A brain in a supercomputer | Henry Markram

www.ted.com Henry Markram says the mysteries of the mind can be solved -- soon. Mental illness, memory, perception: they're made of neurons and electric signals, and he plans to find them with a supercomputer that models all the brain's 100,000,000,000,000 synapses.
TEDTalks is a daily video podcast of the best talks and performances from the TED Conference, where the world's leading thinkers and doers give the talk of their lives in 18 minutes. Featured speakers have included Al Gore on climate change, Philippe Starck on design, Jill Bolte Taylor on observing her own stroke, Nicholas Negroponte on One Laptop per Child, Jane Goodall on chimpanzees, Bill Gates on malaria and mosquitoes, Pattie Maes on the "Sixth Sense" wearable tech, and "Lost" producer JJ Abrams on the allure of mystery. TED stands for Technology, Entertainment, Design, and TEDTalks cover these topics as well as science, business, development and the arts. Closed captions and translated subtitles in a variety of languages are now available on TED.com, at www.ted.com/translate. Watch a highlight reel of the Top 10 TEDTalks at www.ted.com/index.php/talks/top10

[@LordMorningStar]

Watching and listening to these kind of videos always bring me back to the fundamental question I ask myself - what the hell am I?!

[@SpinyNormanDinsdale]

I can't believe how clear and concise this talk was, especially since it involved the brain!. It was so elegantly spoken and he skillfully avoided talking psycho-babel which I think we all appreciate :)

[@xTriad]

This is one of the best TED talks. Great speech.

[@TheLoserKingdom]

@Flem1337 I'm a 17 year old (a dumb one at that) and I could understand most of what he said. Of course, I did need to search up a bit to have a more thorough understanding of what he was talking about, but hey, we never stop learning. In face, this video, along with Jill Bolte Taylor's TED talk enabled me to get a 96% on my English essay about truth, reality and perception! I love learning about the brain, and this project excites me!

[@Udinbak]

@Udinbak cont. It could see which connections are active during a particular thought, it could refine it's thoguht processes, edvice on improvements, or refinements. It could ask to sever a synapse in order to reduce an unwanted response, strengthen it to increase a desireable response, even request a new synaptic pathway to connect and explore disparate functions/memories/senses/etc (synesthesia). If the new region could make these adjustments, then it would be able to do it automatically.

[@dismutased]

Astounding. I hope we see this technology evolve into something very interesting.

[@Udinbak]

just a few tips to consider when you've got the brain mapped and symulated.. basically consider giving it extra regions. by which I mean, for example, create a region which is given information on the brain ie the information the reasearchers are lookng at. not all of it, but at least the map of neural activity. then connect that region with the visual cortex. The point being to allow the simulated consciousness to "see" how it's brain functions. That way, it can give direct feedback.

[@etiennealive]

That was pretty amazing to see ! 5 stars !

[@ReductioAdAbsurdum]

"it's blew a gasket" Indeed. :) I wrote the same phrase earlier in this phrase and got it right. The typing fingers sometimes have a mind of their own; muscle memory, I guess. I have a real problem transposing 'think' and 'thing', do it all the time.

[@Shaunt1]

These get better and better! Amazing what they are doing.

[@ultravidz]

woww this is what ive been waiting for from Ted!!

[@Awesomenizzleness]

I actually looked this up by using my brain

[@starwarsgeek8]

Damn... My brain's just a jumble of equations? I feel mortally insulted.

[@Udinbak]

when they activated it, it began experiencing and thinking. Learning is provided by experience. the moment they showed it a flower, it started to think about the flower and in the process learned about the shape and colour, but since it's out of context (imagine complete sensory deprevation, then suddenly you see a flower) it's ability to "learn" is limited.

[@SpunkySkunk347]

I like this video a lot - too actually be able to map out the processes, the coding, the hard-wiring of neuronal circuitry is amazing - I can't wait to see the results.

[@Udinbak]

@Udinbak cont2. The region would have to be passive at first in order to train the new brain to understand the sensory experience, then active control gradually increased while the mind becomes accustomed to making self adjustments. safety protocols in place of course. active and passive control at the early phases would be counter productive, since the young mind would exploratorially make potentially damaging alterations which could render the mind insane. or the equivalent.. just a thought..

[@NsaneNtheNbrane]

This is amazing and inspiring.

[@BinaryReader]

thanks ted, ive been waiting months to hear this talk.

[@etiennealive]

This video is on the net only 1 day and look at the amount of (different) reactions ... Amazing subject.!!!

[@HKragh]

I'm glad there are people out there with a more... optimistic attitude towards the things we have yet to explain;) Ofcourse it'll be solved. You think people a million years from now will still have no clue? But it IS a tough one, and I agree very much that what he is talking about here, has very little to do with the actual "feeling" of being a human being. Though, as soon as we have build the model, it'll be alot easier to approach the following topics.

[@ahmedasim3942]

This is really a great and commendable effort . It will help engineers built a living , evolving and adaptive hardware. Somthing like a standalone decision making machine . Well the flip side of it will more people of jobs .

[@Surfurplex]

Wow, that was awesome.. Also, the sentence "We can fire it up, and see what happens" is just so awesome :P

[@kevinrothi]

This is very similar to Hierarchical Temporal Memory, and both of them are different implementations of Adaptive Resonance Theory.

[@Boehoehuahoei]

i haven't seen this video for a while now! BUT THIS IS AWESOME!!!! 8 years to go! lol

[@jsymons1985]

Once you build the circuit, how do you then model the dynamics of the morphology of the "circuitry" itself, that is, how the neurons re-wire themselves based on learning. If the circuitry is static, and the only dynamics are those of the circuit, namely, the cumulative firings between neurons, the brain is never really learning. Am I right? In other words, the brain architecture changes over time. How do you account for this?

[@corkkyle]

I can produce a super-computer that will smoke any supercomputer in production today... it takes me about 9 months to build it, and then about 18 years to train it.

[@eragon2121]

Truly amazing

[@spartan9180]

the electrical stimulation part around 13 minutes was incredible.

[@jsymons1985]

that's 100 billion laptops

[@crawlFace]

Very inspiring talk. When we approach such possibilities with sincerity, the results are a celebration of life.

[@Udinbak]

@Udinbak cont3. the study of creating new regions in order to process information in new ways (like a region that analyses visual input and computes precise distances, velocities, mass, angles, weight, etc. or one that can interpret hmtl and has access to the internet) will be invaluable when you (the future) get round to addnig functionality to the human brain.virtualising a new region and integrating it into an unaltered human brain will be the key to transhuman consciousness.

[@MrVrsilvestrejr2008]

Supercomputer can perform perfectly at Antarctica, Alaska, Greenland, Arctic, North Canada and North Russia.

[@Chukwu1848]

Absolutely fascinating!

[@ForceUser]

Really wish they'd discuss the actual equations they bring out in videos like this, I like having the math behind it explained.

[@2661960]

Amazing!

[@Ibogaineuk1]

A deeply fascinating & most Intriguing subject....

[@planetoperator]

the reason the moon 'looks' or 'seems' larger when it's near the horizon is due to a lens magnification effect caused by the light from it traveling through a larger section of the earths atmosphere. another cool exercise for your brain- when you see part of an object, but the majority is hidden out of your view, your brain can finish the object and represent it in your mind. i find this to be a very important clue to how the universe around us is represented.

[@ThroneofEden]

A very facsinating talk, even if it's all theoretical. Though, it's nice to see that people are putting the effort into trying to figure out how to build a brain. I would love to see how these guys progress over the next decade.

[@okuma0kuma]

when they crack the code i hope they install firewall i dont want flash adverts projected into my dreams lol

[@4E65676174726F6E]

Such is the stable equilibrium.

[@d3daiM]

I agree, but it is hard to remain as open as most people when you are an "intellectual" free thinker, because one's subject of intellect often requires that person to dedicate a majority of his life to master the subject objectively. As a result, it would be expected for that person to be quite reserved to his theories. Yes, it is possible to remain still open despite that. It takes a great person. And that's a lifelong journey, irrespective of intellect.

[@halneufmille]

That sounds very cool, what work are you referring specifically about?

[@Silhouette93]

Amazing.

[@awerner2007]

Well put.

[@gucker07]

the theory he is presenting here around the 13-15 minute mark is just mind-blowing. i doubt many people listening to markram for the first time realize what he is actually saying though..

[@planetoperator]

yeah, that's what happens when people recite and not research. i've made knowing and researching the sky and the universe my life, and plenty know more than me. it doesn't bother me when someone questions me or says i'm wrong, it motivates me to double check my theories and beliefs, and i usually learn something new..

[@fight2Bfree]

I don't know.. I can only comment on where I have been living for the last 30 yrs (UsA) it seems people got along with each other better in the 70 early 80s than they do today. A LOT better. These days it seems people are full of rage for some reason.. I don't know why..

[@saerain]

He didn't propose any new theory. That wasn't the point. He was filling us in on the progress of the research. Meet TED.

[@kasuskasus]

Looking forward to his holographic presentation in 9 years!

[@Yggdrasill8]

As long as we continue our exponential progress in science, it seems very certain that this will eventually be solved considering how far we came from just the last century. Thing is, the final answer to this question might seem completely different or ever more complex than what we previously postulated.

[@DTevr89]

That's great! At least you have some sort of unseen sense of fashion.

[@HarshColby]

It will be interesting to follow this experiment and see how far they get. I wouldn't think it takes an entire 'laptop' to simulate a neuron since neurons run much slower than computers, but who am I to say ;) I'm sure sentience is way way off though.

[@P00P0STER0US]

The concept of being able to build a brain is both exciting and terrifying. I don't know if we'll have synthethic brains in 10 years but I might go pull Blade Runner off my dvd rack and give it a spin.

[@Mood1ndigo]

@Hsapienslaptopicus I don't know whether you meant that as an oblique insult, but I love HHGTTG! Also, at the risk of losing all my credibility, I'll clarify: I meant to say "neurobiology"**. I frequently type one in place of the other. I know...I'm an idiot.

[@NicknVio]

Fascinating. If we are confined in a bubble or territorial space known as the universe and it provides at the extreme human possible extension of his potential, then it it could be seen as a deliberate design for "milking" / nursery / isolation virtual room for potentialities. In the layman's term if we keep on zooming neurons, we would be looking at a quantum representation of ourselves. Perhaps that is how we are created.. just a hypothesis among many other possibilities,

[@hal970fx]

This is absolutely fantastic.

[@AutodidacticPhd]

Seeing as these simulations are run on computers, and thus are completely and understandably deterministic, any simulation you run on it can be perfectly recreated at any time. Besides, I highly doubt that they are going to get anywhere near what we would recognize as consciousness in anything like the time table he laid down.

[@Sakura71390]

@winterstellar agree!

[@Ibogaineuk1]

Hmmm...there are some interesting consequences of the points that have been raised here pertaining to mental equilibrium. I would use an analogy that nearly all psychotropic drugs (especially SSRI's) are tantamount to being nothing more than blunt instruments, like using a chain saw for brain surgery, conversely entheogens that attenuate essential neurotransmitters such as Serotonin or dopamine can be likened to being a precision "scalpel" like tool. Way way cool.......

[@int3rl0per]

We always create to fill a need, with great variation on the definition of 'need'. There's no reason a sufficiently large and well-trained neural network or other brain simulation could not do the same.

[@kaje01]

Right, but the point of what he was saying with all the perception stuff was that you only believe you can think infinitely. If you have a single neuron and you stimulate it, all it can know or think is either "yes" or "no". Through millions of these networked together a more complicated "infinity" emerges. There is no magic in your brain. If it can think of infinity, then there is a reason for it, and that reason can be measured / understood / reproduced.

[@SonOfTerra92]

Science is awesome !!!

[@neverthat79]

@leostoltoy If the universe is around 15 billion years old, than it took it around 11 billion years to create the first brain. Which also goes together with what he says later, that the universe has evolved a brain to see itself. Also reminds one of Carl Sagan: "We are the way the cosmos can know itself"

[@4E65676174726F6E]

It makes perfect sense if you don't intend on being mystical. The 'projection' is just the brain's comprehension of the world, which is translated to motor output, which produces new input and further 'projections' ad infinitum. So yes, it's infinite in a sense, much like any other piece of non-halting computer software or other information processes for that matter, until it is forced into conclusion through an external force of nature.

[@LordMorningStar]

I am in LOVE with SCIENCE!!!!

[@ReductioAdAbsurdum]

"That is kind a postulate that heart is just a pump, like so many others. You can hold on to it if you it gives you peace." Are you saying the heart is NOT a pump?! I don't "hold on to it" because it gives me peace -- holding beliefs because they feel good is antithetical to science -- I hold that belief because it's a fact. "Please allow me see science in context of humanity." How could you not? Science was CREATED by humanity, the entire methodology is deeply rooted in our humanity.

[@SimonSez83]

very interesting presentation .... even the advertisement is interesting lol

[@aaronkeogh]

This is quite interesting because I've read that, a brain can grow infinitely big with a relative amount of energy

[@egokick]

@matt7kiwi what's a spirit? how do you detect one and do you believe you posses one?

[@ReductioAdAbsurdum]

As live4Cha said in a response to me, regarding a factual claim I made, "You can hold on to it if you it gives you peace." As if beliefs should be dictated not by the facts, but by what makes you feel good. This, sadly, is overwhelming true for the vast majority of human beings, even for the most objective among us.

[@Udinbak]

@The7whoate9 in fact they would need to effectively map an entire nervous system between the arificial brain, and the skin of the in game avatar. however that could be done seperately, and could in theory be interchangable VR bodies for the minds to inhabit.The main reason you would do this, is to study how the human brain processes information from multiple sources to create the internalised holographic world experienced by the mind.

[@dmnxCGi]

incredible

[@TheLoserKingdom]

@Udinbak Do you think that when they activated it it began learning?

[@doedicurus]

They should have done a presentation on rolex watch. now thats high tech!

[@etiennealive]

Imagine a fusion of Henry Markram simulation of the brain and Edward Witten's M T heory, wich includes 7 extra dimensions and there correspondence with our 3 D - time world. I wonder how the picture of the rose would 'reflect"in 11 dimensions.

[@lovecars890]

AMAZING

[@libanlibanliban]

Interesting!

[@haytam112211]

the brain may be constructed, however the "observer" cannot. the brain is just a processor that translates in this case visual information (light) coming through the senses (eye) into pulses as shown. It is not the brain that sees, it is "you" (some call it consciousness, soul) the observer that see and understand its reality. it is the same observer that consciously decides to make a certain decision (move one finger and not the other for no reason)

[@YourCritic]

You have to admit, artificial intelligence is a truly fascinating topic. If there's one thing I wish I could see before I die is for someone to build a "self aware" computer.

[@doloppost]

Knowledge is power.

[@TheLoserKingdom]

@Udinbak I agree. Smell and taste is (just) chemical impulses. We have detectors that can identify chemicals/smells. But the blue brain will be the only machine to experience it as we do.

[@quadlegsxxxxx]

yeah that was awesome

[@angelofquantum]

The world of Science and Consciousness are coming together. His great studies will revolutionize the world. This Presentation, as you view it, is one of the links that directs and propels my studies into a higher level of thought. Thank you, Dr. Angel De Jesus

[@leostoltoy]

@neverthat79 Fair point. I took his use of the word "evolving" in the sense of darwinian evolution, but if he simply meant "It's taken 11 billion years for brains to appear in the Universe" and "brains continued to change rapidly" then that's fair and I take back my comment!

[@daniellos333]

@The7whoate9 youre right, nano-technology is next.. there was a video of a laptop with a billion processors inside it, made by precise atom aligning, pretty amazing stuff..

[@iamafractal]

Just ten years away from when things realllly get moving...

[@omegavalerius]

Yes indeed he took power in 1985. Your argument is one often put forward and I see both its strength and what I would say weakness which was mainly that precisely the huge power of the arms raise and the SDI made it impossible for the Russians to negotiate about mutually cutting down their arsenals when a more peace loving regime was in place 1985 onwards. I also consider it as a risky move in good or worse to force a nation choose between war and loosing status as a world power.

[@Udinbak]

@neymoura I'm counting on it

[@starxyz]

interesting talk modelling a human mind is never going to be perfect.... what about the paradox of memory... subconsiousness... but this guy is very good in projecting the mechanism in a more simple way so that we all can understand

[@nyctim2009]

one computer equals one neuron but linking 10,000 computers or a million computers for that matter together will always give it a finite number of thought that is possible. A brain or one neuron for that matter is not finite but holds the possiblity to think infinitly. A person can and have thought of impossible things thoughout history, therefore the brain has the capacity to be infinite. That is something that computers can never do, is to think infinitively.

[@qbslug]

so consciousness is a series of decisions... that what I got from it

[@Mood1ndigo]

@TritonAlias No, and no - and I really don't understand how you reached either of those conclusions, given what I wrote. To clarify, I was using the term secularism" in a more colloquial (and maybe not entirely correct) sense; I DO believe in separation of church and state. That said...I wasn't attempting to make some grandiose statement worthy of being parsed under a magnifying glass. I was merely responding, casually, to a statement that I felt was unfair.

[@rickballance]

@winterstellar agreed.

[@xweather]

And, as we can see, Raymond Kurzweil was right: the Singularity is near !

[@mastablack47]

@Mood1ndigo Well Said

[@AllstarFPS]

big bang - "one day there was nothing, then it went boom"

[@Udinbak]

@Udinbak however once this has been created, there's not much stopping us from meeting them in their own reality. even if it's not fully emersve for us.

[@doloppost]

I agree. So the craft of appliance by powerhouses could be called a tool of evolution?

[@ReductioAdAbsurdum]

"It's just dogma of another kind." What exactly is my dogma? I've not said that emotions are inherently bad, in fact I never even said they "make us believe 'stupid shit'"; words you carelessly or deliberately put in my mouth. But they CAN be dangerous, they CAN make us believe stupid or even dangerous shit, of not tempered by reason, if taken to be a reliable measure of objective reality.

[@MorbidEverlasting]

life creates life.