5 ms·

I've seen some amazing prosthetics on the internet, I've been seeing them for decades, but none of them get wide use. They're either all "experimental" or so in

I've seen some amazing prosthetics on the internet, I've been seeing them for decades, but none of them get wide use. They're either all "experimental" or so insanely expensive that nobody can get them. These kinds of articles can make us feel good about science and hopeful about our future, but the reality is that the people who need these things are basically never going to have one or anything close to one.

Dig1t 3y ago
You’re damned if you do and you’re damned if you don’t. Look how much hatred there is for Neuralink. A company actually trying to productize and bring to market a device that will allow quadriplegic people to move and walk again, which could restore life for so many people who need help and have no other options. So if you do try to bring it to market you’re pilloried by the press and everyone online and if you don’t it’s sad because it seems like there’s nobody trying to make the technology accessible.
- notaustinpowers 3y ago
  I think the main concern with Neuralink isn't so much the technology/mission itself, it's Elon. We've seen with his other companies how he runs testing. Blow up rocket after rocket after rocket until it goes right. And even when it does go right, cause catastrophic damage to the launch pad, damage they were warned would happen. With earth Tesla Autopilots it was very finicky and absolutely should have gone through more in-house training rather than releasing it to the public, calling it a "beta" and hoping for the best. We've seen his track record and have a perceived idea of how he prefers to advance technology. That's why a lot of people are very nervous about him putting a chip into people's brains.
  - Dig1t 3y ago
    If you’ve ever built anything you know that the only way anything gets built is with iteration. There are very few examples in history where something new got built and was a perfect finished product v1. The way we build new things is making something, testing it, measuring the outcome and then using the information to build v2. Look at literally every product ever built, that’s how it was made. Rockets especially need this treatment, you have to blow up a lot of rockets to refine the process in any reasonable time frame. It’s not just Elon’s methodology that’s all new things. How many iPhone prototypes do you think they created before they shipped the first one? Neuralink is doing the same thing with lab animals, which by the way is an established practice used in all of science. The end result will be a cure for people who desperately need it and it will be within our lifetime if they are allowed to continue without regulatory roadblocks.
    - _ea1k 3y ago
      Yeah, but it is Musk doing it, so it is different! It is funny, because so many other programs have had similar failures. How many people have Autopilot like things on their non-Tesla cars that they don't even use because they are uselessly bad? All of these things have been through iterations, including potentially dangerous public iterations. All the poor naming criticisms of "FSD" and even "FSD Beta" are fair game though.
- mikem170 3y ago
  > Look how much hatred there is for Neuralink. A company actually trying to productize and bring to market a device that will allow quadriplegic people to move and walk again People are wary of Neuralink because of how big tech manipulates peoples and pollutes society for profit, not because they are opposed to helping quadriplegics.
  - Dig1t 3y ago
    I agree there are things to be wary of, all new tech is a double edged sword. But the pro’s obviously outweigh the cons in the same way the internet and smart phones have. You’ll find very few people who will say they would prefer to live in a world where all humanity’s collective knowledge is not instantly accessible to everyone. You used to have to drive to the library to look things up! Is that old world better? Heck no. It will be the same with neural implants. Overcoming neurological illness and giving everyone’s brain super computer capabilities are worth the risk.
    - tspike 3y ago
      > in the same way the internet and smart phones have I think the jury is very much still out on that one. I just got on Facebook for the first time in almost 10 years, and the comments on 'suggested' content have made me seriously question whether society was ready for these technologies. The corrosive impact of the falsehoods that are being thrown around has only begun to take effect.
      - southernplaces7 3y ago
        People have always thrown around corrosive falsehoods like you wouldn't believe. At least modern social networks also let others spread corrections and counteractions to common myths and bullshit political beliefs. I'd love to see some modern polyannas about "misinformation" hop into a time machine and then spend even a few days talking to any average group of people about their general beliefs in the mid 20th century on downard, or just take a look at the kind of utter invented garbage and hyperbole that was constantly peddled and regularly sold to wide swathes of the public by government and media organizations of all kinds so much more easily in previos decades and centuries. Humans love to invent stories based on tribal notions and biases, so falsehoods never go away even in the most advanced communication age in human history, but historically, we're not doing so bad, simply because the cost of spreading any idea is now lower than ever previously and the means for doing so are more widely available than they've ever been, letting things average out much more rapidly towards message dilution. Anything in the opposite direction, and any centralized "vigilance" of supposed wrong ideas will only take us back to a place where a small number control more narrative than they ever should, and that small number will always tend towards dictating based on selfish interest.
- vGPU 3y ago
  Neuralink is incredibly sloppy. A great example would be the “whoopsie-daisy, we spilled toxic glue on your brain” fiasco.
xenadu02 3y ago
Very rarely does any technology start off cheap enough to be mass-produced. If you don't build prototypes then expensive bespoke initial models you'll often never get to the "half of all who need it can afford it" let alone "90%+ can afford it". If you don't like that then the government will need to step up with public funds.
- autoexec 3y ago
  I guess you're right, this has to start somewhere and it won't ever happen if the tech isn't being developed. I guess I just wish this were publicized a little more honestly. It's always "life changing tech is here!" or at least "right around the corner!" when the reality is we've got a lottery system where year after year and decade after decade a lucky few get some great cyborg tech in exchange for marketing while most people who need them only have prosthetics with utility limited to being a hook or even just a cosmetic assuming they can afford to get any kind of prosthetic at all. History tell us that things aren't likely to be any different 10 years from now.
eichin 3y ago
I thought the DEKA arm was shipping, but apparently https://www.unionleader.com/news/scitech/dean-kamens-new-luke-arm-a-game-changer/article_e6d1a4aa-de48-5877-aea2-4d839cf4cab7.html https://www.unionleader.com/news/scitech/dean-kamens-new-luk... it's finally coming to market this quarter - "testing by nearly 100 amputees for more than 10,000 hours of use" now that it actually has FDA approval; earliest demo that turns up in a quick search was 2007 ... so it's the kind of success that makes your point :}
- NoahKAndrews 3y ago
  That article is from 2016.
  - eichin 3y ago
    ugh, you're right, I'd seen a bunch of older articles but thought that one had a September 2023 dateline. I haven't found anything else with usage numbers either, sorry.

Dig1t 3y ago

You’re damned if you do and you’re damned if you don’t. Look how much hatred there is for Neuralink. A company actually trying to productize and bring to market a device that will allow quadriplegic people to move and walk again, which could restore life for so many people who need help and have no other options. So if you do try to bring it to market you’re pilloried by the press and everyone online and if you don’t it’s sad because it seems like there’s nobody trying to make the technology accessible.

notaustinpowers 3y ago
I think the main concern with Neuralink isn't so much the technology/mission itself, it's Elon. We've seen with his other companies how he runs testing. Blow up rocket after rocket after rocket until it goes right. And even when it does go right, cause catastrophic damage to the launch pad, damage they were warned would happen. With earth Tesla Autopilots it was very finicky and absolutely should have gone through more in-house training rather than releasing it to the public, calling it a "beta" and hoping for the best. We've seen his track record and have a perceived idea of how he prefers to advance technology. That's why a lot of people are very nervous about him putting a chip into people's brains.
- Dig1t 3y ago
  If you’ve ever built anything you know that the only way anything gets built is with iteration. There are very few examples in history where something new got built and was a perfect finished product v1. The way we build new things is making something, testing it, measuring the outcome and then using the information to build v2. Look at literally every product ever built, that’s how it was made. Rockets especially need this treatment, you have to blow up a lot of rockets to refine the process in any reasonable time frame. It’s not just Elon’s methodology that’s all new things. How many iPhone prototypes do you think they created before they shipped the first one? Neuralink is doing the same thing with lab animals, which by the way is an established practice used in all of science. The end result will be a cure for people who desperately need it and it will be within our lifetime if they are allowed to continue without regulatory roadblocks.
  - _ea1k 3y ago
    Yeah, but it is Musk doing it, so it is different! It is funny, because so many other programs have had similar failures. How many people have Autopilot like things on their non-Tesla cars that they don't even use because they are uselessly bad? All of these things have been through iterations, including potentially dangerous public iterations. All the poor naming criticisms of "FSD" and even "FSD Beta" are fair game though.
mikem170 3y ago
> Look how much hatred there is for Neuralink. A company actually trying to productize and bring to market a device that will allow quadriplegic people to move and walk again People are wary of Neuralink because of how big tech manipulates peoples and pollutes society for profit, not because they are opposed to helping quadriplegics.
- Dig1t 3y ago
  I agree there are things to be wary of, all new tech is a double edged sword. But the pro’s obviously outweigh the cons in the same way the internet and smart phones have. You’ll find very few people who will say they would prefer to live in a world where all humanity’s collective knowledge is not instantly accessible to everyone. You used to have to drive to the library to look things up! Is that old world better? Heck no. It will be the same with neural implants. Overcoming neurological illness and giving everyone’s brain super computer capabilities are worth the risk.
  - tspike 3y ago
    > in the same way the internet and smart phones have I think the jury is very much still out on that one. I just got on Facebook for the first time in almost 10 years, and the comments on 'suggested' content have made me seriously question whether society was ready for these technologies. The corrosive impact of the falsehoods that are being thrown around has only begun to take effect.
    - southernplaces7 3y ago
      People have always thrown around corrosive falsehoods like you wouldn't believe. At least modern social networks also let others spread corrections and counteractions to common myths and bullshit political beliefs. I'd love to see some modern polyannas about "misinformation" hop into a time machine and then spend even a few days talking to any average group of people about their general beliefs in the mid 20th century on downard, or just take a look at the kind of utter invented garbage and hyperbole that was constantly peddled and regularly sold to wide swathes of the public by government and media organizations of all kinds so much more easily in previos decades and centuries. Humans love to invent stories based on tribal notions and biases, so falsehoods never go away even in the most advanced communication age in human history, but historically, we're not doing so bad, simply because the cost of spreading any idea is now lower than ever previously and the means for doing so are more widely available than they've ever been, letting things average out much more rapidly towards message dilution. Anything in the opposite direction, and any centralized "vigilance" of supposed wrong ideas will only take us back to a place where a small number control more narrative than they ever should, and that small number will always tend towards dictating based on selfish interest.
vGPU 3y ago
Neuralink is incredibly sloppy. A great example would be the “whoopsie-daisy, we spilled toxic glue on your brain” fiasco.

xenadu02 3y ago

Very rarely does any technology start off cheap enough to be mass-produced. If you don't build prototypes then expensive bespoke initial models you'll often never get to the "half of all who need it can afford it" let alone "90%+ can afford it". If you don't like that then the government will need to step up with public funds.

autoexec 3y ago
I guess you're right, this has to start somewhere and it won't ever happen if the tech isn't being developed. I guess I just wish this were publicized a little more honestly. It's always "life changing tech is here!" or at least "right around the corner!" when the reality is we've got a lottery system where year after year and decade after decade a lucky few get some great cyborg tech in exchange for marketing while most people who need them only have prosthetics with utility limited to being a hook or even just a cosmetic assuming they can afford to get any kind of prosthetic at all. History tell us that things aren't likely to be any different 10 years from now.

eichin 3y ago

I thought the DEKA arm was shipping, but apparently https://www.unionleader.com/news/scitech/dean-kamens-new-luke-arm-a-game-changer/article_e6d1a4aa-de48-5877-aea2-4d839cf4cab7.html https://www.unionleader.com/news/scitech/dean-kamens-new-luk... it's finally coming to market this quarter - "testing by nearly 100 amputees for more than 10,000 hours of use" now that it actually has FDA approval; earliest demo that turns up in a quick search was 2007 ... so it's the kind of success that makes your point :}

NoahKAndrews 3y ago
That article is from 2016.
- eichin 3y ago
  ugh, you're right, I'd seen a bunch of older articles but thought that one had a September 2023 dateline. I haven't found anything else with usage numbers either, sorry.