8 on August 16, Beijing Youth Daily reporter learned that Elon Musk, CEO of Tesla and academician of the National Academy of Engineering, published a signed article in the "China Internet Information" magazine, mentioning the brain-computer interface. The value of in the field of medical rehabilitation and exploring the possibility of interplanetary habitat in outer space. He also said that one day technology may surpass human understanding and control.
Elon Musk stated in the article that he hopes to use technological means as much as possible to help realize a better future for mankind. To this end, any area that contributes to a sustainable future is worthy of our investment. Whether it is Tesla , a brain-computer interface company, or a space exploration technology company, the ultimate goal of these companies is to improve the quality of human life in the future and create as much practical value to the world as possible - Tesla Aiming to accelerate the world's transition to sustainable energy, brain-computer interface companies are involved in medical rehabilitation, and space exploration technology companies make interstellar connections possible.
Regarding clean energy, his starting point for thinking is how to create and store energy continuously and for a long time, and how to continuously provide power for future production and life. A sustainable energy future involves three components.
One is the generation of sustainable energy. In the long run, solar energy will become the main energy source for human civilization. Of course, wind power, hydropower, geothermal power, and nuclear power are also useful energy supplements.
The second is sustainable energy storage. In view of the change of day and night and the change of weather, we need many fixed battery banks to store solar and wind energy, because the sun will not shine all the time and the wind will not blow all the time. Intangible energy needs to be stored in a large number of fixed battery banks. .
The third is electrified transportation. All means of transportation, including cars, airplanes, and ships, will be electrified. Electric rockets may be difficult, but we may be able to make the propellant used in rockets from sustainable sources.
According to estimates, humans need approximately 300 terawatt hours of battery energy storage to achieve a sustainable energy transition. The biggest difficulty in promoting sustainable energy lies in the large-scale production of lithium battery cells. Specifically, from mining and element refining to the production line of battery cells and finally forming a battery pack, it needs to go through many complex links. It can be said that the production of battery cells restricts the rapid development of sustainable energy economy. In the energy revolution, Chinese companies will be a force that cannot be ignored.
He said that in addition to cars, humanoid robots are also becoming a reality. In 2021, Tesla will launch a universal humanoid robot (Tesla Bot). The height and weight of the Tesla robot are close to that of an adult. It can carry or carry heavy objects, and can also walk quickly in small steps. The screen on its face is an interactive interface for communicating with people.
Tesla robots were originally positioned to replace people in repetitive, boring and dangerous tasks. But the long-term goal is for it to serve thousands of households, such as cooking, mowing lawns, taking care of the elderly, etc. "We plan to launch the first humanoid robot prototype this year, and focus on improving the intelligence of the robot to solve the problem of large-scale production. Since then, as the production scale expands and costs decrease, the practicality of humanoid robots will increase year by year. In the future, "A home robot may be cheaper than a car."
He also mentioned that the brain-computer interface company is mainly engaged in the development of computer and human brain integration technology. The brain chip it developed is the size of a coin, similar to the smart watch . Such as wearable devices, but it can be more deeply integrated with the user's body - recording and stimulating brain activity by being implanted in the cerebral cortex.
Brain-computer interface technology will help those with spinal injuries and neurological diseases to restore limb sensation or motor function in the future, or allow quadriplegics to use their brains to easily operate computers or mobile phones.
Regarding many people’s questions about why we need to explore outer space and turn humans into multi-planetary creatures, he also explained that one day, when the sun expands and the earth is no longer habitable, we can take the spacecraft to fly to the new planet. home.By then we will become interstellar citizens, and human civilization will continue to exist. The first step to achieve interplanetary habitat is to reduce travel costs, first by building recyclable rockets, and then by building reusable giant spacecraft to continuously increase the carrying capacity. As of the beginning of this year, Space Exploration Technology Corporation has successfully achieved 79 rocket reuse flights, transporting cargo to the space station and sending ordinary people into space. We also designed and built the largest launch vehicle in history - "Starship", which can carry 100 passengers and supplies at a time. In the future, we plan to build at least 1,000 "starships" to send batches of pioneers to Mars to build a self-sufficient city.
Text/Beijing Youth Daily reporter Song Xia
editor/Tian Tian
