Atomic Brain? - Computerphile

How about a Neural Net where the neurons are actual atoms? Professor Phil Moriarty shows a paper demonstrating the principle from researchers at Radboud University in The Netherlands.
Professor Moriarty's blog with more detail: bit.ly/C_Atomic...
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This video was filmed and edited by Sean Riley.
Computer Science at the University of Nottingham: bit.ly/nottsco...
Computerphile is a sister project to Brady Haran's Numberphile. More at www.bradyharan.com

[@MikeM-py2hq]

Next video: "we got Doom to run on a single atom"

[@incription]

Can a single transistor run doom?

[@Yobleck]

@@incription yes but at 1 frame per year

[@deathtothebeardless2959]

@@Yobleck No. A single transistor cant even store a bit.

[@DehimVerveen]

@@deathtothebeardless2959 Yes it can, that's what NAND flash memory is based on. Floating gate MOSFETs. A single transistor can even store 4 bits in QLC memory. I'm pretty sure a single transistor can't run doom though.

[@mrpedrobraga]

@@DehimVerveen What the How?

[@alexrossouw7702]

Humans: "Okay, we don't need to use Cobalt any more after we invent better Li batteries..." Cobalt: "01001110 01101111"

[@neoqueto]

Cobalt is also useful in the semiconductor industry. But it this research goes anywhere then it will become even more prevalent in computers. Which is TERRIBLE news. Cobalt is mined in Congo using child slave labor.

[@mrpedrobraga]

@@neoqueto Maybe in the future when we mine in space, then. Can Cobalt be in asteroids, though?

[@ronnetgrazer362]

@@neoqueto But the number of atoms in 1 gram of kobalt gets you a lot of computing power. Like, more than all living human brains combined. That's one of the most exciting aspects of the atomic brain, approaching maximum information density. Plus, think of how much energy well be saving when most data processing and storage happens at that scale.

[@rumble1925]

@@neoqueto someone should tell them not to do that

[@Grunttamer]

@@neoqueto maybe cobalt isn’t the problem, maybe it’s the child labor

[@ShaunHusain]

Convenient my name is Shaun so the "Hi Shaun" really feels personal :D

[@tedchirvasiu]

Hi Shaun

[@thequantumworld6960]

Hi, Shaun.

[@daniilzadiran5851]

Shaun, hi

[@DanielSMatthews]

If we had quantum like effects in spoken language he could say hi to all of us at the same time and we would each resolve the actual sound he made to mean what we personally expected.

[@zvpunry1971]

Hi Shaun

[@alexandersinger9788]

Why do I feel a sudden urge to rewatch all those videos on AI safety? Robert Miles, heeeelp!

[@mynewestusername1]

Hi I'm an anti vaxxer anti Vicks ViX VEX methamphetamine in nasal decongestants as well as ketamine 💉 and *cough dxm olney lesion brain damage and CYP2D6 neglectful health care industry opiate pushers and murders ... Mask up mosque up 🤪🤐😷 ignorant🤐 alla🤐 myanmar gold thieves.. pot is a crime Optimus prime last knight DEBIAN linux anti pill gate way drug megatron metatron qubes os lover.. math not meth rip dmx 😔 *cough

[@mynewestusername1]

No idea, are you trying to hide a massacre or something? Or some fine as* puntang 🤪

[@mynewestusername1]

1984 exodus 3:14 serious SIRIUS david divide ✡️/✡️ star of david sirius epoch 1894.13 🧐

[@mynewestusername1]

💯% A+ E=Mc² einstein.... That's MEc²a MEcca Mecha Michael not cheMicheal chemical 🧐 math not meth

[@mynewestusername1]

J e s u s C H R I S T .. I thought I said MATH NOT METH 🤬

[@blaeser13]

Very fascinating, thanks Dr. Moriarty and Shaun! Quite the cliffhanger with "…the system can learn about its previous experiences." More on this please!

[@chalichaligha3234]

I don't think it's any more profound than a logical latch, which "remembers" or stores it's previous input.

[@gijsthoen5432]

I think there isn't a zero energy state in Prof Moriarty... Loving this guy to bits!!!

[@peterhansen5804]

This approach gives new meaning to the term "electronics"

[@andybaldman]

It's always used electrons, lol.

[@gloverelaxis]

@@andybaldman Not *individual* electrons, though.

[@andybaldman]

@@gloverelaxis Yes, individual electrons. Just a lot of them!

[@mrpedrobraga]

@@andybaldman Uh.....

[@DasGrosseFressen]

@@gloverelaxis well you do have single electron transistors...

[@crispyandspicy6813]

Everybody gangsta till the Cobalt atom starts asking what's the meaning of life

[@kylone1]

This seems like an actual possible way forward for Artificial General Intelligence. I wonder if we'll run into a practical limit, or not.

[@AbstractObserver]

"We've got an atom on a surface in ultra high vacuum", so this is how excited a physicist gets when his dream of a spherical cow in vacuum finally becomes a reality!

[@Dtomper]

Literally the best computer science channel in the existence.

[@antonios4553]

I miss him too. Him, Pound and Brailsford are the three G.O.A.T..S. ... hehe

[@sammyflowproductions933]

How is this idea different from the traditional Qbit? The possibility of many states- 0 or 1 or anything in between- is already in use, right?

[@as-qh1qq]

What a mind blowing video! 1 atom transistor.

[@HelliOnurb]

This is very interesting! I wouldn't dare call this a neuron tho.

[@NortheastGamer]

The lack of detail makes it sound sensationalist.

[@HelliOnurb]

@@NortheastGamer It's a bit funny. I think calling them neurons was pretty sensationalist in the first place... but you could also be right, so I'll give a bit of context. Boltzmann Machines have this problems: Networks only form simple undirected graphs with symmetric weights. That means no multiple connections between elements, no connections to themselves, and information computed has no directionality. Also elements only have two states (0 or 1). This atomic BM has one additional BIG restriction: Connections to a single atom are limited by the atoms one can place in its vicinity. In contrast: The amount of neurotransmitter released at a synapse can be modulated (so it's not really a binary thing), multiple synapses to a single other neuron are possible, there's directionality in these synapses, the geometry of neurons (and synaptic distribution) also plays a role in computation (non-linear relationships between input synapses), and more importantly in this case, a neuron can synapse not only to itself but also to thousands other neurons in distant (and very specific) locations at a time. This is only what comes to mind rn tho, there are surely many other things that could mentioned. These atomic computation devices seem super interesting and beautiful already (not to mention how useful they could become in the future), there wasn't really a need to call them something they are not. tl;dr The computational capacity of neurons is given by their complexity and it's only exponentially amplified by the complexity of the networks they can form, these devices are too simplistic to be called neurons imo.

[@HerbaMachina]

Agreed neurons are far more complex then what a lot of physists in computing seem to believe.

[@ShaunHusain]

CS folks don't try to model the physical brain down to the atom or even anything spatial. NN are just a model, roughly based on neurological structure, the activation potential of a "neuron" in code can be driven by incoming edges from "neurons" anywhere in memory so again distance doesn't really come into play... The closest thing to "distance" that we model is the weight or amount one "neuron" affects another.

[@ShaunHusain]

Also neural networks or NN are some of the most successful AI concepts around and has had recent revival due to its effectiveness when given a ton of data and a few thousand cuda cores on modern gpus (researchers now working on reduction of training sets so the networks can train faster and learn more)

[@quaidcarlobulloch9300]

More! I'm in love with this topic, absolutely thrilling. But don't less us distract if we are.

[@tramsgar]

Just when it started to get really interesting, part one ended!!

[@tomedward8652]

I think Sir Roger Penrose suggests that the brain works at the quantum level where there are 3 states instead of just 1 and 0s. He is doing research on microtubules which are potentially responsible for the quantum processing between neurons. This is one hypothesis why we will never be able to "write" a program to simulate consciousness with 1 and 0's.

[@TopNotch50]

Looks like the boys are back in town.

[@quaidcarlobulloch9300]

Are the electrons perfectly efficient? Always able to oscillate?

[@Laff700]

Yup!

[@Reth_Hard]

Do we know the basic principle about how the neurons inside the brain is doing calculations? I know it's not woking the same way like a CPU but do we at least have some clues about the fundemental elements that make our brain do what it is doing?

[@anhedoniac6390]

We have no idea why it works but we can see mechanically what our brain does when it's working.

[@Retinetin]

We know what neurons do down to a chemical level. We know they are like muscles, in which they get stronger/faster the more you use them. This is essentially what they are doing. The part of neuroscience we are still doing a lot of research on is understanding how the brain works as a whole. We understand it at the macroscopic scale, we understand it at the micro scale, but somewhere inbetween is where things are more theory

[@qu765]

I feel like some time in the future, some one is gonna figure out how to make neural-nets be perfectly trained nearly instantly on quantum computers.

[@mahmoudyahya1738]

the final part about the memory phenomena on an atom can be used to store data like a harddrive or as a replacement for the SSD in the future for an extra small / extra fast /extra dense data storage modules (atomic HardDisks) its simply the future repacement of the floating gate MOSFET used nowadays in SSD. the downside of this future tech is that it will be toooooooooo expensive vs its storage capacity. the only upside is that this gives rise to the possibilty of having a very small smartphone that is capable of playing very entertaining and complex console games. or a larger more fixed pc capable of faster OS startup / faster program booting etc.

[@IAmAlpharius14]

I believe he said this was done in a ultrahigh vacuum. Unless they find a way around that maintaining a vacuum in a phone is probably never gonna be practical

[@SecularMentat]

Is 'learn', 'experience' and 'remember' not overly anthropomorphized here? Or is there sound reasoning to build up to that position? This seems like a huge equivocation waiting to happen.

[@MePeterNicholls]

Ok this blew my mind

[@ivanluis2763]

Hello, prof. Moriarty, is this "the end of quantum computing"? And, is this the reason why Intel wasn't even trying to compete with the rest? If yes, I have more questions, thank you.

[@VeProducctions]

Another video with Professor Moriarty, the famous scientific criminal. Excellent.

[@illustriouschin]

Is there a minimum energy state for velocity?

[@Intermernet]

"At rest"

[@Kaslor1000]

So probably the computations done in the brain, consciousness and all that kind of stuff doesn't really happen on a neuron level, but within individual molecules or even atoms inside the neuron? Holy cow, so that means that each of our billions neurons is like a mini computer or mini neural net by itself.

[@StarCoreSE]

Maybe I didn't pay enough attention, but I don't understand what's new here, or how it can be of any help. They just made a neural network with atoms instead of transistors, cool, but that's pointless if you need a big laboratory machine to monitor each atom.

[@allhumansarejusthuman.5776]

Intresting.

[@AlabasterJazz]

How come it has to be cobalt? Couldn't it be any elemental atom?

[@PrivateSi]

The way it should be..... although some kind of photo-atomic hybrid could be the ultimate solution. atom-level electronic and photonic computing working together.

[@moccaloto]

Prof Moriarty has so much energy. Several trillion trillion electron volts at least

[@frankharr9466]

MAN he's got a nice voice. That's really interesting.

[@philipstuckey4922]

could this be a candidate for computronium?

[@alexob3643]

Cool!

[@rufusapplebee1428]

The only meaningful information in this video is single atom lithography ( 500picometer to 50picometer ) depending on the elements involved. NUMA architecture is a way to connect multiple CPU and GPU and other kinds of compute intensive processors and connecting each of them to their own dedicated resources. - universal compute gates at above the scale of single atoms ( e.g. NAND and NOR ) constitute classical compute elements. Neuromorphic is an exercise in branding the reconfigurable processors, its benefit is in able to redesign the processor at atomic level upon software instructions. - for subatomic applications ( the scaling of computational capacity ( via universal quantum gates ) is a byproduct not the main goal. The main goal of subatomic computing is always to harness and utilize high energy for various non relativistic applications.

[@zeevyehuda2501]

The guy from IT crowd!

[@Verrisin]

12:16 - This is what you came for.

[@neuron1618]

Interesting.

[@AlabasterJazz]

On the one hand we have people like this, actively driving progress on the cutting edge of technology. On the other we have anti-mask protests in the middle of a pandemic... I for one am very glad to have counter evidence of Humanity's stupidity so easily and readily available. Thank you educational side of KZbin

[@MrDaanjanssen]

6:35 that caption hahah

[@samuelec]

wow!

[@SubmitTheKraken]

Positronic brain? Sonny where are you?

[@baronvonschnellenstein2811]

I was thinking of R. Daneel Olivaw and his Positronic brain when I saw this video! I wonder what Isaac Asimov would make of this (and the Newton -> Palm Pilot -> Galaxy Tab / iPad) if he were still around?

[@laranjajefessor]

part 2

[@thecaptain8324]

Finally *Last!*

[@ob1jakobi]

I want to be as smart as this guy.

[@Callmecaleb1]

I wonder if my brain is like a big atom in a way..

[@Rubrickety]

It's so hard to tell if Phil is the Analog Kid or the Digital Man...

[@dogus972]

I watch this as if i understand it

[@utp216]

I don’t understand most of this.... but I love it!

[@thequantumworld6960]

See the link in the video information for a blog post that provides more detailed explanation.

[@0ne87]

Sounds exactly like a memristor at the end.

[@MateuszJagocha]

ComputerFail xD

[@davidsteiner5041]

Wild!

[@jkobain]

Like the number of dislikes on this video: 69 right now. For whatever reason.

[@colinsmith6480]

First to see this wow

[@vilivilenius1159]

Finally not first!

[@Amigps01]

Professor Moriarty is so handsome 👀👀👀

[@ronnetgrazer362]

Have you heard anything of what he said? Intelligences will remember this breakthrough 1 million years from now.

[@Amigps01]

@@ronnetgrazer362 nah I only watch science videos to look at all the handsome people. 🙃 Thanks for the useless input!

[@dragoncurveenthusiast]

"This is a big wet squishy thing with lots of very strange, weird stuff happening" 7:31 As a neuroscientist, I approve this message.

[@thekingoffailure9967]

As an avid e621 enjoyer, I too am a dragon curve enthusiast.

[@mynewestusername1]

That's too bad for the both of you

[@synexiasaturnds727yearsago7]

@@thekingoffailure9967 I like you

[@pladimir_vutin]

as a corrupt-minded, i misinterpreted this in a very nasty way

[@bdiddy77777]

Prosecutor: "Why did you kill this man?" Me: "Well the system wants to reach its minimum energy state."

[@Retinetin]

I genuinely thought we would never see a day where we could do this at the atomic scale. That is absolutely wild

[@1000niggawatt]

they've basically invented computronium, right?

[@michaelbuckers]

Modern computers already operate on atomic scale. The real importance of this is that simulating neurons requires disproportionate amount of gates, whereas with this kind of technology you only need equivalent of 1 gate to simulate a neuron.

[@Retinetin]

@@michaelbuckers I'm aware. I've seen how components like SSD's and other components work, but this is a 1 to 1 ratio of atoms to bits, instead of using a coupled hundred or thousand atoms to represent transistors and whatnot. That part is what blows my mind

[@allhumansarejusthuman.5776]

We've had AFM and STM (these microscopes) since the 1980's And we've been experimenting with these ideas ever since. Check out "a boy and his atom" to see a movie made entirely in atoms.

[@Retinetin]

@@allhumansarejusthuman.5776 I've seen that video, and I know the tech has been around for a while, but we have just been playing with these ideas for so long, that I never expected something like this to actually be worked on right now

[@AmnonSadeh]

Science today: Atoms can remember (12:50 - 13:10). Homeopaths tomorrow: We were right all along.

[@michalchik]

I don't know whether to praise or curse you for pointing this out. I just hope it's not a self-fulfilling prophecy

[@_Atzin]

Oh no....

[@cwtrain]

A professor through and through. That power of voice and engagement even in a small room with just a couple dudes and he's speaks like he has an auditorium of a thousand.

[@PMA65537]

Apart from the whole turn-it-off-and-on-again thing.

[@ecicce6749]

he literally has an audience of millions though

[@oafkad]

Moriarty is a rad surname. Even if I have to fight the urge to make a Sherlock joke at any turn. Many of us have much less neat names :p.

[@2openhere]

Every time I see him I want I to say " But Bluebottle, he's fallen in the water."

[@erinwright645]

The first job I worked they gave me a key to the woman's locker room

[@ENDESGA]

MORE ON THIS TOPIC PLEASE!! This video needed to be WAAAAY longer

[@mynewestusername1]

Math not meth

[@Eric_D_6]

used "No actual physics was -harmed- in the creation of this illustration" lol, that's fantastic 9:35 for anyone trying to find it

[@alejandrobrauer8728]

Phil should start a channel about stuff he's interested in, but for people who have a STEM background so he can communicate at a higher level about the cool bits and not say stuff like "the devil is in the details." I want the details!

[@BlueChameleon01]

Cobalt atoms: One one one one one one zero! One one one one one one zero! Tunnelling microscope: You did it! You broke computing down to its bare essentials!

[@km-sc4kz]

hey that guy from sixty symbols. great explanations.

[@MaxDiscere]

Damn I love his passion about this topic. That's how professors should be!

[@sheeplessknight8732]

That's how all professors are when it is a topic they care about, you just had profs teaching the wrong classes

[@kaydot6889]

@@sheeplessknight8732 What are you, a freshman? That's blatantly not true.

[@squirlmy]

I don't know if this supports or disputes your theory, but I had a diabetic professor teaching evolution and sociobiology, he jumped up on his desk and shouted "I really believe this is true!", then he regained composure and asked if anyone had a sugary candy. This was almost 30 years ago and I cherish that memory.

[@Ur11]

"neural net" analogy Smorgasbord.

[@pierreabbat6157]

And you program it in Cobalt?

[@pascalbro7524]

There's a 99.9599999% chance that I really enjoyed this video.

[@lladerat]

Whenever i see Prof. Moriarty i get excited like a 9yo... i mean come on the dude works with the freaking atoms, its so interesting! I only wish James Clewett returned with a new video or two, havent seen him in ages.

[@Cr42yguy]

I just saw the thumbnail and automatically read the title with that sweet accent :)

[@HansLemurson]

I don't see how this is like a Neural Net. It seems just like regular computer components at the atomic level. Which is still cool, but what's Neural about it?

[@HilikusMan]

The fact that it adjusts the weights of the connection between atoms. He mentioned that towards the end

[@qzbnyv]

Professor Moriarty looked almost wistful when mentioning how we know Mike Pound. Sir, fear not, the comment section’s capacity for love is enough for both of you

[@Theraot]

So that is how Intelligent Calcium (iCa) works. I'm glad they worked with Cobalt, or we could have a Helvetica Scenario.

[@sammiller6631]

I'm glad they didn't replay Helvetica Scenario scene. Once was enough.

[@alimanski7941]

That was way too short

[@empmachine]

what's up with the tinfoil shelf? are those all the tools that build up static? (I couldn't see a wire grounding it though)

[@xs0ulLess]

💩

[@WilliamDye-willdye]

Makes sense. Much of machine learning is fuzzy gradient descent, so why not take advantage of analog processes which naturally perform similar "operations"? Back in the day we used analog electronic chips to quickly calculate things like sine and cosine. Digital methods surpassed the analog approach, so analog computation fell out of favor. Maybe it's time for a comeback.

[@pettere8429]

This video should be seven seconds longer. 😝

[@rctime8279]

Moriarty :This is a big wet squishy thing with lots of very strange, weird stuff happening. Cobalt Atom: Hold my quantum brain.

[@realitynowassigned]

This is like suddenly being able to travel across the Galaxy in an instant and its just another good KZbin video

[@RemusVitan]

Even at the time that video was released you were preparing for the Omicron variant :)) (it can be seen on the table side at 2:07)

[@Monothefox]

"The atomic brain" sounds like a 1950s horror/sci-fi flick.

[@TehPwnerer]

Statistical mechanics blew my mind as an undergrad and even today it's nearly unbelievable it's almost magic

[@Veptis]

We are just a dream of some Boltzmann brain anyway?

[@juliaserrano6109]

He looks A LOT like John Travolta

[@pipeh3e8]

What a decade to be alive!

[@sirkowski]

Just the tip.

[@novikovPrinciple]

If I'm remembering this right, what he means by *"changing the electronic configuration of an atom"* is _adding or removing electrons orbiting the atom._ As in "1s 2s 2p.." transitioning to either "1s 2s" or "1s 2s 2p 3s", etc? Please correct me if I'm wrong.

[@chalichaligha3234]

Well, he said that they're keeping the atom neutral while changing the electronic configuration, so from what I understand, they're moving electrons between shells, as some atoms have multiple stable configurations with a given number of electrons.

[@narendrakrane]

TBH just like any other quantum computer videos. All amazing stories, no real explanations. Disappointed.

[@thequantumworld6960]

First, it's not a quantum computer. If you'd like a detailed explanation, and links to the papers of Khajetoorians' group -- see the video information for a link to a blog post that provides much more information. Philip (speaking in video)

[@VivekYadav-ds8oz]

Even if the atomic ML stuff doesn't work out, we still got ourselves a one-atom transistor!

[@tubanbodyslammer9125]

Why is Moriarty a bad surname, I'm an american, is it because of its popularity, or are you worried about being discriminated against

[@DaisyAjay]

The evil genius in Sherlock Holmes is professor Moriarty.

[@anarchist]

Curious if they are using the frequency of the state change in any meaningful way

[@chandrahaslanka]

I really didn't understand what the professor meant by changing the electron configuration of an atom. From what I have read in my high school chemistry, each element has a specific electron configuration. For example, carbon is 1s2 2s2 2p2. Then I read that it is the ground state and the excited states have different configurations. It was very exciting! 😁

[@JamesNewton]

"Configuration" in terms of the number of electrons are fixed, but the shape of the "orbit" or probability of positions can change. One example is the energy state which can change when affected by energy from an external source, and then collapses to release that energy; like in a neon sign or a laser.

[@richardsheppard7297]

If it can only work in a high vacuum can it ever be practical?

[@DasGrosseFressen]

Nope

[@KimTiger777]

Question is there a smaller atom that could function similarly? Imagine if you could do this with hydrogen and helium atoms, would be extremely compact, more efficient perhaps? Also could we drill even further down to quarks level?

[@mnrvaprjct]

maybe you could even go down to strings, if those are what make up quarks. Those strings (if they exist) would also have to vibrate inside of 6 dimensional calabi-yau spaces… so at that point the intelligence would be transcendent?