Forget artificial intelligence. Elon Musk wants you to become a cyborg – Hot Air

posted at 2:21 pm on February 13, 2017 by Jazz Shaw

I suppose that whole idea about make America great again was only going to last just so long. Its been several weeks and were a nation with a critically short attention span so its probably time to start working on a new catchphrase. How about, make human beings great again?

That seems to be what tech genius Elon Musk has in mind with his latest brainstorm. Rather than working on super fast trains or putting people on Mars, the entrepreneur has realized that the one thing truly holding the human race back is human beings. Clearly we have our flaws and shortcomings in terms of everyday physical limitations, but the real roadblock to our success is our poorly functioning brains. Musk has the solution and it involves incorporating some new high-tech gadgets which will allow your gray matter to input and output data at a rate which will hopefully allow you to keep up with the Skynet robots who are sure to be arriving shortly. (CNBC)

Billionaire Elon Musk is known for his futuristic ideas and his latest suggestion might just save us from being irrelevant as artificial intelligence (AI) grows more prominent.

The Tesla and SpaceX CEO said on Monday that humans need to merge with machines to become a sort of cyborg.

Over time I think we will probably see a closer merger of biological intelligence and digital intelligence, Musk told an audience at the World Government Summit in Dubai, where he also launched Tesla in the United Arab Emirates (UAE).

Its mostly about the bandwidth, the speed of the connection between your brain and the digital version of yourself, particularly output.

Yes, I written extensively here about artificial intelligence in the past and its no secret that Im not a fan. Take what you will from the fact that I own my own copy of The Forbin Project on DVD. Smart robots worry me, mainly because I assume that if they are all that intelligent it wouldnt take them long to figure out that we would be fairly easy pickings.

But the subject matter which Elon Musk is dealing with isnt some sort of new artificial brain. Hes talking about the ones inside our heads. These sorts of adaptations, if anything, are even more troubling. This is not to say that Im some sort of technophobe who doesnt want to see mankind benefit from cutting-edge advancements in medical science. There are breakthroughs being made on a regular basis which allow victims of terrible injuries to recover much of their previous normal functionality. I think thats great. Robotic limbs and exoskeletons may someday be improving the lives of people across the globe and not just a few test subjects.

But our brains? That worries me. There is still, even in the 21st century, so much we dont understand about the human brain. What makes it tick? How do we actually store and retrieve data from inside of our minds? How does the brain miraculously repair itself sometimes after traumatic injuries? You can ask a dozen different doctors and come up with nearly as many answers to all of those questions. If we start turning ourselves into computers beginning with the rate at which we process and transfer information, how long before we reach the edge of sacrificing an important part of whatever it is that makes us humans?

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Forget artificial intelligence. Elon Musk wants you to become a cyborg - Hot Air

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