Elon Musk’s Neuralink shows first brain-chip patient playing chess

Published

1 year ago

March 22, 2024

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The first patient to receive a brain chip from Elon Musk’s company Neuralink has appeared to play online chess.

Neuralink released a nine-minute video in which the patient, who is paralysed below his shoulders, appears to move a cursor across a laptop screen with nothing but his thoughts. The video shows him playing chess and turning off the laptop’s music.

The patient, who had not been previously identified, said in the live stream video that his name is Noland Arbaugh, 29, who was paralysed below the shoulder after a diving accident.

Mr Arbaugh received an implant from the company in January and could control a computer mouse using his thoughts, Musk said last month.

Musk previously said the aim of the brain chip is to eventually allow users with disabilities, like the late Stephen Hawking, to “communicate faster than an auctioneer”.

He has also claimed it would be able to potentially treat obesity, autism, depression and schizophrenia.

“The surgery was super easy,” Mr Arbaugh said in the video streamed on Musk’s social media platform X, referring to the implant procedure.

“I literally was released from the hospital a day later. I have no cognitive impairments.”

He said he had “basically given up playing” the game Civilization VI, but “you all [Neuralink] gave me the ability to do that again and I played for eight hours that day.”

‘It has already changed my life’

But Mr Arbaugh said the new technology is “not perfect” and they “have run into some issues”.

“I don’t want people to think that this is the end of the journey, there’s still a lot of work to be done, but it has already changed my life,” he added.

In the Neuralink video, Mr Arbaugh talks about the process he underwent to train on the device after doctors implanted it in January. He said that he would think about moving his hand and that, eventually, moving the computer cursor became second nature.

Part human, part machine – cyborgs are the future

Noland Arbaugh calls himself a telekinetic, moving a computer cursor by thought alone.

He’s the first person to be fitted with a brain chip by Elon Musk’s company Neuralink.

And you can see all over his face what it means to him.

Paralysed below the shoulders for eight years, he has been dependent on others for much of his care. But now he can play computer games and control music. And that’s just the start – he and his engineers are slowly learning the chip’s potential. Being able to control even a small part of his environment and stay up late to play Civilisation VI without the help of his parents is liberating.

“It’s wild,” he says. “It’s crazy.”

The chip implanted in his brain ‘reads’ the signals from neurons that control movement. His hands remain immobile, but his intent to move is picked up and beamed wirelessly to a receiver attached to his laptop. He’s by no means the first to be fitted with a brain-computer interface.

Last year scientists in Switzerland released a video of Gert-Jan Oskam standing up and walking, despite a break in his spinal cord. His brain signals had been re-routed to below the injury, restoring his control of his legs.

A big question remains over the risk. Noland says the surgery was straightforward. He was released the day after the operation and there was no impact from the procedure.

All good there. But he hints at issues, which we might hear more about in future updates.

The technology has the potential to transform the outlook for people with paraplegia. They are often young, injured while playing sport or in car accidents. They have many years of life ahead of them. The chips will be eye-wateringly expensive at first. But the cost will fall as the technology is rolled out and the implant procedure becomes more efficient.

Marvel at Noland. He is a cyborg, part human, part machine. And he is the future.

“It just became intuitive to me to start imagining the cursor moving. It was like using The Force on the cursor, and I could get it to move wherever I wanted,” he said, using a Star Wars reference.

“Every day it seems like we’re learning new stuff,” he said.

US

Farmer becomes first person to die during Trump’s ICE raids

Published

1 hour ago

July 13, 2025

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Farmer becomes first person to die during Trump's ICE raids

A farmer who fell from a greenhouse roof during an anti-immigrant raid at a licensed cannabis facility in California this week has died of his injuries.

Jaime Alanis, 57, is the first person to die as a result of Donald Trump’s Immigration Compliance and Enforcement (ICE) raids.

His niece, Yesenia Duran, posted on the fundraising site GoFundMe to say her uncle was his family’s only provider and he had been sending his earnings back to his wife and daughter in Mexico.

The United Food Workers said Mr Alanis had worked on the farm for 10 years.

“These violent and cruel federal actions terrorise American communities, disrupt the American food supply chain, threaten lives and separate families,” the union said in a recent statement on X.

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) said it executed criminal search warrants at Glass House Farms facilities on Thursday.

Mr Alanis called family to say he was hiding and possibly fleeing agents before he fell around 30ft (9m) from the roof and broke his neck, according to information from family, hospital and government sources.

Agents arrested 200 people suspected of being in the country illegally and identified at least 10 immigrant children on the sites, the DHS said in a statement.

Mr Alanis was not among them, the agency said.

“This man was not in and has not been in CBP (Customs and Border Protection) or ICE custody,” DHS assistant secretary for public affairs Tricia McLaughlin said.

“Although he was not being pursued by law enforcement, this individual climbed up to the roof of a greenhouse and fell 30ft. CBP immediately called a medivac to the scene to get him care as quickly as possible.”

Four US citizens were arrested during the incident for allegedly “assaulting or resisting officers”, the DHS said, and authorities were offering a $50,000 reward for information leading to the arrest of a person suspected of firing a gun at federal agents.

In a statement, Glass House, a licensed Cannabis grower, said immigration agents had valid warrants. It said workers were detained and it is helping provide them with legal representation.

“Glass House has never knowingly violated applicable hiring practices and does not and has never employed minors,” it added.

US

Donald Trump threatens to revoke Rosie O’Donnell’s US citizenship

Published

1 hour ago

July 13, 2025

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Donald Trump threatens to revoke Rosie O'Donnell's US citizenship

Donald Trump has said he is considering “taking away” the US citizenship of actress and comedian Rosie O’Donnell, despite a Supreme Court ruling that expressly prohibits a government from doing so.

In a post on Truth Social on Saturday, the US president said: “Because of the fact that Rosie O’Donnell is not in the best interests of our Great Country, I am giving serious consideration to taking away her Citizenship.”

He also labelled O’Donnell, who has moved to Ireland, as a “threat to humanity” and said she should “remain in the wonderful country of Ireland, if they want her”.

O’Donnell responded on Instagram by posting a photograph of Mr Trump with Jeffrey Epstein.

“You are everything that is wrong with America and I’m everything you hate about what’s still right with it,” she wrote in the caption.

“I’m not yours to silence. I never was.”

O’Donnell moved to Ireland with her 12-year-old son in January after Mr Trump had secured a second term.

She has said she’s in the process of obtaining Irish citizenship based on family lineage and that she would only return to the US “when it is safe for all citizens to have equal rights there in America”.

O’Donnell and the US president have criticised each other publicly for years, in an often-bitter back-and-forth that predates Mr Trump’s move into politics.

This is just the latest threat by the president to revoke the citizenship of someone he has disagreed with, most recently his former ally Elon Musk.

But the two situations are different as while Musk was born in South Africa, O’Donnell was born in the US and has a constitutional right to American citizenship.

Amanda Frost, a law professor at the University of Virginia School of Law, said the Supreme Court ruled in a 1967 case that the fourteenth amendment of the constitution prevents the government from taking away citizenship.

“The president has no authority to take away the citizenship of a native-born US citizen,” he added.

“In short, we are nation founded on the principle that the people choose the government; the government cannot choose the people.”

US

Donald Trump announces 30% tariff on imports from EU

Published

18 hours ago

July 12, 2025

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Donald Trump announces 30% tariff on imports from EU

Donald Trump has announced he will impose a 30% tariff on imports from the European Union from 1 August.

The tariffs could make everything from French cheese and Italian leather goods to German electronics and Spanish pharmaceuticals more expensive in the US.

Mr Trump has also imposed a 30% tariff on goods from Mexico, according to a post from his Truth Social account.

Announcing the moves in separate letters on the account, the president said the US trade deficit was a national security threat.

In his letter to the EU, he wrote: “We have had years to discuss our trading relationship with The European Union, and we have concluded we must move away from these long-term, large, and persistent, trade Deficits, engendered by your tariff, and non-Tariff, policies, and trade barriers.

“Our relationship has been, unfortunately, far from reciprocal.”

In his letter to Mexico, Mr Trump said he did not think the country had done enough to stop the US from turning into a “narco-trafficking playground”.

The president of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, said today that the EU could adopt “proportionate countermeasures” if the US proceeds with imposing the 30% tariff.

Ms von der Leyen, who heads the EU’s executive arm, said in a statement that the bloc remained ready “to continue working towards an agreement by Aug 1”.

“Few economies in the world match the European Union’s level of openness and adherence to fair trading practices,” she continued.

“We will take all necessary steps to safeguard EU interests, including the adoption of proportionate countermeasures if required.”

Ms von der Leyen has also said imposing tariffs on EU exports would “disrupt essential transatlantic supply chains”.

Meanwhile, Dutch Prime Minister Dick Schoof said on the X social media platform that Mr Trump’s announcement was “very concerning and not the way forward”.

He added: “The European Commission can count on our full support. As the EU we must remain united and resolute in pursuing an outcome with the United States that is mutually beneficial.”

Mexico’s economy ministry said a bilateral working group aims to reach an alternative to the 30% US tariffs before they are due to take effect.

The country was informed by the US that it would receive a letter about the tariffs, the ministry’s statement said, adding that Mexico was negotiating.

Trump’s tariff threats and delays

On his so-called “liberation day” in April, Mr Trump unleashed “reciprocal tariffs” on many of America’s trade partners.

The US president said he was targeting countries with which America has a trade imbalance.

However, since then he’s backed down in a spiralling tit-for-tat tariff face-off with China, and struck a deal with the UK.

The US imposed a 20% tariff on imported goods from the EU in April but it was later paused and the bloc has since been paying a baseline tariff of 10% on goods it exports to the US.

In May, while the US and EU where holding trade negotiations, Mr Trump threated to impose a 50% tariff on the bloc as talks didn’t progress as he would have liked.

However, he later announced he was delaying the imposition of that tariff while negotiations over a trade deal took place.

As of earlier this week, the EU’s executive commission, which handles trade issues for the bloc’s 27-member nations, said its leaders were still hoping to strike a trade deal with the Trump administration.

Without one, the EU said it was prepared to retaliate with tariffs on hundreds of American products, ranging from beef and auto parts to beer and Boeing airplanes.