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Elon says it, so it must be true:
Humans must become cyborgs and develop a direct high-bandwidth connection with machines or risk irrelevance and obsolescence, says Tesla and SpaceX founder Elon Musk.
Musk's latest cheery thoughts were imparted at the World Government Summit in the UAE. "Over time I think we will probably see a closer merger of biological intelligence and digital intelligence," Musk said, according to CNBC.
The main thrust of Musk's argument seems to hinge on the limited bandwidth and processing power of a single human being. Computers can ingest, transfer, and process gigabytes of data per second, every second, forever. Meatbags, however, are severely limited by an input/output rate—talking, typing, listening—that's best measured in bits per second. Thus, to risk being replaced by a robot or artificial intelligence, we need to become machines.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by darkfeline on Wednesday February 15 2017, @06:45PM
Sure, our smartphones aren't physically implanted into our bodies, but most first world people literally feel crippled if they don't have their phone.
Humans as a species are distinguished by our cyborg tendencies. While other animals evolve biologically, we evolve technologically. (Although it is not unnatural for animals to take physical objects to "integrate" into themselves, such as hermit crabs. Modern first world humans can be thought of as hermit crabs that seek out smartphones.)
Join the SDF Public Access UNIX System today!
(Score: 2) by krishnoid on Wednesday February 15 2017, @06:51PM
They're probably ahead of us -- I bet cells are the new silicon.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday February 16 2017, @04:36PM
Also how I see it. Wearable tech, computers getting much more smaller, wireless internet access, Siri/Cortana, and more "seamless" human/device interfaces. Smartphones already augment us with photographic memory, navigation, info etc. Surgery as sci-fi might fantasize about is not really necessary.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday February 16 2017, @04:40PM
...at least not until we know how to utilize such surgical modifications in a way that outperforms non invasive options. more neuroscience research is needed!