4 ms·
Paywalled. From an earlier article in Forbes: > Using real neurons avoids several other difficulties that software-based neural networks have. For instance, to
by pezzana 5y ago
Paywalled. From an earlier article in Forbes:
> Using real neurons avoids several other difficulties that software-based neural networks have. For instance, to get artificial neural networks to start learning well, their programmers usually have to engage in a laborious process of manually adjusting the initial coefficients, or weights, that will be applied to each type of data point the network processes. Another challenge is to get the software to balance how much it should be trying to explore new solutions to a problem versus relying on solutions the network has already discovered that work well.
> “All these problems are completely eluded if you have a system that is based on biological neurons to begin with,” Friston said.
https://fortune.com/2020/03/30/startup-human-neurons-computer-chips/ https://fortune.com/2020/03/30/startup-human-neurons-compute...
The other main advantage is low power consumption.
> AlphaGo, the deep-learning system DeepMind created to play Go and which beat the world’s best human player in that ancient strategy game in 2016, consumed one megawatt of power while playing the game, enough to power about 100 homes for a day, according to an estimate by technology company Ceva. By contrast, the human brain consumes about 20 watts of power, or 50,000 times less energy than AlphaGo used.
However, it's not clear whether these hybrid chips will have similarly low power consumption.
- lucb1e 5y ago> The other main advantage is low power consumption. As someone worried about our climate, I'm very curious about that actually. Is it more efficient to feed neurons biological food (from an energy perspective, since that food needs to be grown on land somewhere and takes up solar energy, it needs water that comes from clouds which were created by evaporation, etc.) than it is to use low-CO2 energy sources (solar, wind, nuclear, hydro, wave, whatever) and power a computer with that? E.g. electric motors are very efficient compared to combustion, but it's only effective if you get electricity from a non-combustion source or else you might as well use a combustion engine in the vehicle itself. I kind of assumed it's the same for computers, that they efficiently calculate things compared to biology, but I never really thought about it. I'm curious how energy-intensive biological computers are (discounting any R&D that I assume is currently still a big part of the equation).
- giuliomagnifico 5y agoPaywalled?! I don’t see a paywall here, maybe I’m still in the”free articles limit”. By the way thanks for your quotes!
- kgc 5y agoThere is a company working on biologically inspired neural chips called Rain Neuromorphics. https://rain.ai https://rain.ai