# Brain with cat-like intelligence simulated on a computer by IBM researchers.



## Kevinaswell (May 6, 2009)

If the Matrix or I, Robot's view of artificial intelligence sent chilly shivers down your spine, then prepare for frostbite: IBM's artificial brain is now as smart as a cat--just a stop or two down the line from human powers.










Speaking at the SC09 high-performance computing conference this week, IBM representatives from the cognitive computing team will be unveiling all the technical details behind their successes with large-scale cortical simulation and brain-like emulation. But it boils down quite neatly to news that the team has, for the first time, performed an in-computer simulation of a brain's workings at a near-instantaneous speed.

The magic is all done in software, with particularly clever program elements that emulate the biochemical and electrical activity of neurons and synapses in real flesh-and-blood brains. By hooking together over a billion simulated neurons and 10 trillion (that's 10,000 billion) learning synapses, the overall simulated brain is actually slightly more capable than the brain of your average house cat. On paper, at least--because there remains the huge problem of training the cyberbrain to do recognizably intelligent things, things that, say, a cat would do automatically.

Which is where the other bit of IBM's research comes in. Making cyberbrains more like real human ones means better understanding how our brains work. So IBM has also been studying real working human brains (non-invasively!) through magnetic resonance imaging and some processing on its Blue Gene supercomputer. The idea is to try and gain a better understanding of how communications happen inside the brain.

And here's the kicker: The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency was so impressed by the research, they funded more to the tune of $16 million, with the goal of producing a prototype cyberbrain chip about as smart as a mammal. Remember all those advanced robots we've shown you before? Yup. Imagine an IBM cyberbrain embedded in Boston Dynamics Big Dog, and then try and imagine what it would be capable of ... and I don't mean stuff like taking a robo-leak on the nearest battlefield tree.

Source.

Better source, read this one if your interested for a more in-depth take.


----------



## Vaka (Feb 26, 2010)

Queue posts from all the paranoid robot apocalypse peoples!

But seriously, that's awesome. I can't imagine what we'll have in 10 years of time!


----------



## Kevinaswell (May 6, 2009)

Right, though? I'm often too impatient :O


----------



## Immemorial (May 16, 2010)

Pfffft. Owls are cooler. :dry:


----------



## Blueguardian (Aug 22, 2009)

Nuuuu, I don't want to compete against robots (androids?) for jobs in the future as well~ I am so screwed.


----------



## Kevinaswell (May 6, 2009)

Blueguardian said:


> Nuuuu, I don't want to compete against robots (androids?) for jobs in the future as well~ I am so screwed.


Ooorrr....take out a loan, BUY a robot, and have it go to work for you :O


----------



## Valdyr (May 25, 2010)

One thing that intrigues and pleases me is that they were able to achieve this purely through software, without having to develop radically different hardware. It seemed to be the conventional wisdom that the primary obstacle to something like this was the lack of suitable hardware, while I always argued in favor of the idea that a software-based solution could be achieved. 

I'm curious to see how this develops. I suppose what most immediately piques my curiosity is how to implement a method to teach it useful skills, such as basic problem solving skills, although it brings back to my attention the oft-considered ethical consequences of further development of such a technology.

I've got my AI-rights picket sign already made :laughing:


----------



## sarek (May 20, 2010)

From the article I can sea that they have built the substrate. But what kind of thinking have they been able to teach it? Will they be focusing on specific AI functions or on a more generalised kind of AI?


----------



## Valdyr (May 25, 2010)

sarek said:


> From the article I can sea that they have built the substrate. But what kind of thinking have they been able to teach it? Will they be focusing on specific AI functions or on a more generalised kind of AI?


My guess is that they will begin by working towards specific AI tasks, for two main reasons. One is that, from a practical standpoint, there are many tasks and problems that would greatly benefit from an AI specifically designed and trained to do them. The other is from the economic standpoint; I think that research towards creating task-specific AI will receive far more funding and resources due to governments and businesses probably being more interested in task-specific AI to solve problems than they are on sheer technological development. Then again, it depends how much leverage the scientists in question have, and what they themselves would like to do with it.

My personal prediction is that research into task-specific AI is going to grow and advance much more rapidly than "general" or "lifelike" AI (synthetic life as I like to call it), thought the latter will still progress at a steady rate.


----------



## sarek (May 20, 2010)

That sounds entirely reasonable. What you would get is more along the lines of an expert systems.

I cant help getting the impression though that we are overlooking something that is staring us in the face and that there may be better and cheaper ways to build a generalised AI. If only I knew what that was.


----------



## Valdyr (May 25, 2010)

sarek said:


> That sounds entirely reasonable. What you would get is more along the lines of an expert systems.
> 
> I cant help getting the impression though that we are overlooking something that is staring us in the face and that there may be better and cheaper ways to build a generalised AI. If only I knew what that was.


The answer there might lie in the application of new construction techniques, like nanotechnology and biotechnology. My idea is as good as yours here.


----------



## android654 (Jan 19, 2010)

YouTube - I am the very model of a singularitarian

if only...


----------



## Peaceful Defense (May 9, 2010)

I wonder if they have created a simulated environment for the A.I.


----------



## Jorge (Aug 5, 2009)

So... how long till we are able to come up with a question for the answer "42"?


----------



## Socrates (Feb 1, 2010)

Nyx said:


> Queue posts from all the paranoid robot apocalypse peoples!
> 
> But seriously, that's awesome. I can't imagine what we'll have in 10 years of time!


In ten years, we will have this.

You and I will be able to afford this type of computing power for about $1,000. As will the rest of humanity... 

If we emulate the human brain before 2020, we'll have computers with that kind of power in 2030. The consumer market is always ten years behind, as far as computation is concerned.


----------



## EvanR (Nov 28, 2009)

Clandestine said:


> In ten years, we will have this.
> 
> You and I will be able to afford this type of computing power for about $1,000. As will the rest of humanity...
> 
> If we emulate the human brain before 2020, we'll have computers with that kind of power in 2030. The consumer market is always ten years behind, as far as computation is concerned.


Over time the consumer market will catch up, my guess is less than 10 years.


----------



## Shoku (Aug 12, 2009)

I find it somewhat hard to beleive that we've gone from not being able to functionally simulate the nervous system of a c. elegans worm to simulating human brains at pet levels.

*that worm is a model system so we study the ever living hell out of it. The have deterministic growth patterns, which is to say we know exactly which cells come from which cells all the way through. We know that they will have exactly thi smany neurons every time and which ones those are (302 of them if I recall.)

You would think we could simulate the workings of a few hundred cells before we moved on to these animals with millions, right?


----------



## negativnein (Jun 21, 2010)

The U.S. has DARPA, Europe has nazi gold:
Blue Brain Project - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia


----------



## android654 (Jan 19, 2010)

negativnein said:


> The U.S. has DARPA, Europe has nazi gold:
> Blue Brain Project - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia


Darpa is a joke compared to electronic sentience that'll eventually come about as a result from blue brain.


----------

