4 ms·

Headline: New "artificial car" travels 30 times faster than the real thing and can fly! Thing they're describing: a bullet fired from a gun

asah 4y ago
sorry for the downvote, but an essential function of a car is transportation - bullets don't transport anything (not even small things).
- tsimionescu 4y ago
  Yes, and similarly, a memristor is not a neuron - it only bears a passing resemblance, probably worse than the resemblance between a car and a bullet.
  - Majestic121 4y ago
    You're talking about essence, the parent is talking about function. A horse is not a car, it does not even bear a passing resemblance, and yet both can be used as a mean of transportation.
  - rbanffy 4y ago
    It doesn't have to be, but both are, at some level of abstraction, switches that integrate multiple weighted inputs and set an output level that's used as input for other switches. If this is what we expect, the analogy holds and the implementation details don't matter.
    - tsimionescu 4y ago
      But there is a fundamental difference that breaks the analogy: the "function" that the neuron uses to set its output based on its input is not a function at all, it is a stateful mechanism. That is, for the same input at different times, a real neuron will have different outputs; and its own ouptus may change its state. In contrast, the memristor, once programmed, always applies the same function to its inputs. Even if it can be reprogrammed with a different weighting, it can't do so based on its own output - at least not with any current neural network architechture.
      - rbanffy 4y ago
        I never said the "artificial neuron" would be stateless. Natural ones have states and, if we model artificial ones as stateless it's just because they are easier to model that way. In that sense, an artificial neural network is an exercise of how little "neuron-ness" one needs to make a useful neural network.
- 2muchcoffeeman 4y ago
  These things in the article may not have functions essential to synapses though. I’m no biologist. If a subset of functions is ok then …
- bno1 4y ago
  They do transport you to the other side tho
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
  - Sohcahtoa82 4y ago
    There is no other side. This is it.
- formerly_proven 4y ago
  Some bullets actually do transport something, e.g. explosives or ropes.
- danielbln 4y ago
  Technically, they transport their kinetic payload. The engine stays behind.

asah 4y ago

sorry for the downvote, but an essential function of a car is transportation - bullets don't transport anything (not even small things).

tsimionescu 4y ago
Yes, and similarly, a memristor is not a neuron - it only bears a passing resemblance, probably worse than the resemblance between a car and a bullet.
- Majestic121 4y ago
  You're talking about essence, the parent is talking about function. A horse is not a car, it does not even bear a passing resemblance, and yet both can be used as a mean of transportation.
- rbanffy 4y ago
  It doesn't have to be, but both are, at some level of abstraction, switches that integrate multiple weighted inputs and set an output level that's used as input for other switches. If this is what we expect, the analogy holds and the implementation details don't matter.
  - tsimionescu 4y ago
    But there is a fundamental difference that breaks the analogy: the "function" that the neuron uses to set its output based on its input is not a function at all, it is a stateful mechanism. That is, for the same input at different times, a real neuron will have different outputs; and its own ouptus may change its state. In contrast, the memristor, once programmed, always applies the same function to its inputs. Even if it can be reprogrammed with a different weighting, it can't do so based on its own output - at least not with any current neural network architechture.
    - rbanffy 4y ago
      I never said the "artificial neuron" would be stateless. Natural ones have states and, if we model artificial ones as stateless it's just because they are easier to model that way. In that sense, an artificial neural network is an exercise of how little "neuron-ness" one needs to make a useful neural network.
2muchcoffeeman 4y ago
These things in the article may not have functions essential to synapses though. I’m no biologist. If a subset of functions is ok then …
bno1 4y ago
They do transport you to the other side tho
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
- Sohcahtoa82 4y ago
  There is no other side. This is it.
formerly_proven 4y ago
Some bullets actually do transport something, e.g. explosives or ropes.
danielbln 4y ago
Technically, they transport their kinetic payload. The engine stays behind.