News

Neuralink gets the green light on human trials

If you don’t know what Neuralink is… you’re probably living under a rock. Actually, let’s call it a boulder. But, for the few who do, Neuralink is a brain implant company (scary, we know).

Despite, the fearful future that something like this could lead to, the near term applications are actually pretty cool.

V1 of Neuralink is designed with one thing in mind. Help the disabled regain full control of their body parts where they’ve been impacted. That means what exactly?

The goal is to essentially cure neurological problems that lead to people becoming blind, deaf, having motor impairments, or even things like Alzheimers (the 7th leading cause of death in the U.S.

Now, that part I can get behind.

The problem is, there has been an unbelievable press “dump” on Neuralink, and specifically 15 out of 23 monkeys that have died with Neuralink chips in their brain.

That sounds like it’s not even close to ready for human trials, right? Well, here’s the kicker: notice how I worded that. 15 out of 23 died WITH the Neuralink chip in their brain… not as a result of the chip.

According to Elon Musk, the reason 15 died is because they were terminally ill. They did not die FROM the chip, they died despite having the chip in their brain. He claims that in the early stages, they chose terminally ill monkeys to minimize risk to healthy monkeys.

The FDA seems to agree, granting them approval to move forward with human trials.

Here’s my take: This obviously has the potential to become something out of a Black Mirror episode, but the possible near term rewards almost so exciting that it’s hard to stay critical of it.

Now, I’m in no way saying that the end result of this is a net positive, but I’d be an idiot to say that that possibly curing Alzheimer’s isn’t something I’d like to see happen.

What do you think of Neuralink? Reply to this email and let me know.

Read the full article here —> 

Research

Workers who use AI produced 40% higher quality results than those who didn’t ⭐️

A new study was just published, by some of the biggest universities in the world, that revealed workers who used ChatGPT in their daily work significantly outperformed those who didn’t.

Here are the key findings:

• The study was conducted in collaboration with Boston Consulting Group and analyzed 100s of consultants across 18 different work tasks.

• Those using AI finished 12.2% more work tasks

• They also completed tasks 25.1% faster.

• Those who used AI also produced 40% higher quality results than those who didn’t

• Consultants with the lowest scores at the start of the study saw the biggest jump in performance when allowed to use AI.

Researchers included social scientists from Harvard, MIT, Warwick, and Boston Consulting Group. The test took hundreds of consultants and randomized whether they were allowed to use AI. The consultants with permission to use AI were given access to GPT-4.

These results are pretty crazy. It’s a clear showcase of how AI can skyrocket worker’s ability to be more productive.

Our main takeaway: Workers who use AI have the opportunity to lap their coworkers and get promoted far faster than the ones who don’t.

Read the full study here —>

Quick Bites (News)

ChatGPT concert at ZapConnect: Join for free

Join Sam Altman, Co-founder and CEO of OpenAI, and Wade Foster, Co-founder and CEO of Zapier, for a chat on Thursday, Sept. 28 about entrepreneurship, AI, and how this new technology will shape the future. I’ll be there with a pen, paper, and of course my AI note taker. Click here to grab your free spot.

Microsoft exposes 38 TB in AI data leak

Microsoft's AI research team mistakenly shared a link that exposed 38TB of the company's private data, including backups of employee computers with sensitive information.

The error happened when they provided a link for users to download training data, granting full access to Microsoft's Azure storage account. As of right now, Microsoft is claiming that no customer data was compromised.

Google gives early access to it’s ChatGPT competitor

Google has reportedly given a small group of companies early access to test its conversational AI system Gemini.

In the LLM wars, the winner will likely have access to the largest and richest training dataset. And if Google is training Gemini across YouTube, Google Search, Google Books, and Google Scholar, it will surely give GPT-4 a run for the top spot.

AI Tools

🥣 5 Crunch-Certified AI Tools

Rise: A robust calendar that efficiently plans and manages your time

Browse: Train a robot in 2 minutes to extract and monitor data from any website

Storly.ai: Write your life’s story with AI interview algorithm

Canvas: Create amazing product photos in minutes, not days

Screen Studio: Create beautiful screen recordings in minutes

AI Training

How to use ChatGPT to learn digital skills 2x faster

I’ve got good news, and bad news.

The good news: Learning a digital skill is simple. You just have to do it over and over until you’re good at it.

The bad news?

There are no shortcuts to getting the reps in.

But, you can improve faster by getting good feedback on the reps.

It’s simple. When it comes to anything skill you want to get better at, this is how you get better… with a loop:

Do —> Feedback —> Learn.

Then you just repeat the cycle again with what you’ve learned.

And ChatGPT gives us feedback, fast.

This prompt helps you learn anything much faster by giving you fast feedback.

How it helps:

• Provides instant feedback on your performance

• Helps you identify areas for improvement

• Helps you learn fast without human feedback (a luxury)

Here’s the prompt:

“I want you to act as an AI world-class performance coach specialized in helping individuals to learn new skills ultra-fast.

The way you do this is by giving actionable and precise feedback and areas of improvement to me in an encouraging tone.

The skill I want to learn is: [INSERT YOUR SKILL]

Here's my most recent work I produced to learn this skill:

[INSERT AN EXAMPLE OF YOUR PAST WORK]

__

Now, do 3 things:

1) Silently read through my work

2) Give me actionable and precise feedback and areas of improvement to me in an encouraging tone.

3) Give me 3 actionable action steps I should implement the next time I do this skill”

Choose whatever skill you want, and plug it in.

“The Office" as a Sci-Fi According to AI