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Neurons in a dish learn to play Pong
- m3kw9 4y agoWonder then they can plug in a camera and output the visual from the brain from recall. And would that be called consciousness?
- superkuh 4y agoThis is about 40x more cells than they used to fly a fighter jet in a simulation back in 2004. https://www.nature.com/articles/nrn1572 https://www.nature.com/articles/nrn1572 . I suppose the claim to fame in this similar study is the use of the title organoid and there's some legitimacy to that. Form and function are intimately tied in the brain and just a bunch of neurons on a petri dish isn't quite an organ.
- Kalanos 4y ago
- thrown_22 4y ago>(Discovery Channel, USA, 22 October 2004) That's a bit like saying battle bots solved locomotion of robots.
- sillysaurusx 4y agoGosh, that study. It was the first time my faith in academia was severely shaken. As a 19yo, I spent around 6 hours reverse engineering what was going on, and then fell into a spiral of “Is this what academia is all about? Really?” Because I was so fascinated by the concept, then it was such a letdown… It took some time to appreciate that there are some worthwhile ideas in that paper. But it was my first experience with “Academic lies about accomplishment to secure further funding.” It’s hard to say whether “lie” or “severely exaggerate” is appropriate. A method existed to measure a signal from a neuron. A second method existed to modify that signal. Whenever the plane crashed, the signal was modified slightly, until the plane flew level. It didn’t learn to fly. The researcher modified a neuron (steady signal) until it gave the appropriate signal (e.g. zero) to fly level. Negative signal, plane banks left. Positive signal, plane banks right. If plane crashes, modify neuron until signal is neither positive nor negative. That was the extent of the study. In that context, do you feel like the neurons learned to fly? Maybe. It’s certainly similar in spirit to reinforcement learning in modern times. But I wouldn’t say that setting a signal to zero is a nice definition of “flew a plane”. In other words, there was no active feedback; if you pointed the plane in a slightly different direction, it would immediately crash. It wasn’t doing anything more than setting the signal slowly over time to an answer that was known ahead of time. (Keep the plane level by not moving the controls.) Suppose the neurons learned to draw a straight line. That was essentially what was being demonstrated here. If you substitute “plane crash” with “line becomes a curve”, it becomes much less exciting, to say the least. “Isn’t that just learning to set a signal to a constant value?” “Yep” “Will it always become the same constant?” “Yep” “Can’t we already do that?” “Yep” I was so disillusioned that it took many years to stop believing that academia itself was at fault for misinforming the public so badly. After all, it’s almost two decades later, and people still believe “rat brain flies plane” happened in 2004. If I could go back in time, I’d tell myself not to worry about it; focus on the academics that are working quietly on the frontier, not the ones trying to raise funding for their lab. At least the neurons in today’s study actually learned to play something. But if the past is any indication, I’d err on the side of skepticism.
- thrown_22 4y agoDo you know the actual study which did this? Because the Nature citation on where the work was done is literally "The Discovery Channel".
- sillysaurusx 4y agoIt was big news at the time. Headlines everywhere. Rat brain flies plane. You’d think that within a few years, maybe rat brains would be the primary way we’d control planes. I did manage to track down the original study, which at the time wasn’t too easy; this was before scihub. I wish I’d saved it for posterity. My motivation went from “this is exactly what I want to do with my life” to laying on the couch wondering what the heck could possibly be happening, when the whole world believes rat brains are flying planes, vs what was actually demonstrated in the paper. If you do find it, please post it. It’d be a nice stroll through memory lane, and an interesting retrospective on how to get funding for one’s own research lab. (A handy skill to have, if you don’t mind… well, exaggerating, to say the least.)
- leonmoonen 4y agoThomas DeMarse is mentioned in some of the 2004 news articles. His Google Scholar profile has the following short paper published at a conference in 2005: https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C5&q=Thomas+DeMarse+flight+control&btnG=#d=gs_qabs&t=1665814308197&u=%23p%3DBLUjOn85IbYJ https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C5&q=Thom...
- justin_ 4y agoI think it might be this one: Adaptive flight control with living neuronal networks on microelectrode arrays The brain is perhaps one of the most robust and fault tolerant computational devices in existence and yet little is known about its mechanisms. Microelectrode arrays have recently been developed in which the computational properties of networks of living neurons can be studied in detail. In this paper we report work investigating the ability of living neurons to act as a set of neuronal weights which were used to control the flight of a simulated aircraft. These weights were manipulated via high frequency stimulation inputs to produce a system in which a living neuronal network would "learn" to control an aircraft for straight and level flight. https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/1556108 https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/1556108 https://sci-hub.ru/https://doi.org/10.1109/IJCNN.2005.1556108 https://sci-hub.ru/https://doi.org/10.1109/IJCNN.2005.155610...
- seydor 4y agoi would urge people to read the paper instead. The 'learning' is a bit iffy , and this was meant to test the brain theory of Friston rather than plug neurons into pong. Still, great job on the neurotechnology involved and a step in the direction where we should be going, controlling large numbers of neurons Ars Technica has a better article, although they dont describe the dense electode array correctly: https://arstechnica.com/science/2022/10/a-dish-of-neurons-may-have-taught-itself-to-play-pong-badly/ https://arstechnica.com/science/2022/10/a-dish-of-neurons-ma...
- austinjp 4y agoGenuine question: why "should" we be going in this direction?
- serf 4y agopost-apocalyptic horrible scenarios aside, there are plenty of therapeutic reasons why it would be nice to have neuron-level control of brain tissue.
- rongopo 4y agoIs curiosity a good answer for you? For me it is.
- seydor 4y agobecause it's bottom-up, as opposed to mouse studies that impose our own ideas and record from a tiny fraction of brain cells
- EricMausler 4y agoTo fight neurodegenerative diseases
- austinjp 4y agoExcept the lab doing this make no mention of treating disease. They want to "shortcut machine learning" by using living tissue to perform tasks: https://corticallabs.com/ https://corticallabs.com/
- sidewndr46 4y agoA question for someone who understands the neurology and biology of this much more than I do: Once I have a group of neurons like this trained to do something, can I actually count on them to continue performing that task until they die? Or is it possible they spontaneously reorganize or "learn" a previously unseen behavioral pattern?
- amelius 4y agoI guess they can become tired also, just like humans. (Not a biologist)
- jerojero 4y agoHm. That's a very good question. I haven't kept up with neurobiology research but I imagine as long as the same neurons keep their connections to the same other neurons then it would be possible for them to keep performing the task. And neurons will do keep these connections if the stimuli was strong enough and showed up repeatedly. But when the task is not required for a very long time the circuit that turns this task on will weaken, at least in the brain. And neurons will be forming other connections, but that doesn't mean they will necessarily "forget" about older ones.
- 9wzYQbTYsAIc 4y agoHere is a journal article that might be relevant for you: https://www.cell.com/cell/fulltext/S0092-8674(14)01362-2 https://www.cell.com/cell/fulltext/S0092-8674(14)01362-2 Abstract: ”Neuronal plasticity in the brain is greatly enhanced during critical periods early in life and was long thought to be rather limited thereafter. Studies in primary sensory areas of the neocortex have revealed a substantial degree of plasticity in the mature brain, too. Often, plasticity in the adult neocortex lies dormant but can be reactivated by modifications of sensory input or sensory-motor interactions, which alter the level and pattern of activity in cortical circuits. Such interventions, potentially in combination with drugs targeting molecular brakes on plasticity present in the adult brain, might help recovery of function in the injured or diseased brain.”
- sally_glance 4y ago
- yrgulation 4y agoProper ai.
- sabertoothed 4y agoN.I.
- ALittleLight 4y agoThey are using human neurons for this? The one substrate we can be sure of is capable of producing consciousness?
- djmips 4y agoInteresting question! https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-020-02986-y https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-020-02986-y
- ALittleLight 4y agoThis seems like a research area so horrific it could exist only in a comic book. This type of thing should not be funded or researched. I'm surprised it needs to be said but we shouldn't grow human brains to experiment on them. Maybe if we could understand and quantify consciousness and be sure we weren't subjecting something to hell - but certainly not while we can't do that.
- johnnylambada 4y agoJust as possible that allowing this consciousness to do exactly what it was designed to do and achieve such a sublime state of flow that it would be a crime to NOT let it experience Pong.
- thrown_22 4y ago
- MarcelOlsz 4y agoYC '23 - Stem Cell Recycling - Stem.ly It almost writes itself.
- bigyikes 4y agoFlame bait comment. It’s not a valid comparison. Terminating a natural embryo is not the same as growing an artificial brain which, for all we know, might experience the worst kind of hell imaginable.
- ruined 4y agohell is real
- ofou 4y agoIt's interesting to see research like this coming up. It might inform AI in unpredicted ways IMO. "In vitro neurons learn and exhibit sentience when embodied in a simulated game-world". https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0896627322008066 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S089662732...
- _spduchamp 4y agoDishBrain is better for marketing than DishNightmares.
- im3w1l 4y agoSo we can create microbrains of human neurons. Cool. But what about a gigabrain? Something smarter than all of us? For the record I do think such a creation should have personhood. And have the right to learn about and interact with the real world.
- grepfru_it 4y agoHere's an article that's almost 20 years old on a similar topic https://web.archive.org/web/20041023144731/https://www.wired.com/news/medtech/0,1286,65438,00.html https://web.archive.org/web/20041023144731/https://www.wired... https://web.archive.org/web/20041106064802/http://www.napa.ufl.edu/2004news/braindish.htm https://web.archive.org/web/20041106064802/http://www.napa.u... EDIT: it seems the researcher working on this project passed away recently :(
- yazzku 4y agoFunny how everybody here panics about 'the hell' of experimenting with human brains that could possibly grow consciousness. What about the actual hell we put animals through so that we can eat them? There are also studies suggesting that, for example, crows and other animals have some form of consciousness: https://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/crows-consciousness-humans-primates-study-tubingen-university-germany-b717390.html https://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/crows-consciousne... https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/do-crows-possess-form-consciousness-180975940/ https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/do-crows-possess-f... You don't need to imagine hell, it's already here.
- jjtheblunt 4y agoIf there are extraterrestrials, "Neurons in a dish learn to play Pong" is probably the sort of thing they say while watching us from their UFOs.
- velcrovan 4y agoI tend to think that if there are extraterrestrials, they probably look a lot more like neurons in a dish than like us.
- davisr 4y agoProbably. http://tothemoon.ser.asu.edu/data_g/G04/Unidentified/full/GT4-37149-039_G04-U_f.png http://tothemoon.ser.asu.edu/data_g/G04/Unidentified/full/GT...
- odrekf 4y agoI tried to reply to someone but he got censored for pointing out that if you care about two neurons you should care about the animals that go through hell in the meat/dairy industry. Here's my reply: One can't hope to truly know if another individual (be it a human or any other animal) is conscious (the hard problem of consciousness). But if it has eyes like us, mouth like us, plays like us, cries/screams when hurt like us, and even seem to dream like us (asleep dogs sometimes move like they are running in their dreams, and when they wake up they look confused and still perturbed from what they were seeing in their minds), it makes perfect sense to assume that they are conscious like us, and it's the ethical thing to do.
- hirundo 4y agoIf you apply the same standard within our own species you would be accused of xenophobia. Why should it be different across species?
- fjeifisjf 4y ago
- melagonster 4y agoif all species are same, what's different between vegetables and animals? or even COVID-19 virus and bacteria?
- theflyingelvis 4y agoMaybe they could run for senate in my home state
- crakenzak 4y agoDepends on how quickly the neurons can learn to be incompetent and waste tax payer money, only then will they have a real chance ;)
- IIAOPSW 4y agoHmm. Assuming we could feed in the sort of indicators and summary statistics that already form the way nation-states see reality, we could attach a literal brain to the organs of the state!
- dillondoyle 4y agoAvenue 5 (under rated show) has President 2.0! An AI who is far more competent. Or more like able to make tough decisions without human backlash.
- ummonk 4y agoIt seems needlessly provocative to use human neurons to do this. Presumably they could have had the same effects with neurons from another species. It’s like they want to provoke a backlash from religious people against scientific experimentation.
- _mhr_ 4y agoThey compared human cells to mouse cells, showing improved performance for the human cells.
- drawingthesun 4y agoIt's not needlessly provocative human neurons have shown in almost every study to be superior to all other animal neurons. Let the backlash happen and as a society let's put a stop to letting religious idiocy get in the way of science. There is an entire field of study for ethical science and I stand behind that 100%. Unethical science can get lost! I'm not a progress at any costs type of person. But is this actually unethical or just something a religious idiot doesn't like?
- lvass 4y agoOnly religious idiots would prefer a "normal" life over having human-brained gorilla chimeras do all the work and just consuming psychotropics all day, right?
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- GolfPopper 4y agoSF author (and marine biologist) Peter Watts described something very much like this, only more advanced, in his book Maelstrom (2001): "Achilles Desjardins had always found smart gels a bit creepy. People thought of them as brains in boxes, but they weren't. They didn't have the parts. Forget about the neocortex or the cerebellum—these things had nothing. No hypothalamus, no pineal gland, no sheathing of mammal over reptile over fish. No instincts. No desires. Just a porridge of cultured neurons, really: four-digit IQs that didn't give a rat's ass whether they even lived or died. Somehow they learned through operant conditioning, although they lacked the capacity either to enjoy reward or suffer punishment. Their pathways formed and dissolved with all the colorless indifference of water shaping a river delta." Much of his work, including Maelstrom, is freely available on his own website:https://rifters.com/real/shorts.htm https://rifters.com/real/shorts.htm
- narrator 4y agoAnother great novel about emergent intelligence was Blood Music by Greg Bear. A microorganism develops swarm intelligence.
- jbaber 4y agoI thought you were going to say Starfish by Watts, which also features smart gels.
- GolfPopper 4y agoMalestrom is the second book in the trilogy (or quadrology - the 4th book was split in two in some printings). I didn't have a copy of Starfish handy, and I wasn't sure if gels had been mentioned there or not.
- lvass 4y agoDo we have an open source PetriNeuronSDK to communicate with these yet? I can't wait until we get cloud neurons IaaS.
- d--b 4y ago> he work is a proof of principle that neurons in a dish can learn and exhibit basic signs of intelligence Absolutely not. This shows that you can teach neurons to exhibit a reflex behavior adapted to the given stimuli - which shouldn’t come as a surprise. At best this is jellyfish-like level of intelligence.
- lern_too_spel 4y agoTransformers have shown that language development can also be explained by what you derisively call reflex behavior, with no need for specialized Chomskyan recursion circuitry, as the same mechanism with slight modification (decision transformers) also plays Pong.
- rryan 4y agoThere's a huge difference between fitting a probabilistic model to a data distribution then sampling from it (what GPT-3 is) and agents that invent language and use it to communicate.
- lern_too_spel 4y agoNot much. A transformer trained on multiple senses can learn the sound that an animal makes and associate it with seeing that animal. It can also learn how another agent reacts after it says a word. The huge difference is actually between animal reflexes and learned behavior. Reflex is built-in. I didn't learn to kick my leg in response to a tap on the patellar tendon.
- rryan 4y agoI agree that a Transformer is an example of a "reflexive" behavior because it learns to react in a context (via gradient descent rather than evolution as the learning algorithm). It's a conditional categorical distribution on steroids. I also agree it's not much different than what's going on in this petri dish with pong. But I don't think that's a profound statement. What I'm saying is that calling what a Transformer does "language development" isn't accurate. A Transformer can't "develop" language in that sense, it can only learn "reflexive" behavior from the data distribution it's trained on (it could never have produced that data distribution itself without the data existing in the first place).
- Manuel_D 4y agoI wonder if in the future we'll have some sort of FPGA formed by a neural dish. Hook up an HDMI port to a cube of neurons and it OCRs text or tracks objects. I suspect biological variations in cells would make the results inconsistent, and far inferior to what we can do with semiconductors presently, but it's cool to think about.
- yieldcrv 4y agoMakes me wonder how many states there are in a neuron. Like, they are similar to transistors but have more states than off (0) and on (1).
- jawadch93 4y ago[dead]
- janci 4y agoNext step: run Doom
- austinjp 4y agoFrom the website of the lab doing this https://corticallabs.com https://corticallabs.com Human neural networks raised in a simulation The neurons exist inside our Biological Intelligence Operating System (biOS). biOS runs the simulation and sends information about their environment, with positive or negative feedback. It interfaces with the neurons directly. As they react, their impulses affect their digital world. Our first minds The dishbrain is currently being developed at the CL0 laboratory in Melbourne, AU. We bring these neurons to life, and integrate them into The biOS with a mixture of hard silicon and soft tissue. Our first cohort have learnt to play Pong. They grow, adapt and learn as we do. Silicon meets neuron Neurons are cultivated inside a nutrient rich solution, supplying them everything they need to be happy and healthy. Their physical growth is across a silicon chip, which has a set of pins that send electrical impulses into the neural structure, and receive impulses back in return. The Ultimate Learning Machine Those actions have a positive or negative effect in biOS, which the mind perceives, adapting to improve that feedback. The human neuron is self programming, infinitely flexible, the result of four billion years of evolution. What digital models try and emulate, we begin with. Why? There are many advantages to organic-digital intelligence. Lower power costs, more intuition, insight and creativity in our intelligences. But most importantly we are driven by three core questions. What will we discover if our intelligences train themselves? We know an organic mind is a better learner than any digital model. It can switch tasks easily, and bring learnings from one task to another. But more important is what we don’t know. What are the limits of a mind connected to infinity? What can it do with data it literally lives in? What happens if we take a shortcut to generalised intelligence? Machine Learning algorithms are a poor copy of the way an organic neural network functions. So we’re starting with the neuron, replacing decades of algorithms with millions of years of evolution. What happens as these native intelligences start solving the problems we’d previously left to software? How can we surpass the limits of silicon? Silicon is raw, rigid, unchanging. Our organic neural networks sit on top of this raw power, but the way they grow and evolve isn’t limited to the software they run on. There is no software, it's coded in their DNA. How will computing change as we shift from hard silicon to soft tissue? RFN: Request For Neurons The dishbrain is learning and growing in biOS today, and soon we’re opening an early access preview for selected developers. The biOS is our simulation environment, where you can program tasks, challenges and objectives for our minds. Join our developer program to get early access to our SDK, and secure training time with our minds.
- norwalkbear 4y agoThey also grew eye like structures too right.