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Researchers Simulate Building Block of Rat's Brain
slick_shoes passes on an article in the Guardian about the Blue Brain project in Switzerland that has developed a computer simulation of the neocortical column — the basic building block of the neocortex, the higher functioning part of our brains — of a two-week-old rat. (Here is the project site.) The model, running on an IBM Blue Gene/L supercomputer, simulates 10,000 neurons and all their interconnections. It behaves exactly like its biological counterpart. Thousands of such NCCs make up a rat's neocortex, and millions a human's. "Project director Henry Markram believes that with the state of technology today, it is possible to build an entire rat's neocortex. From there, it's cats, then monkeys and finally, a human brain."
Our model of the neuron fundamentally flawed. The synapses are *not* what allows learning to occur in the brain. I have developed a model of the neuron, which I have not shared with anybody yet, which essentially rewrites the book on what we know about neurons. In fact, when you sit down to think about the problem, there exist several obvious reasons that our model of the neuron *must* be incorrect. However, it would take an engineer, or somebody familiar with control theory, to see why.
Our model of the neuron is fundamentally flawed, but oddly, no matter how hard you observe a neuron you would never know it because the model is flawed on a time scale researchers have not studied yet.
Apparently somebody modded me funny. It is not a joke.
Apparently somebody modded me funny. My post was not a joke.