development is characterized by the selective breaking of connections.
More connections exist at birth than are needed. In this way the early
architecture of the brain is etched rather than written. Later we lose
brain cells at the rate of 17,000 a day. It's a small percentage: over
80 yrs it amounts to 4.96*10^8 or 0.5% of a brain with 10^11 neurons.
>At birth [and before], one neuron does not "know" which other neuron to
>which it should make "contact." It is from internal and external stimuli
>from which specific contacts are selected. The ability of the developed
>brain to "normally" react to an external stimuli comes from an architecture
>that has been created during development stages. A child raised chained and
>in a closet for 18 years will react differently, physically and emotionally,
>to external stimuli as compared to a child that has been going to school.
>Most if not all of the connections made during development are permanent.
>
>Synapses allows for this flexibility of "choosing" connections during
>development rather than being hardwired at the get go.
>
>IMHO
>Lou
>
>----- Original Message -----
>From: "Phil Henshaw" <sy at synapse9.com>
>To: "'The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group'"
><friam at redfish.com>
>Sent: Wednesday, July 12, 2006 4:49 AM
>Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Neurons.
>
>
>Yes, the connection at synapses does seem to be a special case of how
>cells are connected generally, through the blood stream or other medium
>of exchange. That relationship, cells creating a larger system by
>'floating messages in a bottle' to each other is this same extremely
>improbable means of running things that nature uses and seems completely
>illogical from a machine design point of view. When cells interact with
>each other they just dump stuff in the stream and grab stuff from the
>stream (or have it sucked out of them and pushed into them), but there's
>actually no connection between the cells.
>
>
>Phil Henshaw ????.?? ? `?.????
>~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
>680 Ft. Washington Ave
>NY NY 10040
>tel: 212-795-4844
>e-mail: pfh at synapse9.com
>explorations: www.synapse9.com
>
>
>
>
>>-----Original Message-----
>>From: friam-bounces at redfish.com
>>[mailto:friam-bounces at redfish.com] On Behalf Of Jochen Fromm
>>Sent: Tuesday, July 11, 2006 9:01 AM
>>To: 'The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group'
>>Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Neurons.
>>
>>
>>
>>Gaps exists because neurons are not only the building block
>>of the brain and the neural system, they are also cells,
>>the basic building block of any organic lifeform. Cells
>>existed long before any neural system (in eukaroytic
>>and prokaryotic form). To connect neurons by synapses has
>>the additional advantage of high flexibility and adaptivity
>>by providing countless possible combinations that are
>>modifiable during the "runtime" of the system, and
>>by offering the possibility of modulation at the gaps.
>>
>>Emotions in general have indeed a strong correlation to
>>modulation, they seem to be a kind of archaic control system
>>which evaluates
>>situations and controls the behavior (damping undesirable behavior
>>while amplifying desirable actions). They signal the state of
>>the system and control it at the same time - with the help of
>>the reward system, neural modulators and reinforcment
>>learning. It is no accident that
>>pleasant stimuli are commonly associated with reinforcing
>>neural modulators as dopamine.
>>
>>-J.
>>
>>
>>-----Original Message-----
>>From: Russell Standish
>>Sent: Monday, July 10, 2006 4:02 AM
>>To: sy at synapse9.com; The Friday Morning Applied Complexity
>>Coffee Group
>>Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Neurons.
>>
>>My guess is that the "gaps" or synapses, have a lot to do
>>with fine tuning the amount of damping in the brain's
>>dynamical function. It appears that brains need to operate
>>near the "edge of chaos", and some global control system fine
>>tuning this would be desirable.
>>
>>This probably explains the evolution of emotions.
>>
>>Phil Husband's group in Sussex have done a fair bit of work
>>with "GasNets", which is inspired by the design, to make
>>effective robotic controllers.
>>
>>Cheers
>>
>>
>>============================================================
>>FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
>>Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
>>lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at
http://www.friam.org>>
>>
>>
>>
>
>
>============================================================
>FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
>Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
>lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at
http://www.friam.org>
>
>
>
>============================================================
>FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
>Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
>lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at
http://www.friam.org>
>
>
>
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