Elon Musk claims brain microchip has allowed monkey to "control a computer"

Isobel Asher Hamilton
Business Insider

Elon Musk took his colleagues by surprise with an unplanned announcement at a presentation by his secretive neurotechnology company, Neuralink, on Tuesday. 

Musk cofounded Neuralink in 2016. Its goal is to create a chip that could enable a "brain-computer interface." And according to Musk, the company has already had some success — with monkeys.

During the 90-minute event, Musk and various senior staffers at Neuralink presented the company's ambition to design a chip capable of being implanted in the human brain that could receive and transmit signals to the organ. The near-term goal would be to treat various serious brain disorders, such as Alzheimer's and Parkinson's disease, although ultimately Musk's ambition is to achieve "symbiosis with artificial intelligence." 

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Zombie Science: Researchers Kept the Brains of Decapitated Pigs Alive For 36 Hours

Dagny Taggart
The Organic Prepper

Scientists seem to be crossing a lot of boundaries as of late, which begs the question: Just because they can do something, does it mean they should?

Advances in brain-related technology are reaching dystopian levels. Scientists recently developed the ability to predict our choices before we are consciously aware of them, and can now translate people’s thoughts into speech. Smart chips that will create super-intelligent humans are in development, and China is mining data from the brains of citizens.

While there are legitimate uses for some of this technology, it doesn’t take much stretch of the imagination to realize that much of it could also be used for nefarious purposes. 

Are scientists taking some research too far?

 

Developments in artificial intelligence are both fascinating and terrifying, but they pale in comparison to a recent discovery in neuroscience.

This headline caught my attention a few days ago:

Yale Scientists Kept Decapitated Pigs’ Brains Alive for 36 Hours

That article goes on to explain the study:

In March 2018, Yale neuroscientist Nenad Sestan shared a remarkable bit of news with his peers at a National Institutes of Health (NIH) meeting: he was able to keep pigs’ brains “alive” outside their bodies for up to 36 hours.
The news quickly made its way from that meeting to the media. And now, more than a year later, the details of the radical study have finally been published in the highly respected journal Nature, confirming that what sounded initially like science-fiction was actually sound science — and raising startling questions about what it really means to be “dead.” (source)

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Gene-edited farm animals are on their way

BBC News

Scientists have created pigs that are immune to one of the world's costliest livestock diseases.

The team edited the animals' DNA to make them resist the deadly respiratory disease known as PRRS - a move that could prevent billions of pounds in losses each year.

However, consumers have traditionally been reluctant to eat genetically altered animals and crops.

This poses a significant barrier to farmers owning gene-edited pigs.

And because genome, or gene, editing (GE) is relatively new, the absence of regulation currently prevents their sale anyway.

GE is different to the more widely used technology of genetic modification. The former involves the precise alteration of an organism's DNA, while the latter is characterised by the introduction of foreign genetic sequences into another living thing.

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‘Big as cats’: Huge rats flood Swedish city as authorities urge people to keep children indoors

RT 

A Swedish city is battling a merciless enemy, rats 'the size of cats', prompting authorities to call on residents to keep doors and windows closed and pre-schoolchildren inside during breaks. 

"There aren't the normal rats you see in the forest. They're as big as cats," Benny Sagmo from the planning office of Sundsvall city in northern Sweden, explained to the national TT news agency.

The rats have already spread out towards a residential area, according to Sagmo. "If we don't put a stop to it, they can get bigger and bigger…Those who live there can't even have their front doors or balcony doors open. I've told pest control that we're going all in!” he added.

Residents were told to keep doors and windows closed to prevent rats from getting access to food. They were also told to avoid having food for pets outdoors.

“Remember a rat can fit through a hole that is only 20 millimeters - a five-krone coin!” the warning from the city said. 

In the meantime, local Trädet preschool has temporarily banned children from eating or taking their naps outside. "I decided that the children should sleep inside, because we can't risk rats jumping into the pushchairs," headteacher Mia Löfgren told SVT Västernorrland. 

The majority of rats were spotted in Johannedal area of the city. The authorities suggest that the rats may come from the near-by recycling center which is in the process of moving, meaning that the rats' habitat is disappearing.

Your chicken is about to get more full of feces

The Guardian

Most chickens spend the bulk of their short lives covered or standing in feces, ... and the way in which they are dispatched in the modern era is so sordid that farm states are actually passing laws to keep you from ever bearing witness to the slaughter.

The one small hope for human health has been that the US Department of Agriculture has inspectors to watch over [chicken] processing plants and make sure we don't eat sick chickens or chickens covered in their own feces as they make their way through the processing plant. That is, it's been the one hope until now.

The USDA is moving toward final approval of a rule that would replace most government inspectors with untrained company employees, and to allow companies to slaughter chickens at a much faster rate. The rule is called the "Modernization of Poultry Slaughter Inspection", but advocates like the Center for Food Safety and Food and Water Watch are calling it the "Filthy Chicken Rule". "It's really letting the fox guard the chicken coop", says Tony Corbo of Food and Water Watch. And there are already plenty of problems.

The rule comes in the midst of a years-long increase in the number of food-born illnesses, driven in part by a shortage of government inspectors. Salmonella "is estimated to cause 1.2 million illnesses in the United States, with about 23,000 hospitalizations and 450 deaths" each year, according to a recent report by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

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Earth May Be in Early Days of 6th Mass Extinction

Live Science

Earth may be in the early stages of a sixth mass extinction, an international team of scientists says.

Animals and plants are threatened. More than 320 land vertebrates have gone extinct since 1500, the researchers said. The world's remaining animals with backbones are 25 percent less abundant than in 1500— a trend also seen in invertebrate animals, such as crustaceans, worms and butterflies, the scientists reported.

The previous mass extinction, which wiped out the dinosaurs, happened about 65 million years ago, likely from a catastrophic asteroid that collided with Earth. In contrast, the looming sixth mass extinction is linked to human activity, Rodolfo Dirzo, a professor of biology at Stanford University in California, said in a statement. Dirzo is the lead author of the new review of past research on the topic, which suggests Earth is in the early days of this sixth mass extinction. 

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How Technology is Like Bug Sex: Supernormal Stimuli

Comment: Re-blogged from 2013.

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This week, thousands of people swarmed the annual Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas. Looking from above, the scene resembled an insect infestation of scampering masses in a hive of the latest must-haves.

When considering our complex relationship with technology, perhaps it is useful to reflect upon the plight of one particular bug, the male julodimorpha beetle, who like us at times, can’t get enough of a bad thing. His misplaced desire is so powerful that it threatens the survival of his species.

While in flight, the male scans the dry ground of the Australian outback, looking for love. He seeks out the largest, reddest female he can find because these two traits, size and color, impart instinctual cues about the genetic fitness of his mate. Suddenly, the sight of his dream girl stops him mid-air. He composes himself and approaches the sultry beauty.

But the male of the species is not known for subtlety. Genitalia erect, he is ready for action and begins his lovemaking as soon as he lands on her. But his rude advances are rebuffed. However, he is determined to satisfy her, whether she is willing or not. He remains faithful, even as other suitable females pass him by. He wants only the biggest, the reddest and therefore, the most attractive female.

Undeterred, he keeps humping until either the sun bakes him to a crisp or the Australian Tyrant Ants cover his body and begin dismembering him limb from limb. Finally, he dies, never knowing that he unsuccessfully tried to impregnate a ravishingly beautiful bottle of beer.

A julodimorpha beetle romances a discarded beer bottle.

Supernormal Stimuli

 

To the julodimorpha beetle, the beer bottle’s size, hue, and dimpled bottom are an accentuated embodiment of female allure. His story of fatal attraction is tragic, but it is not uncommon. The phenomenon is known as “supernormal stimuli,” a term coined in the 1930s by the Dutch Nobel laureate Niko Tinbergen, to describe exaggerated features, which appeal to an animal’s evolutionary instincts but elicits stronger responses than the real thing. The behavior is seen across many species, most notably, our own.

Tinbergen experimented with small songbirds who chose to sit on large fake eggs rather than their own brood. He saw male stickleback fish attack redder decoys more ferociously than they would real invaders. He also observed some animals who regularly deceive others with the technique. For example, the cuckoo bird is known for laying her eggs in different species’ nests, confident her slightly larger and brighter-colored young will spark instinctual cues to fool the host bird. The unsuspecting mother will nourish the larger cuckoo chick, thinking it is the biggest and therefore healthiest of her brood, meanwhile her own offspring starve to death.

We’re Cuckoos Too

 

Before mocking the gullibility of beetles, birds and fish, consider our own weakness for the things we perceive to be better than the real thing. Society and technology have evolved much faster than our instincts, leaving us vulnerable to the same kinds of adverse influences. But unlike lower animals duped by parasitic species, humans sell supernormal stimulus to each other for a profit.

Harvard psychologist Deirdre Barrett asserts that the technique influences our actions just as much as it does that of other animals. Television and movies portray juiced-up versions of relationships, allowing us to experience heightened emotion, connection and excitement, without all the effort of actually, you know, doing anything.

We’re captivated by video games which provide more exhilarating and purpose-driven versions of life. Dolls, anime characters and other objects of accentuated cuteness — think Hello Kitty and Precious Moments — use biological markers of natal helplessness like large eyes, flat noses, and large heads to entice children and grownups alike to purchase and care for them. Fast food is spiked with extraordinary quantities of sugar and fat, both extremely rare in nature, but also extremely delicious.

But perhaps the most common supernormal stimuli comes piped onto our screens and more recently, into our pockets, via our various digital devices. Our species’ beer bottle to hump seems to be our hunger for simulated sexual stimulation. The illusions created by flickering light on a screen are no more real than the beer bottle is to the beetle, yet digital pornography is a multi-billion dollar industry, which up until last year, timed its own industry convention to coincide with C.E.S.

Our penchant for making pleasurable things even better is nothing new. Some of the world’s oldest works of art provide evidence for the ancient appeal of supernormal stimuli. The Venus of Willendorf, estimated to have been carved from limestone some 25,000 years ago, depicts a female figure with exaggerated features including a detailed vulva and breasts large enough to make even today’s proportionally-enhanced porn stars blush. Historians theorize that the figure is the first in a long line of objects meant to capture the eye and arouse our desires. The creator of the Venus of Willendorf was not only one of the world’s first artisans, he was also among the first marketers.

The Mother of All Stimuli

 

But ever since cavemen began their naughty cave carving, there have been counterbalances to the effects of supernormal stimuli, which separate us from easily-fooled animals. Whereas julodimorpha beetles fornicate with their beloved beer bottle until death, humans quickly wise-up, get bored and move on.
Our brains come pre-installed with a piece of mental software which makes us tire of the old and seek out the new. It’s called “hedonic adaptation,” and it is the reason why lottery winners and paraplegics tend to revert to the same levels of happiness they felt before their respective life-changing events.

We adapt to our situation and our attraction to superficial features like breast size, sugar content, or screen resolution, fades when the object(s) of our desire become commonplace. We’re in love with our latest i-thing for a while, but soon realize it’s just another addition in our growing collection of future trash. Superficial traits may draw us in, but on their own, they lose their appeal.

However, our tendency to quickly adapt leaves us vulnerable to the one supernormal stimuli we find hardest to resist. Though we may cringe at the plight of the julodimorpha beetle or the host of the cuckoo bird’s egg, we are just as mesmerized by one particular traits we find equally enticing. It is why we line-up in droves at C.E.S., Apple stores and movie theaters and it is the stimuli embedded in the stories we tell and the games we play. The ultimate supernormal stimuli, as far as our species is concerned, is novelty.

Our insatiable curiosity is perhaps humanity’s greatest virtue, but it is also the source of many of our weaknesses. Pornography addicts need increasingly stimulating imagery to reach climax, spending hours searching for just the right titillation. Compulsive gamblers must take bigger risks, and incur bigger losses, to get the same fix. These are of course extreme examples, but they illustrate how we are all, to some degree, drawn to the insatiable enchantment of “more”. The new, new thing attracts us because of its mysterious potential, not its rationalized value.

Our salvation, as Dr. Barrett writes, comes from understanding. “Once we recognize how supernormal stimuli operate, we can craft new approaches to modern predicaments. Humans have one stupendous advantage over Tinbergen’s birds — a giant brain. This gives us the unique ability to exercise self-control, override instincts that lead us astray, and extricate ourselves from civilization’s gaudy traps.” Indeed, we begin to free ourselves from the pull of supernormal stimulus when we recognize it as such.

Spiritual Symbol of Persistence...

Don't you just feel like this some days?

via Boing Boing

Coping: With Dangerous Knowledge

Urban Survival

(Tacoma, WA)  "Poor is the student who does not better his teacher," began my son's explanation.  I have shared little  bits of the thinking which has gone into my book "Victims of Process: How Unwritten Recipes Run People's Lives" with my kids and George II in particular.

One of the things I taught him early-on was that process trumps just about everything if you can just find the right authority lever to pull.

As an example, when he was in high school, and for some reason, or other, he decided to order pizza for his whole class at one of the high schools in the Kirkland/Juanita area east of Seattle.

This was many years back, but the long and short of it was that his pizza were seized by the teachers - who proclaimed there was "no eating in study hall."

Worse, once confiscated, the teachers then went into the student lounge and ate George's pizzas!

George was furious, and upon learning the details of the incident, so was I.  But I thought "Gee, what a wonderful teaching moment about how "authority" behaves when it meets with "process."

So the school district was contacted in a formal way, and a copy of any regulation or administrative document, duly authorized by the superintendant and reviewed by the district's legal office, under which the pizzas were seized was requested.

We then asked for (and in a very formal way, with a cc: to my then counsel) where the district rules were regarding the conversion to personal use or consumption, the pizzas which at the time had set G2 back around $48 dollars if memory serves me.

As you might expect, there was nothing written and "approved" which authorized the confiscation of food from school kids, and worse for the teachers, there was nothing authorizing them to eat their ill-gotten gains.

After a short interval (with lawyer and press conference in the wings) George II quickly got his money refunded by the teachers, and thereafter had a miserable time in school - which resulted in his later dropping out and going the GED route and the on into emergency medicine via a circuitous route.

But the main thing was it demonstrated how people will often act as though they have authority even though, when real authority comes a calling, they don't and in turn can be "taken down" for exceeding their limited powers.

-- Fast forward to dinner and my son telling us about going shopping with Gary, his dachshund.

He explained that he got to take his dog anywhere we wanted because he was a "service dog".

But wait!  Didn't people question a Dachshund as a service dog?

Well, yes, of course.  But he had made up a fictitious organization which gave dogs to people with this particular kind of mental dysfunction issue, and thus, were entitled to a service dog.

Does everyone buy it?

No, of course not.  Until, that is, he gets out the "service dog card" which he made up, complete with an elaborate hologram built into the obviously commercial-grade card which included a registration number for the dog!

"Poor is the student, Dad..."

Yeah, yeah, I'm getting that.

I made a note to share this as a fine example of simply defining the authority hierarchy, figuring out what its internal rule-set is, and then simply acquiring the right symbols which then give one authority to use as they see fit.

Scary?  Gary the dog is extraordinarily trained, and no, he doesn't go into restaurants, G2 doesn't overplay his hand,  but it provides an ongoing study and insight into how people lay down to symbols as simple and uncomplicated as a laminated card with something fictitious but very official-looking on it and with a dandy hologram.  Detail and execution counts.

Works for uniformed services and various other authorities, too, so in the larger context,  all G2 did was simply leapfrog to his own ends using the heavily programmed "card symbol acceptance gene" which humans have been bred to respect using but which is readily apparent using the  "reduced instruction set thinking" process perpetrated by those on the marketing high ground.  In other words, those with tax dollars to make up and buy symbols.

Is this bad or dangerous?  I'm not aware of any laws against "Impersonating a fictitious organization..."

Or, is it a quiet and subtle use of programmed acceptance of authority to exercise a slightly higher level of personal freedom?

The teacher needs to think on this one for a while...uppity student and all.

U.S. Soldiers torturing a sheep [Warning: Graphic and very Disturbing]

Just another normal day for Uncle Sam....Why should we be surprised? If the US military aren't standing by and watching torture take place many US soldiers are gleefully murdering civilians as official policy or perhaps for a bit of sport.  So, torturing defenceless animals? It's all part of the fun for these people. And standing around watching this disgusting spectacle is just as bad.  A timely metaphor indeed...

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Ethical rules needed to curb 'Frankenstein-like experiments' on animals

Telegraph

A new report into experiments which transplant human cells into animals for medical purposes said scientists may not be far from giving apes the ability to think and talk like humans. 

Concerns about the creation of talking apes should be taken seriously along with "what one might call the 'Frankenstein fear' that the medical research which creates 'humanised' animals is going to generate monsters", it was claimed. 

A regulatory body is needed to closely monitor any experiments that risk creating animals with human-like consciousness, spawning hybrid human-animal embryos, or giving animals any appearance or behavioural traits that too closely resemble humans, the report said.

Scientists would, for example, be prevented from replacing a large number of an ape's brain with human cells – as has already been done in simpler animals like mice – until much more is known about the potential results. 

Under the new guidelines the power to regulate tests on animals containing human material would be transferred to a body with wider responsibility for animal testing within the Home Office.[...]

The Emotional Lives of Animals

March 2, 2011,  

Yes! Magazine

Scientific research shows that many animals are very intelligent and have sensory and motor abilities that dwarf ours. Dogs are able to detect diseases such as cancer and diabetes and warn humans of impending heart attacks and strokes. Elephants, whales, hippopotamuses, giraffes, and alligators use low-frequency sounds to communicate over long distances, often miles; and bats, dolphins, whales, frogs, and various rodents use high-frequency sounds to find food, communicate with others, and navigate.  

Many animals also display wide-ranging emotions, including joy, happiness, empathy, compassion, grief, and even resentment and embarrassment. Many animals display profound grief at the loss or absence of a relative or companion. Do animals marvel at their surroundings, have a sense of awe when they see a rainbow, or wonder where lightning comes from? Sometimes a chimpanzee, usually an adult male, will dance at a waterfall with total abandon. Ravens and many other animals live by social norms that favor fairness and justice. And outside of Buenos Aires, Argentina, a dog rescued an abandoned baby by placing him safely among her own newborn puppies. Amazingly, the dog carried the baby about 150 feet to where her puppies lay after discovering the baby covered by a rag in a field.