Elon Musk says no primates died as a result of Neuralink’s implants. A WIRED investigation now reveals the grisly specifics of their deaths as US authorities have been asked to investigate Musk’s claims.
Staff observed that though she was uncomfortable, picking and pulling at her implant until it bled, she would often lie at the foot of her cage and spend time holding hands with her roommate.
That is just incredibly sad. Those poor animals suffering for that megalomaniacs ego.
Although they were allegedly not treated according to laws, these animals suffered so future human trials can be conducted safely, not because of Musks ego.
Trials for what? Musk’s implant isn’t new or revolutionary this research has been going on for awhile. But because some egotistical asshole wants to do it people are like wow look at that.
Although they were allegedly not treated according to laws, these animals suffered so future human trials can be conducted safely, not because of Musks ego.
What a noble sacrifice they were physically forced to make, locked away in cages and hidden from the public eye. /s.
While we don’t know exactly what goes on in the minds of animals, we don’t need some fucked up, transhumanist vanity project to see that animals have pain, fear, trauma and self-preservation responses that are comparable to ours.
It’s no more ethical to torture animals in the name of bullshit luxury items then it is to torture children, but it’s just as easy to hand wave away that cruelty by claiming “oh their emotions aren’t as complex as ours and maybe all that screaming and crying and clawing at their face is just how they let other children know they’re having a good time”.
If you’re casually convinced it’s all worth it, you can fucking volunteer. Maybe there’s valuable discoveries to be made by testing what happens when apologism and “allegedly” is forces sideways down someone’s piss hole.
They still didn’t need to kill so many monkeys for that. Clearly taking the “move fast and break things” approach, leading to 1500 monkeys dead.
Entirely unethical. That choice is for musks ego.
It isn’t worth it. This technology asks far too much.
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A chip in our brain is not necessary enough for animals to be literally sacrificed for “future human trials”
Go back to farming dogecoin or some shit
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Musk first acknowledged the deaths of the macaques on September 10 in a reply to a user on his social networking app X (formerly Twitter). He denied that any of the deaths were “a result of a Neuralink implant” and said the researchers had taken care to select subjects who were already “close to death.” Relatedly, in a presentation last fall Musk claimed that Neuralink’s animal testing was never “exploratory,” but was instead conducted to confirm fully formed scientific hypotheses. “We are extremely careful,” he said.
Public records reviewed by WIRED, and interviews conducted with a former Neuralink employee and a current researcher at the University of California, Davis primate center, paint a wholly different picture of Neuralink’s animal research. The documents include veterinary records, first made public last year, that contain gruesome portrayals of suffering reportedly endured by as many as a dozen of Neuralink’s primate subjects, all of whom needed to be euthanized. These records could serve as the basis for any potential SEC probe into Musk’s comments about Neuralink, which has faced multiple federal investigations as the company moves toward its goal of releasing the first commercially available brain-computer interface for humans.
The letters to the SEC come from the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine, a nonprofit striving to abolish live animal testing. The group claims that Musk’s comments about the primate deaths were misleading, that he knew them “to be false,” and that investors deserve to hear the truth about the safety, “and thus the marketability,” of Neuralink’s speculative product.
“They are claiming they are going to put a safe device on the market, and that’s why you should invest,” Ryan Merkley, who leads the Physicians Committee’s research into animal-testing alternatives, tells WIRED. “And we see his lie as a way to whitewash what happened in these exploratory studies.”
For example, in an experimental surgery that took place in December 2019, performed to determine the “survivability” of an implant, an internal part of the device “broke off” while being implanted. Overnight, researchers observed the monkey, identified only as “Animal 20” by UC Davis, scratching at the surgical site, which emitted a bloody discharge, and yanking on a connector that eventually dislodged part of the device. A surgery to repair the issue was carried out the following day, yet fungal and bacterial infections took root. Vet records note that neither infection was likely to be cleared, in part because the implant was covering the infected area. The monkey was euthanized on January 6, 2020.
Additional veterinary reports show the condition of a female monkey called “Animal 15” during the months leading up to her death in March 2019. Days after her implant surgery, she began to press her head against the floor for no apparent reason; a symptom of pain or infection, the records say. Staff observed that though she was uncomfortable, picking and pulling at her implant until it bled, she would often lie at the foot of her cage and spend time holding hands with her roommate.
Animal 15 began to lose coordination, and staff observed that she would shake uncontrollably when she saw lab workers. Her condition deteriorated for months until the staff finally euthanized her. A necropsy report indicates that she had bleeding in her brain and that the Neuralink implants left parts of her cerebral cortex “focally tattered.”
Yet another monkey, Animal 22, was euthanized in March 2020 after his cranial implant became loose. A necropsy report revealed that two of the screws securing the implant to the skull loosened to the extent that they “could easily be lifted out.” The necropsy for Animal 22 clearly states that “the failure of this implant can be considered purely mechanical and not exacerbated by infection.” If true, this would appear to directly contradict Musk’s statement that no monkeys died as a result of Neuralink’s chips.
Jesus. Fucking. Christ. On. A. Pike.
That’s horror novel levels of disgusting.
Let fucking Musk be the next one to be chipped so he can prove how safe and comfortable it is
The way humans treat animals and the natural world in general — scientific and medical experiments, factory farming, ecological destruction, pollution — it’s all one planetary scale horror story.
As if humans treated other humans better when they can.
Animal 15 began to lose coordination, and staff observed that she would shake uncontrollably when she saw lab workers
Jesus fucking christ. That isn’t losing coordination. That is being terrified of these people for what they did to her.
she would often lie at the foot of her cage and spend time holding hands with her roommate.
She knew she was fucked and was getting comfort from those closest.
I’m getting High Evolutionary from Guardians of the Galaxy 2 vibes here. These animals acted like his experiments.
Or the movie was based on real life. Animals aren’t as dumb as we pretend. Other mammals are just that: mammals. The same as us. Mammals have the same feelings as us, the same emotions, the same fundamental chemical reactions, the same socialization. We just have big brains and written language to amplify basic mammalian traits.
Used to work for this asshole. He’s just as much as a hack as Elizabeth Holmes.
Makes sense. You have to be that to become a tech celebrity among elites, competence and intelligence are not things they respect, it’s actually a principal part of their worldview that competence and intelligence are for servants or simpletons, and real apex predator is, well, that kind of hack. They just won’t believe that you are really able to achieve something if you are not.
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Her personally? Not that we know.
But did people die because of the massive blood testing fraud that she engaged in where people didn’t get medical care when they should have because they were getting back false negatives and faulty tests were being used to determine things like the proper doses of potentially dangerous medications like Warfarin? Almost certainly.
You know you’re a great guy doing an ethical thing when lab animals quiver in terror at the sight of you.
TBF, many dogs quiver when you try to wash them. They are afraid and that’s it. They don’t like that much water, and a bath, etc.
This case it’s different, of course.
what really confuses me is how the FDA approves this without a few more years of animal testing and protocol refinement.
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so u’re implying there’s potential corruption? or is there a scenario things are still legal but his (or his people’s) influence is somehow large enough to push it to be approved?
I really wonder if the FDA publishes the reviews and also the names of the reviewers. The latter may be a stretch and potentially abusive. But the former, if available, might make it easier for outside scientists to further inspect.
The people willing to have this implanted do not have brains. Therefore it is safe.
lol I know you’re kidding, but there’s implication of those willing to get things implanted. Society seems to run on hype nowadays. Look at AI and how fast people are jumping on board with trying it, sometimes out of FOMO. Not to say there’s no merit, but if that FOMO feeling spreads real quick, without proper guardrails, Musk will eventually get what he wants.
I don’t think many people will get elective brain surgery out of hype. Even if they would they can’t afford it. You mention AI but chatgpt 4.0 is $20 bucks a month. Cost is a big factor in trends.
Also I am not sure about your qualifier of “nowadays”. Hype isn’t new.
I think a big aspect is going to be disability. I don’t think any able bodied people are going to be rushing to get this in their skull, but if I had full body paralysis? Fuck it, why not. Well, aside from then supporting these horrible practices and essentially torture on those poor monkeys…
Wait til it does something that employers want. The issue is that this kind of thing can become de facto mandatory.
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He wants Republicans to win so they’ll gut regulations.
Animal 15 began to lose coordination, and staff observed that she would shake uncontrollably when she saw lab workers.
These are conscious beings. Imagine being trapped in a lab where the next time you wake up you might not have full motor function?
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Don’t worry, in a few years, it’ll be humans who can barely make rent on their coffin apartments.
That’s heartbreaking. Imagine being trapped in a experimentation room with no escape. Everday’s just hell.
Animal 15 began to lose coordination, and staff observed that she would shake uncontrollably when she saw lab workers.
i hate that i can read this
I question the humanity of anyone who can read that and not be upset.
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Sentient, maybe some limited level of sapience, but not conscious as far as we understand the term
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I literally said “as far as we understand the term.” Sentience, sapience, and consciousness are not interchangable terms; they have vastly different meanings.
We as humans and as we have defined the terms do not label any other species as conscious as we currently understand the term. Consciousness is currently a uniquely human trait. It’s not my decision, it’s just what we know and how we’ve labeled things.
‘I don’t understand so it doesn’t exist’
I literally said “as far as we understand the term.” We as humans and as we define the term. They do not have consciousness based on what we currently know, and there’s very little evidence that they do based on what experiments we are able to conduct. I’m not saying they unequivocally don’t, all I’m saying is as we currently understand the term they do not.
At this point, who trusts musk enough to let him have control of their brain?
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Your mistake is assuming the people who trust Musk are using their brain.
Kanye
I mean, the same guy who’s other company’s car had a tendency to explode or run into people and things doesn’t instill confidence in me. Also, from a tech standpoint, there’s a lot of mistakes happening that seem to be happening a lot more since COVID.
This is nightmare fuel. Why is this allowed ?
One word: money
Yep, I kinda expect this kind of utilitarian villainy from Musk. But, seeing this happen at UC Davis is an eye opening view of just how corrupted by funding schemes US research institutes are becoming.
This is what happens when university leadership positions are filled with nothing but econ and business “educators”.
It’s america as a whole though. Everything has is berning pushed to private industry. America can’t even launch anything into space without the help of a deranged billionaire. America has fallen so hard.
Yeah, it’s real unfortunate. I work for a university hospital, who’s CEO is always supposed to be a physician. Up until about ten years ago it seemed to help the balance of public good against financial reward. Then we started to see a slew of physicians who went back to school for business management getting hired for upper management.
He is so fucked over this, animal experimentation is incredibly tightly regulated. primates even more so.
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We can only hope he pays for this. Or anything else he’s done.
Consequences for the rich in America lol
Didn’t they just get FDA approval for human testing on this stuff?
They did!
If you compare the regulations in the US to Europe, it’s not tightly regulated at all lol
Example?
Unregulated God complex, and sickening leaves of wealth surely that can’t become harmful in any way.
It’s a feature, not a bug.
This is how we create Mojo Jojo on accident
Wasn’t that the explicit goal!?
Unfortunately as far as I know it is pretty standard for monkeys used to test brain interfaces to eventually get infected because of it and have to be put down.
I’m not sure whether the same problems are as common in humans; humans are much less likely to e.g. yank on the implant, especially if the reason they have an implant is to work around some kind of paralysis. And humans are allowed drugs that animals are not.
This is messed up. It’s like something out of a sci-fi horror film. Have to hope no one is stupid enough to put a computer chip in their brains.
You know elon will try no matter what.
True…
Wishful thinking there but you have to know Elon fuckboys will definitely sign the fuck up for this
Imagine needing anti-virus for your brain.
The difference in comments here is between those who show compassion for the suffering of animals - and, by extension, humans - versus those who do not and view this as merely political theater in their unlimited support of Elon.
I think it’s a bit more complicated than that. This could pave de way to getting rid of a lot of handicaps and diseases, not to mention fdvr. I care about monkeys, I just care more about paraplegics for instance.
I think that we as humans put ourselves above all other animals a lot. But as animals with a higher level of awareness, I feel that we have a responsibility to treat all other animals with respect.
If someone thinks it’s justified to experiment on animals, I see it as their moral obligation to do everything in their power to minimize the suffering that animal will experience.
Also, if this technology could potentially help with handicaps (big X to doubt moment tbh) I absolutely do not want Elon fucking Musk to be the one who owns the technology, so I hope they hit his company with the book.
That knowledge shouldn’t be gained through the barbaric butchery of helpless animals.The research should at the very least be conducted in a manner that is respectful to the animals.
There is no reason for them to live lives of terror only to die brutally. Considering how much this technology could advance humanity giving them more comfortable and smiling lives during this whole process costs effectively nothing.
“Science cannot move forward without heaps.”
Hey everyone I think it’s a Futurama quote. Stand down red alert.
It is…
Yeah, yesterday the comment was negative because people thought it endorsed animal abuse. I was clarifying it was a quote. Thanks for the backup.
Not at the cost of humanity. Plus, that statement can be recycled to defend all the horrible inventions and experiments in the past.
Yeah by this rhetoric unit 731 was A-ok and did nothing wrong lmao
It’s like the start of a terrifying science fiction movie where things are about to go horribly, horribly wrong.
Clickbait headline, no tldr? That’s a downvote for me dawg.
Literacy is harrrrrd
Ah, so I was wrong. Gotcha.
Can you explain to me why exactly you think the headline should be considered clickbait?
Hmm. Are you asking in good faith, or to dogpile? Anyway, sure; I can explain why.
The Gruesome - clickbait because “if it bleeds it leads.”
Story - words like “story” are often plainly false when the article is a tiny blurb or fluff piece. Thankfully, this article is an actual story. But remember, it’s still bait.
of How - clickbait because it asks a question it doesn’t answer, baiting the headline-reader to click.
Neuralink’s Monkeys - oh, another Elon Musk altar. The press can’t get enough of Musk.
Actually Died - more bleeding leading.Headlines can just be content, rather than a tease. This article title intentionally relays no new info.
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The content of the piece is revealing, but yes the headline is absolutely textbook clickbait
