“I do find it implausible that an implant would go directly into the brain of someone with zero health problems,” he said. “But if companies take the right approach in helping people with the greatest need, then there may be a way for this to spread into people with less severe conditions, and then eventually become a kind of brain augmentation.”

Certainly, many of these projects will be met with skepticism. And Silicon Valley’s enthusiasm does not always mesh with the physical limitations of medicine and the human body.

“In the physical sciences, there are physical boundaries,” said Matt Angle, a neuroscientist and the founder of Paradromics. “To think that you’ll be able to blow through fundamental laws by sheer ambition and enthusiasm is naïve.”