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Dear all: <br>
<br>
After talking to some of my colleagues, we here kick of a BMI debate
via this email on <a class="moz-txt-link-abbreviated" href="mailto:bmi@lists.cse.msu.edu">bmi@lists.cse.msu.edu</a>.<br>
Many of you on this anonymous list told me that they are interested
and want to be posted. However, we will use this<br>
anonymous list sparely. If you want to keep posted about this
debate and other BMI activities, sign on bmi mailing list <br>
at <a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://lists.cse.msu.edu/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/bmi">http://lists.cse.msu.edu/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/bmi</a> or simply
Google it with key words like "BMI mailing list MSU".<br>
Once you receive email from the mailing list, you can post simply
via reply. BMI mailing list is a moderated list to avoid<br>
unrelated emails. If there are sufficient interest, BMI might host
a live web debate in a few weeks. Post your views!<br>
<br>
The following email I sent to Dave Touretzky is the kick-off for the
BMI debates. I will provide some interesting examples soon.<br>
<br>
On 10/20/11 12:59 PM, Juyang Weng wrote:
<blockquote cite="mid:4EA05385.5050906@cse.msu.edu" type="cite"> Hi
Dave,<br>
<br>
I read some of your papers about hippocampus, which are very
interesting. Let me inject some basic but probably very
controversial ideas you probably will reject. If you do not mind,
I will post this discussion to the BMI mailing list. The main
purpose is to attract more talented researchers to this important
brain-mind subject. <br>
<br>
How about looking at the brain from a top system point of view? I
believe that top (but detailed) theory is powerful, since the
brain basically does signal processing (not in the traditional
sense). Maybe with this view, our future design of experiments
could be more productive? Let me start from one example:<br>
<br>
One of your papers is "Synaptic Learning Models of Map Separation
in the Hippocampus", <i>Neurocomputing</i>, <b>32</b>:379-384,
2000. The co-authors wrote: "If the perforant path projection to
CA3 functions as a pattern completion mechanism, and the DG
projection via the mossy fibers performs pattern separation
(O'Reilly and McClelland, 1994), then ..."<br>
<br>
My new perspectives about the brain benefited from such local
views, but I think that such local views can also benefit from the
entire brain-mind point of view, in the sense of a giant Finite
Automaton (FA). This brain FA is not handcrafted, but rather
developed, since all phenotypes emerge from a single cell
(zygote). So, I model such a developmental FA as the
Developmental Network (DN). Then, the Hippocampus is simply a
very small part of a giant DN. According to how the DN works, I
predict the following: If we focus on a small part (e.g.,
Hippocampus) of this DN, we definitely will get hopelessly lost,
like a hiker in a forest without a global map. He can see some
local phenomena from where he stands, but he did not see the
entire forest. <br>
<br>
Focused, per-phenomenon discoveries have been prevailing in the
brain science literature in the modern science, with few
exceptions (Charles Darwin is one). This is probably because only
such papers can be accepted and funded in the modern time.
Although those phenomena are useful, they are piece meals. Now,
there seem to have enough pieces to put the grand puzzle
together. I have established what a DN can do in real time, by
modeling the brain-mind from the entire FA (DN) point of view.
Since all pieces of DN seem to fit what we know about the brain
science, the brain should not be less efficient than a DN.<br>
<br>
You can say that this is just fantasy, but I have a series of
rigorous proofs. <br>
<br>
Daniel M. Wolpert said at SfN 2009 that the over 1400-page long
volume of "Principles of Neural Science" by Kandel et al. could be
much condensed if we could model the entire brain in computational
theory. I hope that the DN theory can help that condensing
process. <br>
<br>
A major infrastructure problem is that what I talked about above
spans at least 6 disciplines. Meaningful conversations are
extremely difficult. If you feel angry or insulted by my above
text, I feel that it is partially because of this huge divide. <br>
<br>
I am giving a CC to Jay, as his work was cited. <br>
<br>
Best regards,<br>
<br>
-John</blockquote>
<br>
-John<br>
<pre class="moz-signature" cols="72">--
--
Juyang (John) Weng, Professor
Department of Computer Science and Engineering
MSU Cognitive Science Program and MSU Neuroscience Program
3115 Engineering Building
Michigan State University
East Lansing, MI 48824 USA
Tel: 517-353-4388
Fax: 517-432-1061
Email: <a class="moz-txt-link-abbreviated" href="mailto:weng@cse.msu.edu">weng@cse.msu.edu</a>
URL: <a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://www.cse.msu.edu/~weng/">http://www.cse.msu.edu/~weng/</a>
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