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Coding for brain chips gives cognitive computing boost
It's a cognitive leap forward. IBM can now program an experimental chip they unveiled two years ago. The chips, designed to mimic how our brains work, are set to power computers that handle many streams of input data at once – much like the sensory input we deal with all the time.
IBM's TrueNorth computer chips contain memory, processors and communication channels wired up like the synapses, neurons and axons of a brain. A key idea is that the chips can be hooked up into vast grids with many thousands working together in parallel.
For certain types of task, such as quickly responding to large amounts of input data from sensors, they are much faster and less power-hungry than standard chips. They could one day replace human reflexes in self-driving cars or power the sensory systems of a robot, for example.
But because the chips rewrite the rulebook for how computers are normally put together, they are not easy to program. Dharmendra Modha and his colleagues at IBM Research in San Jose, California, learned this the hard way. The team's first attempts were full of errors: "The programs were very unintuitive and extremely difficult to debug," says Modha. "Things looked hopeless."
So they designed a new way of programming. This involves telling the computer how to yoke together the many individual chips in play at once. The IBM team came up with a way to package the functionality of each chip inside blocks of code they call "corelets".
Building blocks
These corelets can be bundled together to make bigger corelets, each performing just a part of the overall software. Modha's team presented the work at the International Joint Conference on Neural Networks in Dallas, Texas, this week.
The approach lets coders focus on how corelets should be connected to each other rather than what goes on inside them, turning programming into a wiring problem. "It opens a new way of thinking about how to tackle big systems," says Modha.
It also makes code reusable. The team have already built up a library of over 100 corelets that can be used as the building blocks of new programs. One early corelet can identify whether a piece of music was composed by Bach or Beethoven, for example.
Modha expects that the number of functions will grow exponentially. "As new corelets are written and added to the library there are many more combinations in which the existing corelets can be put together," he says.
Source: http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn24022-coding-for-brain-chips-gives-cognitive-computing-boost.html#.UgycB9IeAWN
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Founded by Russian entrepreneur Dmitry Itskov in February 2011 with the participation of leading Russian specialists in the field of neural interfaces, robotics, artificial organs and systems.
The main goals of the 2045 Initiative: the creation and realization of a new strategy for the development of humanity which meets global civilization challenges; the creation of optimale conditions promoting the spiritual enlightenment of humanity; and the realization of a new futuristic reality based on 5 principles: high spirituality, high culture, high ethics, high science and high technologies.
The main science mega-project of the 2045 Initiative aims to create technologies enabling the transfer of a individual’s personality to a more advanced non-biological carrier, and extending life, including to the point of immortality. We devote particular attention to enabling the fullest possible dialogue between the world’s major spiritual traditions, science and society.
A large-scale transformation of humanity, comparable to some of the major spiritual and sci-tech revolutions in history, will require a new strategy. We believe this to be necessary to overcome existing crises, which threaten our planetary habitat and the continued existence of humanity as a species. With the 2045 Initiative, we hope to realize a new strategy for humanity's development, and in so doing, create a more productive, fulfilling, and satisfying future.
The "2045" team is working towards creating an international research center where leading scientists will be engaged in research and development in the fields of anthropomorphic robotics, living systems modeling and brain and consciousness modeling with the goal of transferring one’s individual consciousness to an artificial carrier and achieving cybernetic immortality.
An annual congress "The Global Future 2045" is organized by the Initiative to give platform for discussing mankind's evolutionary strategy based on technologies of cybernetic immortality as well as the possible impact of such technologies on global society, politics and economies of the future.
Future prospects of "2045" Initiative for society
2015-2020
The emergence and widespread use of affordable android "avatars" controlled by a "brain-computer" interface. Coupled with related technologies “avatars’ will give people a number of new features: ability to work in dangerous environments, perform rescue operations, travel in extreme situations etc.
Avatar components will be used in medicine for the rehabilitation of fully or partially disabled patients giving them prosthetic limbs or recover lost senses.
2020-2025
Creation of an autonomous life-support system for the human brain linked to a robot, ‘avatar’, will save people whose body is completely worn out or irreversibly damaged. Any patient with an intact brain will be able to return to a fully functioning bodily life. Such technologies will greatly enlarge the possibility of hybrid bio-electronic devices, thus creating a new IT revolution and will make all kinds of superimpositions of electronic and biological systems possible.
2030-2035
Creation of a computer model of the brain and human consciousness with the subsequent development of means to transfer individual consciousness onto an artificial carrier. This development will profoundly change the world, it will not only give everyone the possibility of cybernetic immortality but will also create a friendly artificial intelligence, expand human capabilities and provide opportunities for ordinary people to restore or modify their own brain multiple times. The final result at this stage can be a real revolution in the understanding of human nature that will completely change the human and technical prospects for humanity.
2045
This is the time when substance-independent minds will receive new bodies with capacities far exceeding those of ordinary humans. A new era for humanity will arrive! Changes will occur in all spheres of human activity – energy generation, transportation, politics, medicine, psychology, sciences, and so on.
Today it is hard to imagine a future when bodies consisting of nanorobots will become affordable and capable of taking any form. It is also hard to imagine body holograms featuring controlled matter. One thing is clear however: humanity, for the first time in its history, will make a fully managed evolutionary transition and eventually become a new species. Moreover, prerequisites for a large-scale expansion into outer space will be created as well.
Key elements of the project in the future
• International social movement
• social network immortal.me
• charitable foundation "Global Future 2045" (Foundation 2045)
• scientific research centre "Immortality"
• business incubator
• University of "Immortality"
• annual award for contribution to the realization of the project of "Immortality”.
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