Earlier this year, Noland Arbaugh became the first patient to receive a brain chip implanted by Elon Musk’s Neuralink company. The 29-year-old lost control of his limbs after a diving accident eight years ago, but has since gained the ability to move a cursor only with your mind thanks to a device the size of a coin implanted in his skull and brain.
Obviously, technology is not without its dangers, but it also has the potential to profoundly impact lives from people like Arbaugh, giving them novel ways to live independent lives.
At the same time, according to his latest media appearance, Arbaugh noted that The system update is giving you amazing new abilities.
“Basically, I have an aimbot in my head,” Arbaugh explained in an interview, referring to the robots that automatically lock onto their opponents in video games, giving players seemingly superhuman reflexes-. They will probably have different leagues for people like me because it is just not fair. The aiming ability is more precise and faster. Sometimes, it is so good that it moves even before I think it should move. If you think about moving your hand, the signal is basically already sent before you move your hand.
Although games like Call of Duty They are still “too far out of Neuralink’s reach at this time“According to Arbaugh, he has successfully played many other games, including Civilization VI and Mario Kart. “In the next few years, I think I’ll be able to play anything that other people play. I hope to play Halo someday, too,” Arbaugh added.
Despite the abundance of gaming applications, their experience with the brain-computer interface has not been entirely smooth. In early This year, he started losing control of the cursor. Neuralink discovered that some of the threads inserted into his motor cortex had begun to retract over time, possibly due to air trapped in his skull after surgery.
As a result, the company now hopes to insert the wires, each of which is thinner than a human hair, deeper into the brain of the second volunteer. But in addition to playing video games with almost superhuman reflexes, Arbaugh also reflected on the disadvantages of having hardware installed in your brain.
“People ask me all the time if this can be hacked, and the short answer is yes,” Arbaugh concludes. “But at this point, at least hacking this wouldn’t do much good… It’s possible that You can control the cursor on my screen and make me see strange things, but little more.”