#2167 - Noland Arbaugh

Joe Rogan (0:13)

What's up, Noland?

Noland Arbaugh (0:14)

Nothing much. Can you guys hear me through this?

Joe Rogan (0:16)

Yeah.

No, it's perfect, it's perfect. It's a pleasure to meet you, man.

Noland Arbaugh (0:20)

Hey, you too, thanks for having me.

Joe Rogan (0:22)

I have a feeling if there's a movie that they do in the future of how the world changed in 2024, you're going to be in that movie.

Noland Arbaugh (0:30)

Yeah, that would be cool.

Yeah, that would be cool. I wonder if they'd get to play me.

Joe Rogan (0:36)

They probably don't need people by then. They'd probably just do movies with AI and probably really quickly.

You could probably take a really great novel, like The Great Gatsby, run it through an AI video creator, and it would just make you the most amazing version of The Great Gatsby.

Noland Arbaugh (0:51)

Yeah, that's true.

Joe Rogan (0:52)

Probably.

Noland Arbaugh (0:53)

Yeah, that'd be sick.

Joe Rogan (0:54)

But if we're talking about historical moments in human beings and in technology, the implementation of Neuralink on the first human patient, that's you.

Noland Arbaugh (1:06)

Yeah, yeah, I guess so.

Joe Rogan (1:08)

No, definitely.

Noland Arbaugh (1:10)

Yeah, I mean, I keep thinking about it. You know, BCI have been around for a while.

Joe Rogan (1:16)

What is BCI?

Noland Arbaugh (1:18)

Brain-computer interface. So just implants that they've done in people, different ways that they've found.

They've given people the ability to control electronic devices. They've been able to control computers and stuff. There are a couple things out there. The Utah Ray Synchron came out with something where basically they go through the artery in the neck and that they kind of thread something up into the brain that expands in a vein up there and an artery up there, and then they can control the brain through that. So BCI has been around for a while, a few decades at least, I think since like the 90s. So I always say that we're standing on the shoulders of giants sort of thing, but I know Neuralink just has, it's in a league of its own, and I know that with Elon's name attached to it, it's going to blow up way more.

But I think this is the beginning. I think everyone else that comes after this basically is going to be pulled up by the progress Neuralink's making and the fact that they are trying to open source basically all of it. I think the whole field is just going to grow exponentially at this point.

Joe Rogan (2:25)

Well, we can only hope so, and that really is fascinating. And it really is fascinating how many different ways and strategies they've employed to try to connect computers to human beings and brains.

So do you know what year the first one was that they did this?

Noland Arbaugh (2:42)

Uh, 98 maybe. Yeah, I think so. I think that was the Utah array. That just was, it looks like a chip with more fixed threads on it. They were, I think, a lot smaller, and it just sat on the brain.

So obviously another open brain surgery, and they put it in there, and then it would read a section of the brain motor cortex, I think, as well.

Joe Rogan (3:08)

Have you seen some of the stuff now where they're using some kind of scanning imagery where they can actually see thoughts?

Noland Arbaugh (3:16)

No, I haven't.

Joe Rogan (3:17)

Yeah, they're doing, where they think they're going to be able to record dreams eventually, and what they're able to do now is get like an approximation of what someone is seeing and thinking. Can you find that, Jamie, so we can figure out exactly what they did?

Noland Arbaugh (3:35)

Yeah, here it is.

Joe Rogan (3:35)

Scientists read dreams using brain scans. Is this an older one? This is not the newer one.

Noland Arbaugh (3:41)

That's crazy. I mean, I've always heard that scientists really don't know what dreams are and what is going on or why we do it. I've heard plenty of people say, like, yeah, we still don't know why you even need to sleep, or what's going on in your dream. I don't know if that's changed recently, but I don't know, dreams are an interesting thing.

Joe Rogan (4:01)

The whole sleep thing is interesting. MRI scans reveal what we see in dreams. Japanese researchers unveiled dreams' visuals with 60% accuracy using innovative MRI scans at Pivotal Kyoto studies showcasing a breakthrough in sleep science. Wow.

Wild stuff.

Noland Arbaugh (4:20)

That picture just looked AI. Are we dreaming in AI now?