Elon lied about the monkeys — and he shouldn’t be trusted to put his Neuralink chips in human brains.

“They are claiming they are going to put a safe device on the market, and that’s why you should invest,” Ryan Merkley at the Physicians Committee, told Wired. “And we see his lie as a way to whitewash what happened in these exploratory studies.”

Really heartbreaking reading what happened to the monkeys.

People quite rightly think of Elizabeth Holmes as a fraud for making false medical claims about what the Theranos machines could do. So why aren’t Elon’s claims at Neuralink being held to the same level of scrutiny?

https://futurism.com/neoscope/terrible-things-monkeys-neuralink-implants

@technology #Elon #Neuralink #ElonMusk

  • Spzi@lemm.eeEnglish
    59·
    1 year ago

    Headline:

    TERRIBLE THINGS HAPPENED TO MONKEYS AFTER GETTING NEURALINK IMPLANTS, ACCORDING TO VETERINARY RECORDS

    What are these terrible things?

    Up to a dozen monkeys suffered grisly fates after receiving a Neuralink implant, including brain swelling and partial paralysis.

    First is the case of the monkey “Animal 20.” In December 2019, an internal part of the brain implant being inserted into the primate “broke off” during surgery. Later that night, the monkey scratched at the implant site, drawing blood, and yanked on the implant, partially dislodging it. Follow-up surgery discovered that the wound was infected, but that the placement of the implant prevented treatment. The monkey was euthanized the next month.

    Before that, a female monkey designated “Animal 15” began to press her head against the ground after receiving the brain implant, pick at the site until it bled, and eventually lost coordination, shivering when personnel entered the room. Scientists discovered she had brain bleeding, and in March 2019, she too was euthanized.

    The following year, a primate called “Animal 22” was put down in March 2020 after its brain implant became so loose that the screws attaching it to the skull “could easily be lifted out,” according to a necropsy report.

    “The failure of this implant can be considered purely mechanical and not exacerbated by infection,” the necropsy states.

    As Wired notes, that statement alone seemingly contradicts Musk’s claims that no monkeys directly died from Neuralink brain implants.

    And so would the account of an ex-Neuralink employee, who told Wired that Musk’s claims that the monkeys were already terminally ill are “ridiculous,” even a “straight-up fabrication.”

    “We had these monkeys for a year or so before any surgery was performed,” the ex-employee said.

    The testimony of an anonymous scientist conducting research at CNPRC seems to corroborate the ex-employee’s allegations.

    “These are pretty young monkeys,” they told the magazine. “It’s hard to imagine these monkeys, who were not adults, were terminal for some reason.”

    • worldsayshi@lemmy.world
      24·
      1 year ago

      Not only are monkeys as intelligent as small kids. All monkey species are at least a thousand times as rare as humans.

      These experiments sound like they’ve been done by people who don’t know what they’re doing?

      • toy_boat_toy_boat@lemmy.world
        81·
        1 year ago

        Unfortunately, these experiments are being performed by people who know EXACTLY what they’re doing. We’re not in the 1940s any more. Fucking hell. If I had the personal power, I’d gladly rain holy hellfire upon these wholly inexcusable, inexorable, inexcrimentinable human fecal chunks.

    • TehPers@beehaw.orgEnglish
      1·
      1 year ago

      What the hell. I feel bad for reading that, holy crap. That’s some nightmare fuel.