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A New Look At Brain Control
one_neuron_two_neuron writes "Researchers at Harvard have taken a new look at how electricity can make neurons fire in the brain. The scientists found some surprising things: if you stick an electrode in the brain and apply current, you don't just make a small group of neurons fire — many neurons fire a long way away from the electrode. That's probably because instead of activating the cell bodies of the neurons, their axons fire. Those axons are the wiring of the brain. Your cerebral cortex is something like a big pile of unwound yo-yos — if you stick an electrode into the cortex, you're much more likely to hit the strings (the axons), and the yo-yo connected to the string can be really far away. So, how will you ever hook up a computer to your brain? This data shows that we need to rethink how to do that with electrical current. If you stick an electrode in one place, neurons in a totally different place will fire. New optogenetic methods (e.g. using viral delivery of proteins) might work. Or possibly we will figure out how to make the brain learn to interpret these sparse, widespread electrical patterns. New optical techniques have made a dramatic impact on neuroscience recently, and this study uses pulsed-laser-scanning microscopy (two-photon microscopy) to take pictures of neurons deep inside the living brain. The academic paper (PDF) is available on the author's site."
So, how will you ever hook up a computer to your brain?
Who wants to? I can't think of anything dumber.
Your cerebral cortex is something like a big pile of unwound yo-yos
WTF? Why don't they just say "the brain is a big pile of neurons and axons"? It would be more helpful than this bizarre analogy.
... and then they built the supercollider.
A new look at brain control... in other words, what the government's been doing for the last 30+ years. Ever heard of the little CIA project called MK-ULTRA?
It makes me sad to think that some day, I'll be stumbling around with my brain machine interface, creating thought streams one at a time and accidentally thinking of something else halfway through, losing my work, and asking the kids for help.
And they'll look me in the eye and feign sympathy as they blast high-frequency shorthand thoughts back and forth to one another, mocking my generation for being so dumb that its members can't even work a brain port properly.
What if we just give people a magnet to wave around their heads...would that work, too? You know, with the induced current and all...
From the sophomoric language in the summary (my apologies to real sophomores, like the ones in high school) and the fact the paper hasn't been submitted anywhere and so who else would have access, I conclude that it is the first author (a student), not the second (a post doc that did the matlab work) or third (an MD/PHD) that posted this here. Calling yourself a researcher and not making your student status clear is a failure of full disclosure. It also works against you in that people will forgive a students a lot of mistakes that they'll end up holding against you otherwise.
In your hurry to promote your ideas you gloss over or ignore a large body of research that disproves your assertions.
- We've known for a long time about sparse networks and distal activation. The distribution is due to Hebbian assemblies. Hebb, Donald O.
- We can and do stimulate and record nearby spatially and temporally. Use the stimulation pulse as the deactivation signal on the recording probe. We can even do them simultaneously with high impedance, high speed data collection equipment and adjusting the output Y scale to logarithmic. Ask Vince to explain this last part. We also use magnetic stimulation and shielded electrical probes.
- Inadequate and poorly stated background material is a sure way to not only get rejected but also get remembered by those editors and rejected in the future. You've got to assume that not only will some of them know about the field, some of those reading your submission may be among those being misrepresented or those who you fail to represent but should have.
- The above goes double for trying to make your idea sound good by making others sound bad. It pisses people off, and you may be wrong (you are) which just gets your manuscript returned.
- You fail to show that your method can be generalized to normal neuron activation, and thus be useful for (the inadequately described) computer interface, or anything else that requires 'normal' operation. And not being able to show normal operation means not being able to tell if and/or when your method causes incorrect operation or damage.
- The background theory and history shortcomings call into question your theory, the need for your technique, and the usefulness of your large volume of supporting data and graphics. This last part looks like argumentation by bafflement - flooding the reader with overly technical details in order to bullshit them into accepting your other points. Even if it's not that, it looks like it.
Does Dr. Reid know this was posted here?
"I may be synthetic, but I'm not stupid." -- Bishop 341-B
i just want to be able to download stuff to my brain, kinda like in the matrix, maybe a bluetooth chip embeded in my head
If you look at the water surface during the rain, you will see waves crossing all the time.
Now imagine that in the brain you have the response exactly in places where several waves cross to merge into one temporal peak. Thus, it is important to have a frequency that can be modulated... Now imagine that you have billions of neurons (drops of water) and trillions of places where waves cross to form signal strong enough to induce another wave.
I am not a brain researcher, but can you reproduce this chaos using light interference to create artificial brain?
As a former neuroscientist I can attest to the difficulty of stimulating one neuron specifically. One needs to realize the concept of stimulation by and electrode is completely meaningless without a proper understanding what brain activity normally looks like. It doesn't look like one 'sending' neuron in an otherwise tranquil environment. It looks like an ant hill of signals with groups of 'sending' and groups of 'listening' neurons, changing roles all the time. So even when you are over the surprise that you may be poking an axon instead of a neuron soma, there is still a long way to go before you get what you are poking into..
If you're trying connect a computer to the brain, why not connect it through the nerves. Sounds way more pleasant than brain electrodes.
Your cerebral cortex is something like a big pile of unwound yo-yos
Yeah, great. Thanks for clearing that one up Slashdot.
I would've started SolarSidewalks, or SolarPaths. There has to be nearly just as much or a shit-ton more paths than roads around the world. It's a lot safer, considering humans can deal with a slippery surface pretty well while on foot (unless you're running). You can install a long lengths of concrete where you need the most traction, like intersections and inclines. And paths are generally cleaner than roads by far. also allowing the panels to collect more light.
And, it probably wouldn't have to include a huge price tag in comparison to a major overhaul of a busy road infrastructure.
Particularly the language "totally different place."
Neurons in a "totally different place" will fire....this kind of language doesn't comfort me about the prospect of sticking electrodes into my brain. "We're not totally sure which neurons we're firing. It could be the ones we're touching with this little wire or it could be ones in a totally different place.. I guess we'll find out, huh?!?!"
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If my neurosurgeon said that to me as he started drilling into my skull I would be wanting to strongarm my way out of the OR....
ïIf only I could get my head out of this damn Clockwork Orange device...
This is so patently obvious that to call it a new discovery is just silly. Who conducted this study at Harvard; the accounting department?
Anyone involved in brain science knows how interconnected the brain is and how remotely connected neurons are. Why would anyone assume that forcing one neuron to fire from an electrical stimulus would only affect neurons locally?
you don't just make a small group of neurons fire -- many neurons fire a long way away from the electrode. That's probably because instead of activating the cell bodies of the neurons, their axons fire. [...] and the yo-yo connected to the string can be really far away.
Was this ever not blatantly obvious?
I'm always shocked by how unobvious the whole concept of the brain is to even the very "scientists" who work on it.
They seem to always be caught in some tiny box and/or focusing on details that are only artifacts of the foundational rules.
I'm sorry, but trying to identify what a specific part of the brain does (except for some really specific parts like the cerebellum), is a pointless exercise, that shows that you don't really understand the point of the way a neural network works.
It is like looking at the digital data inside a memory chip, instead of the wires themselves, to understand how the chip itself works. You can gain something from it. But why use such a bad point of view?
And this is even worse: I mean, who here seriously did not think that when you stick an electrode in your brain, the electricity will run down the axons it touches, to land anywhere that axon ends (Which sometimes can be more than 2 or 3 feet away somewhere down/up the spine!)
What did they think before? That it only touches the cells themselves? That's like only touching the fruits inside of a rolled up raspberry bush.
Oh, and by the way: Yo-yos? Really? That's the worst analogy ever. Or did you do that to foster "Yo dawg, [...] yo momma and yo yo ma's yo-yo [...]" jokes?
Any sufficiently advanced intelligence is indistinguishable from stupidity.