I do not work on AI but would like to keep up with recent events. There was an article in Communications ACM (if I'm not mistaken) within the last year or two about the brain mapping, and this most recent SC12/RJ10502.pdf describes the hardware. I've been disappointed that there were no links to fundamental insights gained with this or with smaller prototypes.
In the early 1970's for an undergraduate class paper I wrote that the cerebellum was similar to a hologram, thereby implementing an associative memory. (Very high connectivity 10^6 in, each output has 10^4 to 10^5 connection, many sources of input both physical and from cerebrum. No need to tailor which input connects to which output, just as no need to control phase of wave from each source of light to each silver halide grain, with enough connectivity one gets associative memory. Maybe my explanation is too brief to be clear.) Later I learned about "spin glass" and "energy minimization" type of neural network -- based on the terminology it is obvious that the course was taught from the perspective of a physicist. I realized that the associative memory with feedback gave a general purpose computer. Having such a system partition itself into functional units would result in an awesomely complex and potentially powerful AI computer. The above is old news, old ideas. The question is: for the layered structure of the cerebrum, what can it do? Perhaps there are new paradigms, new broad, conceptual models of brain function. My point is, why do descriptions of the hardware not give links to research groups that are thinking creatively about what the hardware can do. It is reasonable to suppose that with the capability of simulating 530 billion neurons and 100 trillion synapses and also having a logical organization similar (in some respects) to a real brain, there are research groups of really clever people who have written new paradigms about neural computing and are been doing simulations on machines that are smaller than the one described in the SC12 article. Where can I and others learn about the conceptual developments related to these large neural simulators? Alan -- Alan Scheinine 200 Georgann Dr., Apt. E6 Vicksburg, MS 39180 Email: [email protected] Mobile phone: 225 288 4176 http://www.flickr.com/photos/ascheinine _______________________________________________ Beowulf mailing list, [email protected] sponsored by Penguin Computing To change your subscription (digest mode or unsubscribe) visit http://www.beowulf.org/mailman/listinfo/beowulf
