Hardware Implants Mimic Brain Cells

An anonymous reader writes "PopSci is reporting that Ted Berger, a USC scientist, has been working to engineer a brain implant the mimics the functions of neurons. Early tests on rat brain cells have shown promise, and if successful, Berger's implant could remedy everything from Alzheimer's to absent-mindedness — and reduce memory loss to nothing more than a computer glitch"

Time to recycle the MS-Borg icon

[davidwr]

Methinks it's high time to make a generic borg [slashdot.org] icon for cyborg-tech stories.

Re:Engineered humans?

[future assassin]

>However, it also presents some less optimistic possibilities: for example, someone might be able to "program" humans as we program computers today. Imagine some terror organization such as Al Qaeda creating a fearless, seven-foot, feel-no-pain specimen..

Or imagine someone local and maybe you know creating a device that takes you out and then they rob you or even better cause the chip to kill you.

Re:Engineered humans?

[badboy_tw2002]

A decade? That's much to short sighted. Something like this could eventually enable immortality. Think about it - if you replace enough neurons, pretty soon most of who you are would live inside the machine. At that point, who's to say where your consciousness lives? Whats to stop you from transferring to a completely electronic brain and living on as long as you have juice? Of course, there's a lot of metaphysics around this - would "you" still be "you", what if you made a copy, etc. etc. Fascinating stuff. Of course, we're a long ways off from it, but if you look where transistors and such were 50 years ago, its not such a stretch to think this will be a possibility in the next few centuries.

Re:Java?

[AKAImBatman]

Does the main bus of your computer run Java? Does it run x86 instructions? Does it run anything of the sort?

This technology appears to be mainly about routing signals, not generating or processing them. It assists with memory by properly storing and retrieving those signals, but it does not interpret them. (As evidenced by his comment, "I don't need to understand music to repair a CD Player.")

The article is correct, however, in that this technology will bring us one step closer to understanding how the brain functions. Since these neurons are artificial, the signals passing through can be sampled and stored on an external device. This would allow researchers to reverse engineer many signals in parallel rather than trying to trace one or two signals through the brain as they've been doing.

Unfortunately, I doubt this technology will outright unlock the secrets of conciousness. Remember how neural networks were intended to be an invaluable research tool into self-awareness? Well, the resulting networks ended up working in a similar but fundamentally different way from the organic brain. That fundamental difference prevented the networks from fully simulating the human brain.

So we'll take the next step forward, and learn where our previous mistakes were. Not to mention, uncover thousands of new questions. :)

Re:Raises some interesting questions

[Tipa]

It's that old thought experiment -- if you have an axe and you get a new head for it and then later replace the handle, is it the same axe?

Re:Raises some interesting questions

[brunascle]

it's more than that, it's also a question of when/if someone loses their sentience/conscious self/soul/whatever you want to call it.

At what point do we cease being human?

[Giometrix]

At what point are we no longer human? Our thoughts stem from the firing of neurons. If half of those neurons are computer chips, was it a human thought or a computer generated though. I'm all for finding cures to Alzheimer's disease, but I do not want to be a glorified computer case. I did not read the article (yet), and I realize that the part of the brain discussed in the article is probably different than the creative parts of the brain, but I still think its a valid question; at what point do we stop being human (as we know it)?

Playing the Alzheimers card to get funding?

[KokorHekkus]

I don't thing this could be useful for any Alzheimers treatement in a very long time if ever (and we've probably solved it in another way even if it ever gets there).

As I understand it Alzheimers is basically a case of protein misfolding creating amyloid plaques on the neurons and that really screws up the functions (perhaps some with actual medical/biological knowledge can expand on that). Anyway, it's not just one part that you can hot-swap to use a computer term... it's happening all over the affected area. So you're not going to just plop in a new frontal lobe and call that a cure are you?

And yet the researcher goes on and makes a big point of this:

Today an estimated 4.5 million Americans suffer from Alzheimer's, at an annual cost of some $100 billion, according to the Alzheimer's Association and the National Institute on Aging. "And those figures are just going to climb as my generation gets older," says Berger, who can rattle off the grim statistics from Alzheimer's and other brain disorders that disturb memory. Another 5.3 million Americans are victims of traumatic brain injuries

I do belive that this technology could have many many wonderful uses but that Alzheimers isn't one of them... and by using on of the scariest biggest diseases just to flag down some interest he's doing not only himself but the whole research area a disfavour.

Re:Raises some interesting questions

[Anonymous Coward]

No, the axe/computer brain example are exact analogs. It is saying that if you replace a fundamental part of the whole, is the same original whole reclaimed? The only difference is that with humans, our composition is such that we are sentient.

What is interesting about the question is it ponders what constitutes a thing. Assuming there is some "self" is very much akin to the belief in Platonic ideals. I think once we begin creating machines with enough complexity to be sentient we will see a huge drop in the importance of questions such as those posed, since such machines strongly favor a materialistic description of the universe. At this point, the "self" is essentially a wiring of the brain, and memory states, continually changing and essentially continuously mutable and replicable. The natural conclusion is then the absense of a self, since it lacks any defining characteristics.

If they can act like neurons....

[PotatoHead]

then, we've got an interesting interface here. Sprinkle a few of these into the motor cortex, then have the person work with feedback systems to learn to differentiate those controls from the natural ones. From there, all sorts of potential exists for communication.

Instead of the computer being an active part of the brain, it becomes more like a PDA that you don't have to carry. Motor feedback signals, generated from the neurons would then become something like morse code.

Would be damn nice to be in a job interview, using Google in real time, while answering the questions with ordinary speech!

Re:At what point do we cease being human?

[dj_tla]

Our thoughts stem from the firing of neurons. If half of those neurons are computer chips, was it a human thought or a computer generated though.

Is there really a difference? Our brains are incredibly complicated, but just because they are biological doesn't mean they're not just computing devices. It may be unsettling to some to believe, but this idea of 'free will,' that we're in control of our minds and can freely choose to do whatever we want is an illusion created by the very brain that tells us what to do. Sure, you can just randomly say "Hey, let's break the monotony!" and jump off a building, exhilarated by the feeling of freedom, but it's all a function of the inputs your brain has received over its lifetime. I have no doubt that, given the same inputs, you would do the same thing all over again.

This also brings up something interesting I remember from classes about computability theory. The halting problem [wikipedia.org] can be expressed as: if a turing machine is given a turing machine as an input, can it determine if the input will finish running? Keeping in mind that a turing machine can simulate another turing machine. If one considers the brain a computing device, like a turing machine, then extending the halting problem metaphor, will we ever be able to reverse-engineer the brain to the point that we can recreate it?

Re:Playing the Alzheimers card to get funding?

[Jewfro_Macabbi]

We already have a substance which helps prevent Alzheimers, marijuana... As you've stated Alzheimers is a plaque build-up on the brain. The binding and releasing of cannaboid to cannaboid brain receptors literally keeps the pipes clean....

Re:Is absent mindedness something you can "cure"

[mdielmann]

Seconded. Before I started taking my little white pills, I had more difficulty managing stress, and losing control if stress got too high. I'd been managing this for years without medication, with little success. I was doing things that I didn't want to do. Then the stress point would pass, I'd feel bad, redouble my efforts, and it would happen again sooner or later. Now, I lose control a lot less, when I lose control it's not as bad, and it doesn't last as long. So, depending on how you define it, my personality hasn't changed, or it's changed to what I've been striving towards for years.

For those of you who say I should have just sucked it up, I'll give you an analogy. Imagine that during every waking instant you have to squeeze a wrist exerciser. No matter what else happens, you need to keep that grip or someone's going to get hurt. No matter how strong you are, you're going to get tired, or distracted, or just sick of having to maintain that grip. That's what it was like for me. Every now and then I need to apply that grip, but it's no longer constant. When the time comes, I can easily deal with it. I spend a lot less time regretting the things I've done, because I do a lot fewer things that I wouldn't have done if I'd had control. I'd rather not take those little white pills, but if I have to take them for the rest of my life to maintain this state that's something I can accept.