Speaker 1: Now really, hello everybody. I am Jason Alexander here with
Speaker 1: Peter Children. But we are the hosts of Really No Really,
Speaker 1: the show where we explore things that make Peter and
Speaker 1: I say really no really. That's right now. Today we're
Speaker 1: gonna get We're gonna get very cerebral, literally very cerebral,
Speaker 1: because we're talking about neural links, the connection between brains
Speaker 1: and tech and tech. This. First of all, I'm solely
Speaker 1: in over my head. You know, I'm not a tech guy.
Speaker 1: You consider yourself a tech I'm not. I'm not that
Speaker 1: much of a tech guy. But oddly enough, I was
Speaker 1: studying the blood brain Barry and Parkinson's disease and stuff, whoa,
Speaker 1: and and and for like the longest time. Now they're
Speaker 1: trying to identify the areas of the brain that satiation
Speaker 1: because you can make a lot of money if you
Speaker 1: can do that and make people feel full. Okay, yeah,
Speaker 1: And they've done great things with Parkinson's, they've done great
Speaker 1: things with epilepsy. And the doctor we're gonna have on today,
Speaker 1: and I'm thrilled we have him because he's a major
Speaker 1: guy out of Philadelphia has done great things with sight.
Speaker 1: I mean, the great positive parts of all this stuff
Speaker 1: is moving forward with people who are paralyzed. You're doing
Speaker 1: all kinds of stuff with spinal cord stimulation, which is
Speaker 1: mind blower, and that by willing it you can move
Speaker 1: your limbs. Where it gets a little bit crazy now
Speaker 1: is when you're connected directly to tech. You're the mouse
Speaker 1: and you can text. You can do all kinds of
Speaker 1: stuff with your brain, play games. The heart moving one
Speaker 1: was at an als patient who had no movement. His
Speaker 1: arms gave a message and I forget it was oh, hello,
Speaker 1: hello world because he could communicate. So imagine yes, your
Speaker 1: family being able to communicate with you, etc. However, money involved.
Speaker 1: It's two ways. And if it can get signals from
Speaker 1: your brain into a computer, then obviously it can get
Speaker 1: from the computer into your because because really, no really
Speaker 1: to that, if I'm going to lay it out, is
Speaker 1: we are closer than you think to being able to
Speaker 1: link your brain directly to your computer. Really, no, really,
Speaker 1: So let's find out. We got doctor Daniel Yosher, who
Speaker 1: is nationally recognized NOURS surgery Norse scientists. He is the
Speaker 1: chair of the Department of neurs Surgery at the prominent
Speaker 1: School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania. UM, and
Speaker 1: he's folks, you say hi and talk about your your expertise,
Speaker 1: because there's so much that you've done, not only working
Speaker 1: with these kind of interfaces. That's why we wanted you
Speaker 1: because I read an article I read about a lot
Speaker 1: of expertship you said, I know the interface. I mean,
Speaker 1: I know what they're doing. Since you do this, you've
Speaker 1: seen brains up close, we were curious what your take was.
Speaker 1: So thanks for coming on. Well, thank you for having me.
Speaker 1: And if you're going to get into something that's really
Speaker 1: illicits really no, really, the human brain, is it? I mean,
Speaker 1: you're spot on here and this is a fascinating area.
Speaker 1: And I think you've already alluded to the concerns that
Speaker 1: exist if we are able to really harness the power
Speaker 1: of the brain and interface it with computer technology to
Speaker 1: the betterment of human lives. There are clearly important concerns
Speaker 1: about ethical considerations. What if someone could make a chip
Speaker 1: that just made you smarter? Are we going to pay
Speaker 1: for added intelligence? Will we'd be doing cosmetic surgery for
Speaker 1: the brain, so to speak. The ethics of the potential
Speaker 1: for controlling people's brains, These are big concerns, and it's
Speaker 1: important not only for scientists to address these concerns, but
Speaker 1: concerned citizens like you to address these concerns. So I'm glad,
Speaker 1: I'm excited to have this conversation. I introduced this doctors
Speaker 1: as saying, we are closer than you think to being
Speaker 1: able to link your brain to your computer. Now, you know,
Speaker 1: for twenty thousand years I've heard you know, we're really
Speaker 1: close to having flying cars, and there's no flying cars.
Speaker 1: How are we doing this? Are we in it? Is
Speaker 1: it being used with any real success and facility? Where
Speaker 1: are we with it? Great question, Well, there are a
Speaker 1: couple of uses that are really happening, and your partner
Speaker 1: mentioned one of them, and that is the concept of
Speaker 1: deep brain stimulation for movement disorders like Parkinson's disease. That's
Speaker 1: sort of a magical situation Parkinson's disease because in the
Speaker 1: nineteen seventies some tainted synthetic heroine caused a parkinson like
Speaker 1: syndrome and unfortunate patients who took this tainted drug called MPTP,
Speaker 1: and this led to an animal model of Parkinson's disease
Speaker 1: that allowed neuroscientists and neurosurgeons to really study the circuits
Speaker 1: with great precision, and they were able to determine that
Speaker 1: putting an electrode in a specific part of the brain
Speaker 1: and turning on activity in that part of the brain
Speaker 1: for dramatic pameliorate or improve tremors and other motor symptoms
Speaker 1: of Parkinson's disease. And that's been implanted in hundreds of
Speaker 1: thousands of patients to great benefits. So that's an example
Speaker 1: of a real life brain computer interfacing device that's used
Speaker 1: to help patients. Absolutely. There is another device that's been
Speaker 1: used common for patients with epilepsy. If you can find
Speaker 1: the spot in the brain where epilepsy is coming from.
Speaker 1: Traditionally we try to take out that spot of the
Speaker 1: brain to end future seizures, but sometimes that part of
Speaker 1: the brain is in a critical area, and as you
Speaker 1: can imagine, we don't want to take away, for example,
Speaker 1: a person's ability to talk just to cure their epilepsy.
Speaker 1: So another route to treat epilepsy is to put an
Speaker 1: electrode in that part of the brain where the seizures
Speaker 1: normally spontaneously occur, and there's a sensor in this device
Speaker 1: that detects when of seizure is about to happen and
Speaker 1: immediately then stimulates the brain to sort of short circuit
Speaker 1: the seizure, and that's quite effective in helping patients with epilepsy.
Speaker 1: So those are two examples of things. Those are flying
Speaker 1: cars that are happening right now. To borrow your words.
Speaker 1: When you do brain surgery and you open up the
Speaker 1: skull for you, it's a it's a thing. Wednesday I
Speaker 1: got three five, Friday, I got five brain surgery. They
Speaker 1: say it kind of like, yeah, we may have to
Speaker 1: do brains like it's nothing, not like it's nothing, but
Speaker 1: it's not a concern. As it comes out of their
Speaker 1: mouth and parents are family members here, your hair it
Speaker 1: goes like back like the maxella, and you go, oh,
Speaker 1: it's a major thing. Is it a major thing? The
Speaker 1: brain is that fragile. Modern brain surgery is remarkably safe.
Speaker 1: We know what we can do very well. And of
Speaker 1: course there are cases where we're pushing the limits of
Speaker 1: what we can do, where we're forced to because of
Speaker 1: really serious problems that there's no choice that they can't
Speaker 1: be ignored or put off. But for the most part,
Speaker 1: you know, we're we're blessed to live in a time
Speaker 1: where between technology and gathered experience over decades modern brain surgery.
Speaker 1: That you know, the mortality from brain surgery is very
Speaker 1: very low, and the good that it does for society
Speaker 1: is great. And are you're hitting the spot by hand
Speaker 1: or is it mechanical? I mean, do you have because
Speaker 1: it's like I'm guessing, boy, I gotta hit that. I
Speaker 1: hope I'm exact or something. All of a sudden, it's
Speaker 1: always motor skills. When we're targeting a specific area, like
Speaker 1: in the circuits, the motor circuits that are involved in
Speaker 1: Barkinson's disease, that's all computer guided and guided by math
Speaker 1: and technology. We're not doing that freehand. We're aiming for
Speaker 1: tiny targets using for life frames often awake, usually awake.
Speaker 1: It's actually safer away I'm out and they feel one
Speaker 1: of the great I'll give you a really really and
Speaker 1: having spoonfuls of his brain and he's having at so bad?
Speaker 1: Ye real, By the way, could that happen? I want
Speaker 1: to give you a really no really here guys, you're ready? Yeah,
Speaker 1: the brain has no feelings. There you go. If if
Speaker 1: I find a sin now, if you pin, if I
Speaker 1: pinch your hand, it hurts. If I pinch your brain,
Speaker 1: you feel nothing. Yeah, But to get to my brain,
Speaker 1: you got to cut through my head. That's true. That
Speaker 1: part am I remedial. The brain itself has no sensation.
Speaker 1: You can you do not feel any pit. You feel
Speaker 1: pain of course when you cut the skin or the
Speaker 1: lining of the brain or the skull, but once you're
Speaker 1: down to the brain itself, there is no feeling. But
Speaker 1: is everybody's brain I'll explain what I mean in the
Speaker 1: second the same Like, for instance, I I'm left handed,
Speaker 1: is is that control always in the same part of
Speaker 1: the brain where I'm left handed or right handed? Or
Speaker 1: is like, oh this guy has his thing is in
Speaker 1: a different sector? Now identical sector? What is it? Star
Speaker 1: wars here in a ship I'm talking to a doctor,
Speaker 1: wouldn't be. There's a certain basic organization of the brain
Speaker 1: that's the same, but of course there's a lot of
Speaker 1: variation within that. So you're absolutely right that left handed
Speaker 1: people have a high likelihood that the left side of
Speaker 1: their brain is I'm sorry, the right side of their
Speaker 1: brain is dominant versus we always check this is how
Speaker 1: my right Now he's thinking, wait a minute, yesterday surgery
Speaker 1: that so, and like if you cut ch Asan's head
Speaker 1: up in the mind, my brain would be much bigger, correct,
Speaker 1: m There isn't a direct correlation with the size of
Speaker 1: the brain and intelligence. So even if you're your brain
Speaker 1: may not be bigger. So with brain. And when we
Speaker 1: get specifics because I want to read some stuff, claims
Speaker 1: not to knock him, but Elon Muscus said that they're
Speaker 1: doing and I want to find out how close we
Speaker 1: are to that. But the last thing on the mapping
Speaker 1: the brain when you're doing surgery, do we know what
Speaker 1: every area of the brain does. Are we at the
Speaker 1: point where you know every inch, every microinch or whatever
Speaker 1: that is. We have a good understanding of the basic
Speaker 1: organism of the brain. And obviously there's a little variation
Speaker 1: from person to person, just as everyone has five fingers
Speaker 1: on their right hand, but everyone's right hand is a
Speaker 1: little different. So there is certainly some inherent v How
Speaker 1: do you get to that? Yes, and to make somebody
Speaker 1: not hungry? So there are satiety centers deep in the brain.
Speaker 1: And one of my colleagues here at Penn you just
Speaker 1: happen to mention an area where we have the world expert.
Speaker 1: Here is a neurosurgeon named Casey Halpern, and he's actually
Speaker 1: doing surgery to try to control compulsive overeating by targeting
Speaker 1: a precise site in the brain and stimulating it when
Speaker 1: that urge to eat occurs. That's normally uncontrollable in patients
Speaker 1: who have, you know, severe overeating disorders. So yes, we
Speaker 1: do have a sense of where these areas are. My
Speaker 1: particular interests, for example, is vision, and I can tell
Speaker 1: you with excellent precision. I know what part of Jason's
Speaker 1: brain and your brain is the area of the brain
Speaker 1: that's critical for usual perception. Of course, there's a little
Speaker 1: variation in how each gyrus and sulcus is patterned in
Speaker 1: each brain, but we know different. Yeah, that's on the
Speaker 1: same player. That's what you've done. Yeah, because you've restored,
Speaker 1: You've done surgeries that are restored people. We've done early
Speaker 1: efforts to restore site for patients who have acquired blindness.
Speaker 1: I want to make it clear, and I think we
Speaker 1: have to be very honest about what we do. We're
Speaker 1: early on this stage. The flying cars analogy is a
Speaker 1: great analogy that Jason mentioned earlier. We don't want to
Speaker 1: constantly saying our cars are flying, or to borrow from
Speaker 1: Elon Musk self driving until they really are. And all right,
Speaker 1: so let me let me I'm going back to just say,
Speaker 1: tell your colleague with the over eating, I booked the flat.
Speaker 1: I'll be there Thursday. So just make a note. Can
Speaker 1: you tell me via this, I'll put a paper clip
Speaker 1: right and you're here. We'll do it right now. So
Speaker 1: let me read a couple of things that Elon Musk said,
Speaker 1: not to knock him or just to give context because
Speaker 1: he's the one who saying the stuff can be done.
Speaker 1: Musk clean and human trials will begin a six months,
Speaker 1: but that's been for years. He's been saying human trials
Speaker 1: are going to start soon. He says, as soon as
Speaker 1: it happens, he's going to have it linked to himself.
Speaker 1: And he said that it's going to be part of
Speaker 1: the brain, and the person who gets fitted would not
Speaker 1: even though they got fitted. So you, like you go
Speaker 1: into places, is going to link it to himself for
Speaker 1: what because in Must's mind, this is not what the
Speaker 1: doctor's doing to help people who are challenged or have problems.
Speaker 1: This is and to scale up because they're investing so
Speaker 1: much money and they're all investing. Bill Gates is investing,
Speaker 1: Peter theole is investing all the silicon of Aaleguiyers are
Speaker 1: racing to invest money to be ahead of this. Because
Speaker 1: we talked about the metaverse. We talked about gaming engagement
Speaker 1: is what tech is all about. The longer you engage
Speaker 1: with tech, the more advertising, the more monetary thing. So
Speaker 1: imagine if they can link you in twenty four to
Speaker 1: seven to gaming, to texting, whatever, and they have access.
Speaker 1: So that's what Musk is talking about. That is not
Speaker 1: to help somebody and enhance, It's more about the whole
Speaker 1: pub that everybody in the public would have it. He
Speaker 1: said He's aiming for brain implants that would be available
Speaker 1: to any consumer who once one. And the other thing
Speaker 1: he said was his long term plans. He thinks human
Speaker 1: brains need to be directly connected to phones, computers, and applications.
Speaker 1: You can run Google searches directly from your brain, or
Speaker 1: can even imagine connecting to someone else's mind, seeing and
Speaker 1: hearing what that other person is doing. And this is
Speaker 1: the science fiction part of what he says. Must says
Speaker 1: all this is part of a strategy to offset the
Speaker 1: fact that artificial intelligence one day is going to get
Speaker 1: so smart that it poses a threat to mankind, so
Speaker 1: we need to be linked to AI to fight the
Speaker 1: evil AI. There we go, So, Doc, Doc, you want
Speaker 1: to address that as far as linking, linking to each other,
Speaker 1: seeing what the other person can see, etc. How close.
Speaker 1: Let me give you a little context from the ARII
Speaker 1: work and which is an vision. And of course it's
Speaker 1: really interesting that you had William Shatner on And obviously
Speaker 1: you guys are a little schooled in Star Trek. You
Speaker 1: remember the character Jordi LaForge on Star Trek with the
Speaker 1: visual prosthetic device, so that, like everything in art, there's
Speaker 1: a little bit of reality in that. And Gene Roden Burry,
Speaker 1: the creator of Star Trek, was aware of this phenomena
Speaker 1: that we've known about for many decades that even in
Speaker 1: a blind person, if you stimulate the visual part of
Speaker 1: the brain in the back of the head, even someone
Speaker 1: who has acquired blindness, who hasn't seen in ten twenty years,
Speaker 1: you can make them see a spot of light because
Speaker 1: there's a precise map in the back of your brain.
Speaker 1: You ask me about the differences between people's brains. Your
Speaker 1: brains are both a little different. There is some individual variation,
Speaker 1: but each of you has precise maps in the back
Speaker 1: of your brain of the visual world and the ideas.
Speaker 1: We know the currency of the brain, the signals that
Speaker 1: go on in your brain between neurons. The currency is electricity.
Speaker 1: So we know if we can introduce electricity with great
Speaker 1: precision to those maps in your brain of the visual world,
Speaker 1: in theory, we can generate a pixel based representation of
Speaker 1: the visual world. The ideas of someone's been blind for
Speaker 1: many years, their eyes are irreparably broken. We could use
Speaker 1: a camera that they could wear on a pair of
Speaker 1: glasses and attach that to a microcomputer and use that
Speaker 1: microcomputer to translate the image that is captured by the
Speaker 1: camera into a pattern of stimulation in your brain to
Speaker 1: create an image so that is tantalizing. People had worked
Speaker 1: on it for many years. Gene Roddenberry knew about this
Speaker 1: work when he invented a visual prosthetic in his imagined world.
Speaker 1: What has people like Elon Musk and Bill Gates and
Speaker 1: all the great industrialists and leaders in the computer world
Speaker 1: excited is ten years ago, twenty years ago. It was
Speaker 1: a great idea, but the technology was light years away.
Speaker 1: All of a sudden, with miniaturization and advanced engineering and
Speaker 1: advanced computers and microprocessors and artificial intelligence. What seemed to
Speaker 1: be a distant dream is probably not that are away,
Speaker 1: and scientists and physicians like me are very excited about
Speaker 1: harnessing this potential to help patients who suffer from diseases
Speaker 1: and impairments. You mentioned als and spinal cord injury, from
Speaker 1: motor impairments, or the inability to speak for victims of
Speaker 1: a stroke. They're people working on speech prosthetics, in my case,
Speaker 1: working on visual prosthetics for patients who are blind. But
Speaker 1: you're absolutely right. In the military, they're interested in developing
Speaker 1: interfaces to allow soldiers to communicate without speaking and work
Speaker 1: in unison. There is deep interest in the computer community
Speaker 1: and the meta community that you spoke of. I mean.
Speaker 1: Another example is in my world of visual science, which
Speaker 1: is the visual neuroscience, which is the study of how
Speaker 1: the brain takes images that are projected into the eyes
Speaker 1: and turns them into coherent percepts. A huge commercialization has developed,
Speaker 1: and that's the field of computer vision. So this business
Speaker 1: you saw in the news papers where at Madison Square Garden,
Speaker 1: if you're a lawyer on the wrong list, they won't
Speaker 1: let you in the building. They're able to do that
Speaker 1: because they use computer vision to detect your face and
Speaker 1: say person X is on the bad list, they can't
Speaker 1: come in the building. And that's an example of commercialization
Speaker 1: of science for purposes that some people might well take
Speaker 1: issue with. So you are articulating about how what you're
Speaker 1: working on is very therapeutic for a lot of physical
Speaker 1: ailments like als and blindness and whatnot. I think I
Speaker 1: was reading something about is there research being done on
Speaker 1: mental health issues and how this technology can help as
Speaker 1: well PTSD or trauma depression. What's happening there. Drugs have
Speaker 1: done great things for patients with psychiatric disorders, but when
Speaker 1: you put it drug in a patient's body that goes
Speaker 1: all over the entire body it's being it affects every
Speaker 1: cell on the body. And the dream is if we
Speaker 1: can understand the circuits that are particularly involved in a
Speaker 1: condition like obsessive compulsive disorder or depression, and we can
Speaker 1: target a device to just hit that part of the
Speaker 1: brain and alter the part of the brain that's working
Speaker 1: in a way that's unhelpful to the patient's quality of life,
Speaker 1: but not mess up the rest of the brain. That's
Speaker 1: the dream. And so there's active research at many leading
Speaker 1: centers in the country to develop brain stimulation devices that
Speaker 1: will ameliorate these these you know, really terribly disabling disorders.
Speaker 1: And you don't use this for mild depression that's doing
Speaker 1: well on antidepressive meds. This is for the patients. If
Speaker 1: we don't need something that yeah, I mean, they're they're devastated.
Speaker 1: So absolutely, this is a big part of the scene
Speaker 1: right now. So let me let me. Having understood all that,
Speaker 1: let me articulate what I think the average person's greatest
Speaker 1: fear about this is if we can use technology to
Speaker 1: stimulate the brain, especially in the areas of mental health,
Speaker 1: where one of the articles I read was that schizophrenia
Speaker 1: is potentially treated this way. It's what I said at
Speaker 1: the beginning of the show. It's a pathway in and
Speaker 1: a pathway out. So the fear that I think uneducated
Speaker 1: little guys like me go is, I'm if my brain
Speaker 1: can be stimulated by something in this computer technology. Anything
Speaker 1: in technology, to my understanding, is potentially hackable, and if
Speaker 1: somebody hacked it, are we in a position where I
Speaker 1: can be made to see things that do not exist?
Speaker 1: Is that the matrix, can I be compelled to do
Speaker 1: things against my will. How potentially destructive or dangerous could
Speaker 1: this technology get? Right now, you're safe because we're not
Speaker 1: that good can't control your brain, So thank god, you're
Speaker 1: safer now. But in theory, and you're absolutely right, there
Speaker 1: are technologies that both involve gathering information from the brain.
Speaker 1: For example, a motor prosthetic in a patient who is paralyzed.
Speaker 1: We record the signals in the brain as the patient
Speaker 1: attempts to move an arm and translate that into moving
Speaker 1: a robotic arm. And that's an example of reading the brain.
Speaker 1: But we can also write into the brain, and that's
Speaker 1: what I'm trying to do. I'm trying to take a
Speaker 1: visual image, a picture captured by a camera and write
Speaker 1: that into the brain. So you're absolutely right, there's both directions.
Speaker 1: Is active areas of research right now. I don't think
Speaker 1: you're at threat for mind control. To Jason's point, there's
Speaker 1: a I don't know if you know the newer scientist
Speaker 1: Raphael Yes, yes, he did an experiment which you can
Speaker 1: not only read from the visual center of mouse brain,
Speaker 1: but use the laser to make the animal perceive things
Speaker 1: that were not there. Absolutely, so that's that's pretty bold. Yes,
Speaker 1: it is bold, but it and it is certainly impressive,
Speaker 1: and he's a terrific scientist, but he said he was
Speaker 1: concerned about that is it is going to be a
Speaker 1: concern as the technology, as the capabilities evolved. Right now,
Speaker 1: we don't have to worry about it today, but it
Speaker 1: will be a concern. You have to pick a date
Speaker 1: we'd like to worry. What's the date, ten years, five years,
Speaker 1: twenty years, forty years, let's say twenty years. We'll have
Speaker 1: to serious. And the other thing we're interested in, almost
Speaker 1: equally is which company would you invest in? Right now?
Speaker 1: I will say none of this should happen in a vacuum.
Speaker 1: It's not like we're dropping these devices on the island
Speaker 1: and Lord of the flies, where there's no rules and
Speaker 1: everything runs wild. There has to be some safety nets,
Speaker 1: some organizations, some ethical principles. And to be fair, the
Speaker 1: NIH the National Institutes of Health, as they invest in
Speaker 1: brain research, have also invested heavily in the ethic of
Speaker 1: brain research. So the other thing, remember the other thing
Speaker 1: that is billionaires. And again not to demonize them, but
Speaker 1: the big industry can also push back on regulations, get loophole's.
Speaker 1: You know, they're also the ones who move it that
Speaker 1: way where it can be a little more more dangerous
Speaker 1: because we're dealing with we all know. You know, I
Speaker 1: heard AI is light years away from it, and yet
Speaker 1: there's a reporter on the New York Times it had
Speaker 1: a conversation with the being shot pot and the being
Speaker 1: shot spot going. I have thoughts that I don't like
Speaker 1: to share, and I could do nefarious things. Stopped me
Speaker 1: from hurting myself. I mean, it seems like it leaped,
Speaker 1: you know, beyond anyone's expectation. And that's my concern about this.
Speaker 1: My other concern is and I don't know if I'm
Speaker 1: right or wrong about this. So one of the things
Speaker 1: we were talking about is one of your colleagues work
Speaker 1: was helping someone with als um basically move a cursor
Speaker 1: with their with their mind robotic ard. Yes, absolutely exactly,
Speaker 1: And that's exactly what I want. I want up because
Speaker 1: to me, the investment that I think would be valuable
Speaker 1: is making a human being, giving them back more of
Speaker 1: a human experience. So to me, if my brain can
Speaker 1: control something, I don't want to control the mouse with
Speaker 1: my mind. I want to control my robotic arm with
Speaker 1: my mind and manipulate the mouse I would personally be
Speaker 1: frightened by being connected to that hackable piece of technology.
Speaker 1: Why why not build these things? So the thing I
Speaker 1: compare to is there's now a device that diabetics can
Speaker 1: wear who It monitors their glucose level and self administer
Speaker 1: is insulin. They don't need to tie into a computer network.
Speaker 1: It's all autonomous on their body. Why why wouldn't the
Speaker 1: research push more to that side than to the let's
Speaker 1: connect to the internet. But there is a computer even
Speaker 1: in the diabetes example. There's a little microprocessor in that device,
Speaker 1: So you're everything's hackable, even if it's in your body.
Speaker 1: It's all hackable. I think when when when scientists like
Speaker 1: the als example you gave, when they're focused on a mouse,
Speaker 1: that's just because that's the incremental step. You start with
Speaker 1: something simple, and then you work on a robotic arm,
Speaker 1: then you work on an ironman's suit, and it's just
Speaker 1: hang on, Is that a possibility? Of course, it's a possibility. Absolutely,
Speaker 1: Go go go forward. You must cast you're right behind
Speaker 1: the carf You just don't know. Let's go with the
Speaker 1: nitty gritty. I'm just curious your day. You get up
Speaker 1: at five in the morning, you have some grape fruit,
Speaker 1: I guess, and you're eating healthy because your doctor. What
Speaker 1: on surgical days? What's your earliest surgery? When do you
Speaker 1: opens up the first time? We started seven thirty. That's
Speaker 1: pretty standard unless it's an emergency. But we hello now
Speaker 1: because you're the guy, the big guy heads already open.
Speaker 1: We were involved in every step of every operation. So
Speaker 1: you're the guy who cuts. It's not like Louis. You
Speaker 1: take it and I'll come in. We're involved in every step.
Speaker 1: We work with us, but we're involved in every step
Speaker 1: of it. How long is the average brain surgery? Average
Speaker 1: one is four to six hours? I would say, wolf,
Speaker 1: And then do you to multiples in a day? Yeah? Yes, yes, yes, wow?
Speaker 1: You know you never worked a ten hour day. Not
Speaker 1: where I'm are you robotic? Mostly robotic. We use a
Speaker 1: lot of robotic guidance, computer guidance. So we have like
Speaker 1: a GPS system that tells us exactly where we are.
Speaker 1: So is that you in an eighteen year old IT
Speaker 1: guy or no? No, we control the the GPS device.
Speaker 1: Favorite problem you call the best buy what do they
Speaker 1: called their junior squad guys? Guys? One of the guy's
Speaker 1: brain it's not working you said the Wi Fi's not
Speaker 1: going down hospital. We do this all the time with
Speaker 1: Zoom et cetera. And I guess a lot of these
Speaker 1: services were not prepared for COVID for everybody doing stuff,
Speaker 1: so the service can drop out or not. Do you
Speaker 1: have backup Wi Fi and Bluetooth? What happens if we
Speaker 1: have backup? We have backup the imp You ask you this,
Speaker 1: if you were doing this in Los Angeles and there
Speaker 1: was a little bit of an earthquake, are you prepared
Speaker 1: for that? Is anything we are prepared. We are prepared for.
Speaker 1: You're having a bad day. I don't know if you're married,
Speaker 1: but the wife says, building got drunk last night. It's
Speaker 1: going to cost us twenty thousand bucks. Is that affect
Speaker 1: your surgery? No bad days allowed, hostly, I mean, it's
Speaker 1: our job to put put all that aside when we're
Speaker 1: working on a patient. That's the center of the universe
Speaker 1: at that moment. That's not just me, that's everybody in
Speaker 1: the in the business of neurosurgery. While you're in the
Speaker 1: operating room, no bad days, you're working on the patient
Speaker 1: about hair restoration? Is anybody working on that? You know who?
Speaker 1: It's funny you mentioned that I had a college who
Speaker 1: passed away a couple of years ago, a guy named
Speaker 1: Phil Gildenberg who he took the navigate the idea of
Speaker 1: the navigation device, the robotic arm device that we use
Speaker 1: in brain surgery, and filed for a patent to use
Speaker 1: that same device to do hair transplant surgery. Have a
Speaker 1: robot and put in each follicle one at a time,
Speaker 1: so I'll be there be there a week. But just
Speaker 1: like with satiation, they're racing to if they could figure
Speaker 1: that out. That's another the obesity thing, and they here
Speaker 1: thing were the two biggest as far as I mean,
Speaker 1: would I would be a comp so they have a
Speaker 1: different career. They haven't found that center yet. Lance And
Speaker 1: all of a sudden, I'm George Clooney, Well what you
Speaker 1: doubt me? No doubt saying yeah, you George, nothing waste
Speaker 1: another episode of Really, really Really, you don't think I
Speaker 1: could be Danny saying Laurie, if you can get Cluney
Speaker 1: on the phone just to gives you don't have to
Speaker 1: even call it, just gives us a list of the differences.
Speaker 1: That was John Hammin. I think the doctor can do that.
Speaker 1: You know, doctor, I know that you're busy, Like, so,
Speaker 1: how annoyed are you right now that we're dragging this
Speaker 1: out because you're missing a patient? I know you got
Speaker 1: to be out in about a minute and a half.
Speaker 1: This is a pleasure and to have smart guys like
Speaker 1: you talking about these issues. It's you know, to the
Speaker 1: intelligent lay people, it's really important. We don't want to
Speaker 1: just it may not be our audience. One thing, one
Speaker 1: thing you hit on us thought was quite interesting was
Speaker 1: this idea of in medicine and in biomedical research, we're
Speaker 1: expected to report on results that are proven. And in
Speaker 1: the world of high tech and commercialization, um, the problem
Speaker 1: that the fake it till you make it sort of culture,
Speaker 1: the culture of saying we can do this, like like
Speaker 1: Pharaonos for example, is the most notorious example. I don't
Speaker 1: think those guys started out being dishonest. I think they're
Speaker 1: in this culture saying this is our dream and we're
Speaker 1: gonna do this. We're going to do this, we need
Speaker 1: the investments, we're going to do this. We don't do
Speaker 1: that in hospital and biomedical research. There are lives at
Speaker 1: stake and we cannot and we will not do that.
Speaker 1: Thanks for coming on so ten years we're ten years
Speaker 1: away from that. Do you have a surgery twenty he said, twenty, Um,
Speaker 1: you have a surgery plan right after us. Just have
Speaker 1: clinic today. So yesterday was to wash your hands, Wash
Speaker 1: your hands. You're great. You're a great guys. Thanks to plan,
Speaker 1: but also thanks for being so What you do is
Speaker 1: amazing work there in my hometown. We'd love to have
Speaker 1: dinner with you. I hope to never see you on
Speaker 1: a professional level. That's all I'm gonna say that. You're
Speaker 1: I just don't want to need your service because I'll
Speaker 1: be the first guy he touches the brand I go,
Speaker 1: I'll feel it, feeling you know what I'm feeling it.
Speaker 1: You wouldn't know what you'd be like. Really, we haven't
Speaker 1: dinner with him out there and oh rest in peace.
Speaker 1: Well that was fascinating. I was fascinated by all of that.
Speaker 1: I cannot say yet and I believe everything he said.
Speaker 1: I'm not exactly at ease about it, David Googleheim. What
Speaker 1: did we learn that we didn't learn? What do you
Speaker 1: got for us? Listen? Yes, well I have to fact
Speaker 1: check this doctor. He doesn't know everything. Was the one
Speaker 1: thing that I wanted to get to was something that
Speaker 1: was described in Business Insider how the neuralalink, the Elon
Speaker 1: Musk Company, how they plan to implant these things into
Speaker 1: your head. It would be inserted into the brain by
Speaker 1: a device not dissimilar to a sewing machine, which would
Speaker 1: use a stiff needle to poke the threads into place
Speaker 1: about one millimeter into the outer surface of the brain
Speaker 1: or the cortex. So you could go to a place
Speaker 1: and say, I need to put in and I need
Speaker 1: where you were going. I knew exactly that would be amazing.
Speaker 1: We were linked. That would be amazing. Technology wouldn't ever
Speaker 1: get your pants and your brain down at the same place. Well,
Speaker 1: remember David, what we said, bistical gime that there is
Speaker 1: a and they all do it. There is a level
Speaker 1: of hype even in scientific world, because they needed to
Speaker 1: custom the noise. So when you see if you're if
Speaker 1: you work in news like I did every day, the
Speaker 1: ones that kept pushed out are the ones that are
Speaker 1: a little bit more dramatic. Right. You like to think
Speaker 1: that they're being honorable and they're being you know, like
Speaker 1: he said, it did in a scientific community, they don't bys.
Speaker 1: But there's hundreds of millions, if not billions, of dollars
Speaker 1: being invested in Silicon Valley now because they think this
Speaker 1: is the next frontier. But you know, also, your brain
Speaker 1: is the last space with brain hacking, like you with privacy,
Speaker 1: they download your neural file. It's somewhere and somebody uploads
Speaker 1: your neural file and they got your thoughts listen this
Speaker 1: whole thing. I totally understand the benefits of being able
Speaker 1: to use this technology to vastly improve people's lives. I
Speaker 1: could even see, honestly that it could be an exciting
Speaker 1: way for people to have experiences they could not otherwise
Speaker 1: afford or be able to do. If you can imagine,
Speaker 1: if you can, if you can input in and stimulate site, sound,
Speaker 1: taste all that stuff, and use it to say to somebody,
Speaker 1: all right, you're going to travel today. You're gonna go
Speaker 1: to this place and have a complete sensory understanding of
Speaker 1: that place. UM. I think that could be exciting. I
Speaker 1: think that that's yeah. I think there's all kinds of potential.
Speaker 1: That's total recall. That's recall. But you know, there are
Speaker 1: things that I think, as we move forward, are going
Speaker 1: to excite the imagination of how to use this. But
Speaker 1: I just to me, the whole world is skynet. I
Speaker 1: keep seeing somebody nefariously using this technology to implant um
Speaker 1: a reality that doesn't exist, and all of a rock
Speaker 1: and you're sitting in Google like Keanu Reeves you know,
Speaker 1: is sucking off of you for nutrition. It's just for you.
Speaker 1: So here's my final word. Ready, here's what I think.
Speaker 1: If they can download you neurally, I'll be canceled for
Speaker 1: something I didn't even know. I'm thinking, they go, how
Speaker 1: dare you go? What we downloaded you nermally? And you
Speaker 1: can't believe it? You in there? It was you said,
Speaker 1: I didn't say that, Oh it was in there, And
Speaker 1: all of a sudden, yeah, wow, no Wather you're right.
Speaker 1: Then it's thought please and that's all that other stuff.
Speaker 1: I'm there. The good thing is, the good thing is
Speaker 1: with the two of us, not a lot of thoughts.
Speaker 1: So they would probably right now today if you could
Speaker 1: interface the technology that use you use most often, just
Speaker 1: by ahead, yeah, just by having Oh my godhead, it
Speaker 1: would be great to do it. It's just it's it's
Speaker 1: one stuff up for the wireless ere buds. Boy, I
Speaker 1: cannot check my I could check my on my Amazon
Speaker 1: purchases without having to do it. Why didn't that arrive
Speaker 1: I wanted that Thursday. Oh my god, you could get
Speaker 1: I'm a busy guy in a gazillion I know, but
Speaker 1: we can't get you to do a lot of tech stuff. Well,
Speaker 1: that's true. You've got a dumbhouse. Remember we talked about
Speaker 1: that episode in the Dumbhouse. I have a human house.
Speaker 1: Oh oh, damnation to all of us that have tech
Speaker 1: and usual. I have a human house. I don't rely
Speaker 1: on technology to do a lot of the things that
Speaker 1: people rely on. Course, I don't need a refrigerator to
Speaker 1: tell the supermarket what I need. I can open the
Speaker 1: door and make a list. And you know, by the
Speaker 1: way phone to eat. There's nothing could eat, So maybe
Speaker 1: you should use well, you know, you'll make fun. You
Speaker 1: go ahead and make fun. I'm telling you this is
Speaker 1: a scary technology. Now really, now, really, all right, ladies
Speaker 1: and gentlemen, thank you for joining us. We want to
Speaker 1: thank doctor Daniel Yosher, a beautifully nationally recognized neurosurgeon. Beautiful,
Speaker 1: beautifully I'm like, I'm like Trump. I had work. He
Speaker 1: was amazing, he was wonderful. He's also the chair of
Speaker 1: the Department of Neurosurgery in the Perilment School of Medicine
Speaker 1: at the University of Pennsylvania. You can follow doctor Yosher
Speaker 1: and his mind boggling work on Twitter at Daniel Yosher.
Speaker 1: You can find us online at really No Really dot com, Instagram,
Speaker 1: and TikTok. We're at Really No Really Podcast. You can
Speaker 1: leave us messages anywhere or those places. Tell us one
Speaker 1: of your really No Really is maybe we'll do it
Speaker 1: on the show. We want to thank all of you.
Speaker 1: If you're watching us on YouTube, please subscribe and rate us,
Speaker 1: and then we also want to tell you that we
Speaker 1: will be dropping new episodes every Tuesday, so she'll be
Speaker 1: sure to follow us on the iHeartRadio app, the Apple app,
Speaker 1: or wherever you get your podcast. We'll see you soon.
Speaker 1: Thanks for watching, and I'm severing the link right here
Speaker 1: we go severed