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Oct 14, 2024

Illusionism and functionalism

Posted by in category: neuroscience

In the last thread, someone asked what exactly is it about consciousness that illusionists say is illusory?

One quick answer is that for illusionists, the properties people see in experience that incline us to think that consciousness is a metaphysically hard problem, are what’s illusory. In weak illusionism, the properties aren’t what they seem. In the strong version, which is usually what “illusionism” refers to, they don’t exist at all. But what exactly are these properties?

I’m a functionalist, someone who sees conscious experiences, and mental states overall, as more about what they do, the causal roles they play, than about any particular substance or constitution. It’s a view that I think provides a necessary explanatory layer between the mental and the physical, and so sees no barrier in principle to a full understanding of the relationship between them.

Oct 14, 2024

Will we be able to upload our minds?

Posted by in categories: biotech/medical, computing, neuroscience

I’m pretty much a subscriber to the computational theory of mind (broadly speaking), which holds that the mind is information in the brain. If this theory of mind is accurate, then there should be no barrier to someday uploading a copy of our mind into a computer, providing we can find a way to record it.

This is, of course, a controversial notion. There are many people who swear that uploading will never be accomplished. They list a lot of reasons, from the fact that the mind is inextricably entangled with the workings of the body, to the impossibility of ever making a fully accurate representation of the brain, to religious beliefs about mind / body dualism (which you won’t see me address in this post).

Regarding the notions about the mind being tangled with the body, I suspect the people who express these sentiments are underestimating what our ability will eventually be to virtualize these kinds of mechanisms. Sure, our mental states are tied to things like hormones, blood sugar level, the state of our gut, and many other body parameters. But many of these parameters are driven by the brain. And I don’t really see any reason why we wouldn’t eventually be able to simulate its effects on a virtual brain.

Oct 14, 2024

Objects previously regarded as black holes may actually be wormholes

Posted by in categories: cosmology, physics

Some scientists believe black holes might be wormholes, offering shortcuts through space and time

A team of physicists from Sofia University in Bulgaria has proposed a fascinating theory that wormholes, hypothetical tunnels linking different parts of the universe, could be hiding in plain sight. These wormholes may resemble black holes so closely that current technology cannot distinguish between the two, according to a new study reported by New Scientist.

Oct 14, 2024

Will Elon Musk’s Tesla Optimus Beat Unitree’s G1 in the Race for Mass Production?

Posted by in categories: Elon Musk, robotics/AI

Would you buy a $16,000 Unitree G1 for your home assistant? Share your thoughts in the comments.

The pressure is on for Elon Musk to accelerate the mass production of Tesla’s Optimus robot as Unitree Robotics announced that its $16,000 G1 humanoid robot is ready for mass production. Initially focused on four-legged robots, Unitree shifted to humanoid designs and quickly developed the G1, which now boasts impressive capabilities like leaping, climbing stairs, and adjusting its gait in real time. Standing at 1.32 meters tall and weighing 35 kg, the G1 features 3D LiDAR, a RealSense depth camera, and a 9,000-mAh battery for two hours of use. While it’s ready for production, Unitree hasn’t confirmed if mass production has begun.

Oct 14, 2024

Rare comet spotted in North Texas sky

Posted by in category: space

A once-in-80,000-year comet was spotted in the North Texas sky this weekend. If you missed it, you’ll have more chances.

Oct 14, 2024

God Alone is Immortal

Posted by in categories: education, life extension

1 Timothy 6:16 is one of the foundational verses for conditionalists. In it, we see a theological principle that we are not ready to relinquish in favour of popular teachings. It is the principle that God is the only being in the universe who has immortality; only God has Immortality His immortality is exclusive. In that respect, he is different from all other beings.

“The only One who has immortality, dwelling in unapproachable light; no one has seen or can see Him, to Him be honour and eternal might. Amen” (HCSB).

The verse is the second part of a doxology: a pause to praise the God of whom the author is writing. In its context, Paul is encouraging Timothy to keep pursuing eternal life to which he was called, but has not yet attained. It is a promise from the only one capable of making that promise: God, who alone possesses that thing that Paul urges Timothy to pursue.

Oct 14, 2024

Frontiers: The process by which synaptic inputs separated in time and space are integrated by the dendritic arbor to produce a sequence of action potentials is among the most fundamental signal transformations that takes place within the central nervous system

Posted by in category: neuroscience

Some aspects of this complex process, such as integration at the level of individual dendritic branches, have been extensively studied. But other aspects, such as how inputs from multiple branches are combined, and the kinetics of that integration have not been systematically examined. Using a 3D digital holographic photolysis technique to overcome the challenges posed by the complexities of the 3D anatomy of the dendritic arbor of CA1 pyramidal neurons for conventional photolysis, we show that integration on a single dendrite is fundamentally different from that on multiple dendrites. Multibranch integration occurring at oblique and basal dendrites allows somatic action potential firing of the cell to faithfully follow the driving stimuli over a significantly wider frequency range than what is possible with single branch integration. However, multibranch integration requires greater input strength to drive the somatic action potentials. This tradeoff between sensitivity and temporal precision may explain the puzzling report of the predominance of multibranch, rather than single branch, integration from in vivo recordings during presentation of visual stimuli.

Individual thin dendritic branches are fundamental functional units in the nervous system (Branco and Hausser, 2011). Experimental data support the concept that they can operate as quasi-independent processing and signaling units capable of non-linear behavior (Mel, 1993; Wei et al., 2001). In combination with their parent dendritic branches, these thin distal dendrites can function in two distinct modes (Gasparini and Magee, 2006; Katz et al., 2009). If distributed synaptic inputs arrive on multiple distal branches, the depolarization on each branch may be below the threshold for recruiting local active conductances in a regenerative manner and yet be sufficient to trigger a somatic sodium spike. This is sometimes referred to as the traditional “integrate and fire” model (Abbott, 1999), the “synaptic democracy” model (Yuste, 2011), and the “global” model of integration.

Oct 14, 2024

Scientists build world’s thinnest lens, measuring just 3 atoms thick

Posted by in categories: materials, particle physics

The world’s thinnest lens diffracts light of specific wavelengths instead of refracting it.


By arranging a special material in concentric rings, researchers have built the world’s thinnest lens at just three atoms thickness.

Oct 13, 2024

Traded: Venture Capital 🦄 on Instagram: Elon musk’s @spacex caught a 19 story tall rocket booster in mid air

Posted by in categories: Elon Musk, finance, space travel

82K likes, — tradedvc on October 13, 2024: Elon musk’s @spacex caught a 19 story tall rocket booster in mid air.

Credit: Shaun Maguire — X

Oct 13, 2024

AI model LucaProt uncovers 251,000 new RNA viruses, revealing hidden diversity worldwide

Posted by in categories: biotech/medical, robotics/AI

🌍🔬🦠


In a recent study published in the journal Cell, researchers developed a deep learning model, “LucaProt,” a transformer-based AI model to detect highly divergent ribonucleic acid (RNA)-dependent RNA polymerase (RdRP) sequences in meta-transcriptomes from diverse ecosystems. They identified 180 RNA virus supergroups and 161,979 putative RNA virus species, showing that RNA viruses are widespread and present even in extreme environments.

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