Possible Superconductivity In the Brain? (springer.com) 158
"The unprecedented power of the brain suggests that it may process information quantum-mechanically," according to a new research paper. Long-time Slashdot reader time961 writes: Pavlo Mikheenko, a superconductivity researcher at the University of Oslo, has published a paper in the Journal of Superconductivity and Novel Magnetism (abstract only; arxiv pre-print here) suggesting that microtubule structures in pig neurons exhibit evidence of superconductivity that could represent a mechanism for quantum computing performed by the brain to achieve the brain's phenomenal information processing power. The observed effects (at room temperature and standard atmospheric pressure) are claimed to indicate a critical temperature of 2022 +/- 157 K, far higher than the 135 K achieved in other materials under similar conditions.
Interesting, if true.
Interesting, if true.
Porcine aviation (Score:4, Insightful)
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I'll believe this when these superconducting pigs levitate above magnets.
Oh, but they already do! Unfortunately, with pigs being so intelligent, they seem to have a real phobia about being that close to liquid nitrogen. We have tried professional counselors, but we just can't seem to get them into the tube with that stuff. Who would have thought?
Examples of diamagnetic levitation:
https://www.ru.nl/hfml/researc... [www.ru.nl]
Human brain maybe a quantum computer! (Score:1)
IMHO, human brain quite possibly is a quantum computer (where neurons work as qubit/qutrit registers)!
For example, consider how we can switch from thought to thought, moment to moment, where each thought is instantly selected among (surely) astronomical number of different possibilities!
(Instantly making a choice (solution) from a huge number of possibilities is the main power of quantum computers!)
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Neurons are orders of magnitude larger than the scale on which QM matters, buddy.
Size doesn't matter (Score:2)
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No, the size of the quantum computer is much smaller. The rest is the infrastructure that allows it to exist. Now go back to the original comment, reread it and maybe you'll understand my point.
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Or maybe reread what you just said. Neurons are infrastructure, possibly something that contains a quantum component of some sort. Not that I necessarily agree, but what you're saying doesn't rule out the OP.
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does the paper argue that neurons, as a unit are QM? or does it suggest that much smaller structures within the neuron, which may exploit QM, could explain high processing power. to use your analogy, just as the infrastructure is large (cooling and such) for rudimentary quantum computers humans are building, the neuron could also primarily be 'support infrastructure' for much smaller QM objects within the neuron.
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Yes, the OP argues precisely that. Now go get a cookie, and tell your mother I said hello.
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Show us your math, or GTFO.
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Re: Human brain maybe a quantum computer! (Score:1)
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You should read up on neural nets. Especially embeddings of words and images, and attention mechanisms. You'd be amazed that analog circuits can handle n-dimensional spaces (usually 300-1000 dimensions) for meaning representation and they can combine, select and transform those representations with ease. Another rel
Wrong. It is not QM, it is QFT. (Score:4, Funny)
And I suggest that the brain has unprecedented power, because it connects to superpowers present in the Dark sector via the mechanism of kinetic mixing.
It is not science anymore, but a popularity and buzzword contest.
This is Pseudoscience BS (Score:4, Informative)
This Quantum Mind crap has been around since the 90s. It's just mysticism wrapped up in new jargon to sound all sciency to people who don't know what they're talking about.
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The idea was proposed by Sir Roger Penrose. He got the sir part for being a scientist. It was a serious idea. Substructures within neurons could plausibly (especially in 1989) exhibit some quantum mechanical properties. The idea didn't work out.
The better part of a decade later the woo factory decided quantum was synonymous with magic.
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Roger Penrose also hasn't published any significant research since the 90s because he turned into a crank and has been spending his time appearing at "conciousness studies" conferences.
Re:This is Pseudoscience BS (Score:5, Interesting)
And believe me, it's sad to see one of our great minds turn into a nut.
I minored in physics at Penn State in the late 90s when he was at the Penn State Institute for Gravitation and the Cosmos at Penn State, so I actually attended some of the original lectures he gave on QM. It was just as nutty back then. He basically dreamed up an entirely new particle that didn't exist in the standard model and which had never been detected and then postulated it interacted with microtubules in some unknown way to cause some unknown effect and *MAGIC* consciousness happens.
Even though it was known at the time that's not what microtubules do and that there's no way a neuron could maintain quantum decoherence long enough for it to have any effect on its synaptic function.
It is and always was a bunch of wishful thinking because Penrose personally couldn't deal with the idea free-will may be an illusion.
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...the idea free-will may be an illusion.
If free will is an illusion, then it cannot be an idea. The whole thing is pseudo-profound bullshit.
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Re: This is Pseudoscience BS (Score:2)
I dont think anything written by that odious crank Hubbard can be taken on any kind of authority or have any useful insights beyond the psychology 101 he based his entire cult on.
Re: This is Pseudoscience BS (Score:2)
Oops , my mistake, wrong author. Ignore previous post.
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Consciousnesses and free-will can exist even with a traditional model of the brain as a machine. I never understood why people see a fundamental problem here and then feel the need to introduce magical "solution" to this problem based on pseudo-science. The contradiction appears if you think about yourself as some ghost sitting elsewhere that controls the body. Then everything which is locally decided (by neurons etc) takes away the freedom of the ghost to control the body. But if you think about conscio
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I think free-will can exist without consciousness. And yes, I think it makes sense that a decision must exist before we can become aware of it. How could it be different?
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I don't understand. A part of the brain that would make the decision. After the decision is made the brain (maybe other parts) may become aware of it. What does not make sense?
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But the difference only comes from artificially splitting mind, and brain into unrelated parts. But if the mind is an emergent property of the while brain as a system this does not make any sense. The part which makes the decision and the part which becomes aware of are all integrated into a complex system which together produces the mind. So it is not a contradiction that the mind makes the decision and is aware of it and the same time different parts of the brain are involved in this process.
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Ooh... We need to be careful not to make Penrose's mistake, though. Free will is a dangerous topic for so many reasons, including how the debate is framed. Free will in the moment may be very different than what happens under careful deliberation. One is based on heuristics and instinct, the other on deeper mental states.
Microtubules as a path for coherent electrons is pretty unlikely, yes. One would have to first explain how one maintains a coherent state in such a noisy environment, then they'd have to ex
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There is no evidence. But there is not even a single good argument (not even to speak of a theory) why the features of quantum mechanics would somehow help to explain free-will. It is just sloppy thinking along the lines: Well, we do not understand how consciousness and free-will works and we also find quantum mechanics a mysterious and fascinating so how about QM explains consciousness. Of course, postulation the connection between two not fully understood things is not an explanation in the sense of scien
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Agreed. However, there is a modicum of logic to the notion of looking for a possible connection. Free will by definition has to be at least partially non-deterministic. As quantum mechanics is the only realm of physics which is non-deterministic, if one presumes free will exists, it suggests (weakly) there may be an aspect of consciousness which is driven by a mechanism which draws on uncertainty principles.
The weakness of the above proposition is that the logic is inductive, not reductive. While inductive
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Agreed. However, there is a modicum of logic to the notion of looking for a possible connection. Free will by definition has to be at least partially non-deterministic
No, I don't think so. Something is free when it is controlled by itself and not restricted from the outside. It is free if it follows its own internal processes which could be deterministic or not. Whether a decision is made by a deterministic algorithm or role of dice simply has no logical relationship to whether it is free or non-free.
Yes, I know many people think otherwise, but I think they are wrong.
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Okay... But if you didn't have the choice on setting up that deterministic system, then you still end up back to the beginning. The philosophical implications of consciousness being deterministic are vast. Depending on viewpoint, it could be argued you have returned to the notion of essentially being a biological robot. None of your choices were really choices. Free will itself is relatively poorly defined, which muddles things a lot as well. But as soon as determinism comes in, you have no real choices, re
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Don't be so sad : here in France we have the guys that believe in the power of water (infinite dilutions, homeopathy etc.) and managed to get their paper published in Nature some years ago.
In each and every pharmacy you find, prominently exposed, zillions of homeopathic pills, and indeed you'd better be prudent when talking about it, given the number of folks that BELIEVE...
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--Mahatma Gandhi
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Bono and the remaining members of the Bee Gees are also Sir. That isn't saying much.
Re:This is Pseudoscience BS (Score:4, Interesting)
Well, since all attempts to model a human mind conventionally have failed and since quantum stuff is pretty much the only additional mechanism Physics currently offers, it does have a point. I do agree that it is mysticism. But unless Physics finds something else that could explain the mind (seems rather unlikely at this stage), mysticism is pretty much the only possible explanation. Yes, I find this unsatisfactory too. But this does not blind me to the known facts.
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Have their been any realistic attempts to model a brain? Last I heard, the most sophisticated neural structure modeled was something like part of a rat's motor cortex, and the results were very promising
Lets be clear that neural networks are not even remotely close to modeling a brain - even if you created one from a full connectome mapping of a human brain (which last I heard we weren't anywhere close to creating) you'd be modeling a network of dozens (hundreds?) of wildly different types of massively com
Re:This is Pseudoscience BS (Score:5, Informative)
Have their been any realistic attempts to model a brain?
Still not quite able to model C elegans. [wikipedia.org] Rather a long way from modelling an ant, let alone human consciousness.
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Well, since all attempts to model a human mind conventionally
Have their been any realistic attempts to model a brain?
The brain and mind are not the same thing. The brain is a physical structure and the mind is a different thing. There are plenty of incomplete models of the brain whilst modelling consciousness has been the occupation of philosophy for thousands of years. Science based in materialism forms the theory of consciousness as an emergent property of matter so any discussion is already precluding matter as an emergent property of consciousness because science can't explain it.
Also the discussion is limited b
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The brain is the physical model of the mind, as presented through the senses and mind of an observer. Just as a rock our physical model of how it is to observe/interact with a rock, rather than a non-interacting rock in itself.
If you believe mind is some nebulous other thing which the brain, try having a brain injury. Or just a swift knock on the head. See how well the brain damage describes the state of your consciousness then.
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The brain is the physical model of the mind, as presented through the senses and mind of an observer. Just as a rock our physical model of how it is to observe/interact with a rock, rather than a non-interacting rock in itself.
Yours is a rather obvious conclusion based on the limitations materialism. Your perception is that the brain is also one thing, when it is not. The reptilian and mammalian brain are separate from the neocortex. Prioritising activation of these primitive complexes over the neo-cortex, as in the case of amygdala activation stressing the hypothalamus pituitary adrenal axis, will very quickly illustrate to you that the mind and brain(s) are two distinctly separate entities.
Your analogy of a rock is poor.
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So, to use a much simpler example, a physical computer is the physical model of all the software can run on it?
Sorry, but these simplistic models break down completely when taxed by actual complexity.
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So, to use a much simpler example, a physical computer is the physical model of all the software can run on it?
No, it is a substrate upon which potential software runs. It is not useful in and of itself but as a tool that demonstrates the existence of layered "concept complexes".
Sorry, but these simplistic models break down completely when taxed by actual complexity.
Obviously because it is not a model, it is an analogy offered to move from a rock analogy to the idea of concept complexes in concrete form. I don't use them in my book as anything other that an oversimplification that introduces concept complexes. I built an abstract model of consciousness as a tool for resolving mental health issues that
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methinks alcohol, weed and LSD are more fun then a knock on the head to get the point across?
These are simply impairments of perception.
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Indeed. Interface problems. Also, some parts of the services the mind uses (for example, most/all of concrete memory) do also run in the brain. Does not mean the complete thing does.
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Hahaha, yes. Incidentally "emergent property" = "Poof and it was there! Nobody knows how or why!" It is just a scientific way of saying "we have no clue".
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Hahaha, yes. Incidentally "emergent property" = "Poof and it was there! Nobody knows how or why!" It is just a scientific way of saying "we have no clue".
Exactly!
Re: This is Pseudoscience BS (Score:2)
Yes! And not only that we have no way of knowing or predicting, but also that with complete knowledge of the antecedents the product is still unknowable.
Study hydrogen and oxygen independently forever and you will never be able to deduce the properties of water. Emergence is real, a result of chaos creating order, and each new order so creatied leading to new chaos which again engenders another level of order. Nested, interrelated, dependent, inseparable, non-linear, and nondeterministic.
This is intrinsi
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Well, since all attempts to model a human mind conventionally have failed and since quantum stuff is pretty much the only additional mechanism Physics currently offers, it does have a point.
All attempts to cure the common cold have so far, failed. Should we also wave the quantum mechanical wand for that?
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Attempts to _model_ the common cold are pretty good. Your analogy is flawed.
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Mine was not an analogy, it was reductio ad absurdum.
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Not really. That one requires some skill, which is lacking in your presentation.
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No, they have not been able to model the human mind because it's too big, the most they've done with neural network processing is very tiny stuff. And the neurons in the brain are analog devices, not digital.
Also the articles linking of superconductivity with quantum computing is just silliness.
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No, they have not been able to model the human mind because it's too big
That is just speculation, i.e. it is not necessary the core problem and if it is a problem, it may not be the only one.
the most they've done with neural network processing is very tiny stuff. And the neurons in the brain are analog devices, not digital.
What tells you artificial neural networks are even the right model?
Also the articles linking of superconductivity with quantum computing is just silliness.
That I can agree on. Especially as we still do not know whether quantum computing does actually work for anything meaningful.
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Argument by analogy, as useless as most argument by analogy. And you worked a false premise in there too: nobody I know understands the brain as a kind of computer. But we have analyzed the anatomy of the brain sufficiently to be sure that it is, ahem, a kind of neural network. How does that work for your steam engine analogy?
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Since most neural networks are purely Turing machines, it doesn't work as well as you might think. There are many useful models from computational analysis, but the phsyical 3D network of neurons with analog signals triggering timing based changes with no clock frequency and a rather non-binary set of signals due to accumulation of multiple signals, it's not modeled as well as one might hope with a computable binary system.
There are many parallels, especially as neural nets have grown more and more complex
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Well, neural network computing does model analog processes. It's only done digitally because it's being done on a digital computer. The clock isn't there because the neural network needs it, but because the program simulating the network uses a clock in it's algorithm and it sits on top of a typical digital computer. Most programming languages are also based around sequential processing (ie, update simulated neuron 1, then update simulated neuron 2, then...).
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I am not sure you know what a neural net is, or a Turing machine. There is such a thing [wikipedia.org] but this is a combination of neural networks and state machines. And "physical 3D network of neurons"... WTH are you talking about?
Please at least read the Wikipedia article on neural nets.
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The Wikipedia articles reinforce my points. For example, "n common ANN implementations, the signal at a connection between artificial neurons is a real number, and the output of each artificial neuron is computed by some non-linear function of the sum of its inputs.". Nerves, do not rely on rely on real numbers. They rely on triggered impulses, extremely timing and physical structure sensitive, and without the time signal normally used by digital systems to ensure that signals are transmitted consistently i
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I'm familiar with the neurology of the retina and visual cortex thank you. You would seem to have your own private definition of Turing machine. Please, at least say state machine, and you're still wrong.
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What part of the "Turing machine" definition is missing from most neural networks? Most of them have more than sufficient hardware to run the logical processes of a Turing machine. The lack of the appropriate program may hinder them from the classic definition, but that's what a modified program is for. I see your point that a "state machine" may better capture their limitations. Personally, I have been dealing with "state machines" which have no input lately: you've reminded me that inputs are part of the
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OK, today I learned that the signal on a neural axon may be richer that a single scalar frequency value, in particular, inter-pulse intervals are known to carry information for some neurons. So I agree that the current conception of neural networks is too simplistic, or too unlike the real thing to be able to imitate it accurately. And now I got what I wanted, clear evidence that the total bandwidth of the brain is higher than has been fashionable to suppose. Not stupidly magical like the parent article pro
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Critical temperature of 2000K is, uh, kind of a giveaway. Around the melting point of nickel.
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That sort of appeal to ignorance (we don't know how X works, therefore any explanation is valid) is the essence of pseudoscience.
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Just because there's no hard evidence to back up a theory doesn't make it pseudoscience.
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To qualify as a scientific theory, there has to be at least some indirect evidence supporting it,
such as an underlying theory that does has evidence. Your example of gravitational waves having
"no proof" is incorrect, since gravitational wave theory is in turn based
on the well established principals of relativity theory.
This "quantum consciousness" rubbish is nothing but idle speculation.
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As an unrelated side note... (Score:3)
I've been gathering peoples' reactions to this study in the comments sections of news articles for my paper, "Catchphrase Hokum: Assessing The Public's Willingness To Believe Anything That Uses Buzzwords And Was Published In A Journal With A Five-Year Impact Factor Less Than One", which has been accepted for publication in the journal Gullibility.
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I've been gathering peoples' reactions to this study
Oh, well if it's for science... *hands over sample vial containing my reaction*
bunch of nonsense (Score:5, Informative)
I am a condensed matter physicist.
This paper measures normal nonlinear electrochemical effects and assumes they're superconducting. Further, there is a misunderstanding of what quantized conductance means, and how to demonstrate that quantized conductance is being measured.
There is no evidence presented of superconductivity, and no good argument for why it would be expected. It's a bit embarrassing that the author is a Physics professor.
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Just shows that Physics has gotten overly complex. I know it deals with a real object, buts if it were not I would call the whole thing an utter design failure.
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Physics always was overly complex. When we get to be God then we will design the universe much more simply, won't we?
Brain Conductivity (Score:1)
I don't know about super conductivity, however simple electrical conductivity in the brain seems to be a factor in mental health. An existing test, called a Hair Tissue Mineral Analysis can reveal your base reaction to stressors be it flight, fight, fawn or freeze when your Amygdala takes control. People with personality disorders can affect the mineral balance of the brain by taxing those resources with their behaviors and abusive techniques.
After discovering that I made a effort to make sure that t
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I just decided that I give very little fuck about other people and that improved my sleep tenfold
Perhaps they feel the same about you.
Microtubules (Score:2)
I remember microtubule structures in the brain making the news around 20 years ago. At the time there was some speculation that they might provide some other mechanism in which information transfer could occur, and if I remember correctly, it was through sympathetic resonance.
God. Continuously. Invents. Science. (Score:2)
Full stop.
Critical field? (Score:2)
Assume for the moment that our memories are stored in superconducting qubits, and the critical temperature really is 2000K, what is the critical field required to erase someone's memories completely at body temperature(310k)? Surely this is a simple matter for someone good at physics to figure out.
Moore's Law is still in play (Score:2)
The /. post right above this one posits that the looming end of Moore's Law (the seeming endless improvements in computational throw) will spell the end of AI improvements so that we will never see "self-improving" AI.
I think both premises are premature. Once computation moves into the quantum realm -- including biological computing -- AI will find a fertile playground and will quickly outstrip human limits.
Good luck with all that, everyone.
Re: "Interesting, if true!" (Score:1)
I saw a Twitter tweet about how Neil A. backwards was alien. How about that?!
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Neil Armstrong written backwards is "Gnorts, Mr Alien"
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The original article says The estimated critical temperature of superconducting network in the brains is
rather high: 2063±114 K. Not sure what it means, but doesn't match the summary at all.
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I expect if you got the pig's brain up to even 1000 K it would stop superconducting....
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I expect if you got the pig's brain up to even 1000 K it would stop superconducting....
But at 71C, that same pig would be...delicious.
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I could have used quotation marks around the original article text: "The estimated critical temperature of superconducting network in the brains is
rather high: 2063±114 K. "
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As nutty as the paper sounds, this alone isn't dispositive enough to dismiss it out of hand. These transition temperatures don't have to obey some kind of order. For example, the Fermi temperature of most metals [wikipedia.org] is far in excess of their melting temperatures, which is why free electron model describes metal behaviors so well.
Having said that, at those temperatures, if there is to be any superconductivity, it's clearly not through formation of Cooper pairs, or frankly any phenomena where quantum coherences a
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Oh come on mods, that was super funny
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It was definitely a cut above the usual anti-Trump spam.
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Everything is built on top of quantum particles and effects. Electricity is a quantum effect. So technically you can throw the quantum buzzword at anything and be correct while simultaneously not saying anything of value.
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