Elon Musk unveils pig with chip in its brain

Tech Entorproner Elon Musk has revealed a pig called Gertrude with a coin-sized computer chip in her brain to describe his ambitious plans to create a working brain-to-machine interface.

“It’s kind of like a Fitbit in your skull with tiny wires,” the billionaire entrepreneur announced on a webcast. His start-up Neuralink applied to originate human trials last year.

   

The interface could assist people with neurological difficulties to control phones or computers with their mind.

Elon Musk argues such chips could ultimately be used to help cure conditions such as dementia, Parkinson’s disease and spinal cord injuries.

But the long-term ambition is to usher in an age of what Mr Musk calls “superhuman cognition”, in part to combat artificial intelligence so powerful he says it could damage the human race.

The processor in her brain sends wireless signals, indicating neural activity in her snout when looking for food.

Mr Musk stated the original Neuralink device, revealed just over a year ago, had been simplified and made smaller.