to use the computer, they’d come sit him upright and put a joystick in his mouth, leaving him unable to speak. And he was often very uncomfortable in that position, so he couldn’t do it long. Now, he can use the computer fully laying down, without anyone’s help. The next logical step would be to have some robotic helper arms.
Anyway he can’t shoot himself. He can’t hold a gun or anything else. There’s little reason for this to be about Musk at all other than money. This is the culmination of decades of research from many medical professionals. It’s about a lot more than one person.
It’s 100% about Musk, yes, given his pursuit of tech even if it comes at a human cost. It’s a pattern of his specific companies.
What this situation demonstrates is that Musk is pushing the tech ahead before it’s ready and that the person recieving the implant is simply lucky that that negligence and haste hasn’t left them with brain damage or worse.
No one is saying medical devices shouldn’t be developed to help people, I’m saying Musks tech-cult attitude of “move fast and break stuff” should not apply when human lives and well being are involved.
Nobody is making you get a brain chip. Noland did the research, talked about it with his family, and wanted to proceed in spite of the fully disclosed risks. Bodily autonomy is a fundamental human right - if you want to do something or have something done to your body it’s not the governments place to stop you. Safeguards are necessary, and they do exist. You don’t need laws to make sure everybody has the same risk tolerance as you. I can’t fully imagine what it would be like to have no use of my body and no hope of recovery. But I wouldn’t want people like you or me who aren’t in my shoes deciding what I can and can’t do. Honestly if he wanted to have a lethal injection, I believe he should be allowed to make that decision, but he can’t. I’m happy he was able to make some kind of decision, and regain some autonomy, if only temporarily, and not just be a vegetable head in a bed for the rest of his life.
Again, the person’s desperation is a key here, this technology is targeted at people who are potentially willing to try anything even if it comes with risk.
That isn’t the same sort of consent I have as someone who isn’t paralyzed and just think it’d be cool to control my garage door with my brain or something. I’m not under the same pressure.
If I mix a bunch of laundry chemicals and bill it as a miracle cure for cancer, and then target vulnerable people willing to try anything because they are stage 4, that doesn’t excuse me of my reckless disregard for safety or to use those people as experiments.
Musk’s company wants to get this tech into human beings as quickly as possible even if it’s underdeveloped and potentially unsafe because Musk’s priority is not really about helping people.
Are you suggesting that the FDA gave Neuralink special treatment in the approval process? Or are you suggesting that the government should specifically shut down anything Musk tries to do, like SpaceX?
That or Musk’s org lied, misrepresented their progress or found loop holes in the regulation process, yes.
It’s pretty obvious from its immediate failure that it was not ready.
