Cyber Brains - Blue Brain Project

This has to be one of the coolest websites I've ever seen. The Blue Brain Project is an attempt by I.B.M. to simulate a human brain via computer. According to the website this is the first comprehensive attempt to reverse-engineer the mammalian brain. Now that's a wild concept! If they succeed they will have created a realistic working cyber-brain. It appears that they are making progress and the implications of what's possible is just incredible.

I can't even begin to explain how this works because of the complexity of the matter. The very basics of this would be to simulate a neocortical column, which is like one microcircuit of the brain. They would simulate neuron activity, and then the process of synapse. This simplified explanation than creates one neocortical column. I believe I read that the human neocortex has about 10,000 - 100,000 thousand of these micro circuits. Then in order for me to completely butcher the explanation of this , they would daisy chain or patch together the appropriate number of neocortical columns and would then have a working computer simulated neocortex. My explanation sucks, so if this topic interests you and you haven't already researched this for yourself check out the link at the end of this post.

This really is right out of the pages of some cyber punk novel come to life. I would guess that once they have a working model, it would just be a matter of time before they figure out how to interface it with a biological brain. That would mean that eventually we could download and upload information into and out of our brains like something out of the Matrix movie. Like Neo in the Matrix we would all be able to learn Kung Fu simply by plugging ourselves in. I know I'm probably sensationalizing this a bit, but at the rates of progress in the computer and technology fields those days may not be very far off.

To take this a step further, it may be a simple matter of time before we can upload our entire brain into a virtual reality. This would create an entirely new paradigm on the concepts of consciousness and reality. The very idea of this type of technology and it applications make my head spin. If your bored and into wild concepts like this you might want to check this out.

http://bluebrain.epfl.ch/