Professor Freeman Dyson (Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton) recently gave the Statutory Public Lecture of the School of Theoretical Physics. The lecture was held in UCD on Monday 19th May and was entitled “Are Brains Analog or Digital?”.
l-r: Prof. Werner Nahm (Senior Prof. & Director of the School of Theoretical Physics, DIAS), Prof. Arthur Jaffe (Chairman, Governing Board, School of Theoretical Physics, DIAS), Prof. Freeman Dyson (Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton), Prof. Vincent Cunnane (Chairman of Council, DIAS), Mr. Cecil Keaveney (Registrar, DIAS).
Abstract of lecture:
We know that creatures like us have two separate systems for processing information, the genome and the brain. We know that the genome is digital, and we can accurately transcribe our genomes onto digital machines. We cannot transcribe our brains, and the processing of information in our brains is still a great mystery. I will be talking about real brains and real people, asking a question that will have practical consequences when we are able to answer it. I am not able to answer it now. All I can do is to examine the evidence and explain why I consider it probable that the answer will be that brains are analog.
Leave a Comment
Last Updated: 22nd March 2016 by mary
19th May 2014 – Statutory Public Lecture of the School of Theoretical Physics
Professor Freeman Dyson (Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton) recently gave the Statutory Public Lecture of the School of Theoretical Physics. The lecture was held in UCD on Monday 19th May and was entitled “Are Brains Analog or Digital?”.
l-r: Prof. Werner Nahm (Senior Prof. & Director of the School of Theoretical Physics, DIAS), Prof. Arthur Jaffe (Chairman, Governing Board, School of Theoretical Physics, DIAS), Prof. Freeman Dyson (Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton), Prof. Vincent Cunnane (Chairman of Council, DIAS), Mr. Cecil Keaveney (Registrar, DIAS).
Abstract of lecture:
We know that creatures like us have two separate systems for processing information, the genome and the brain. We know that the genome is digital, and we can accurately transcribe our genomes onto digital machines. We cannot transcribe our brains, and the processing of information in our brains is still a great mystery. I will be talking about real brains and real people, asking a question that will have practical consequences when we are able to answer it. I am not able to answer it now. All I can do is to examine the evidence and explain why I consider it probable that the answer will be that brains are analog.
Category: School of Theoretical Physics News & Events
School of Theoretical Physics
STP, DIAS Weekly Seminar: 'N=4 Yang-Mills scattering amplitudes: symbol alphabet, cluster algebras & plabic graphs' with Anastasia Volovich (Brown University) can be viewed 👇 youtube.com/watch?v=3VXr0X…
"There's a schism in our picture of the world, and this is bridging that gap" – L. Borsten (former DIAS physicist), talking to Quantamagazine in their recent article ``How Gravity Is a Double Copy of Other Forces" about research collaborations at DIAS. 👇 rb.gy/zo8l5v
STP, DIAS Weekly Seminar: 'Non-Hermiticity: A New Paradigm for Model Building in Particle Physics' with Peter Millington (University of Nottingham) can be viewed here 👇 youtube.com/watch?v=0wRwcS…
Was a pleasure to welcome an Tánaiste to DIAS & Dunsink Observatory today. We're delighted he has an interest in the educational, research as well as recreational possibilities Dunsink offers. We look forward to working with him on these in the future. #DIASdiscovers twitter.com/LeoVaradkar/st… Retweeted by STP, DIAS
STP, DIAS Weekly Seminar: 'High-Order Topological States in Electronic & Photonic Lattice Systems' with Dario Bercioux (Donostia International Physics Center) can be viewed here 👇 youtube.com/watch?v=CD-rCb…
New paper published in Physical Review D by authors Ygor Pará, Giandomenico Palumbo (DIAS), & Tommaso Macrì - 'Probing non-Hermitian Phase Transitions in Curved Space via Quench Dynamics' journals.aps.org/prb/abstract/1… Retweeted by STP, DIAS
New paper published in Physical Review D by authors Ygor Pará, Giandomenico Palumbo (DIAS), & Tommaso Macrì - 'Probing non-Hermitian Phase Transitions in Curved Space via Quench Dynamics' journals.aps.org/prb/abstract/1…
STP, DIAS Weekly Seminar: 'The Complex Elliptic Genera of Simple Surface Singularities' with Katrin Wendland (Universität Freiburg) can be viewed here 👇 youtube.com/watch?v=HEpoNj…
John T. Lewis was born on this day in 1932. From January 1975 Professor Lewis took over the Directorship of STP, DIAS - a position he would hold for 25 years. He's pictured 👇 with Lochlainn O'Raifeartaigh & Reverend Patrick Browne (Monsignor Pádraig de Brún)
Mainz Institute for Theoretical Physics, Johannes Gutenberg University - 12-23 April 2021 Gravity and Emergent Gauge Fields in Condensed and Synthetic Matter indico.mitp.uni-mainz.de/event/228/
Happy World Quantum Day! From DIAS’ own Erwin Schrodinger – one of the founding figures of quantum physics – to current research into quantum theory and its applications, DIAS is proud to celebrate over 80 years of quantum research.
DIAS STP Weekly Seminar: 'The Swampland and String Universality' with Miguel Montero (Harvard University) can be viewed here 👇 youtube.com/watch?v=kZv8Nl…
The DIAS School of Theoretical Physics are pleased to announce the publication of "Gauge × Gauge = Gravity on Homogeneous Spaces using Tensor Convolutions" #DIASdiscovers #theoretical #physics #gravity #gauge #highenergy twitter.com/StpDias/status… Retweeted by STP, DIAS
I guess you noticed who signed this one? @CardColm @StpDias @DIAS_Dublin twitter.com/aliiicv/status… Retweeted by STP, DIAS
STP, DIAS Paper - Can gravity be thought of as two gauge fields? Check out ``Gauge × Gauge = Gravity on Homogeneous Spaces using Tensor Convolutions'' - By I. Jubb (DIAS) L. Borsten, V. Makwana, & S. Nagy (Heriot-Watt, Edinburgh & Queen Mary's, London). arxiv.org/abs/2104.01135
DIAS STP Weekly Seminar: Mithat Ünsal from North Carolina State University discusses non-invertible symmetries and string tensions beyond N-ality in semi-Abelian gauge theories. Catch it here: youtube.com/watch?v=qI4Ekk…
As part of the DIAS Summer Studentships programme the School of Theoretical Physics of the Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies is delighted to be in a position to offer at least 4 Summer Studentships. dias.ie/positions/inde…
STP, DIAS : Celebrating Synge Week - 23-30 March Day 6: Synge was appointed Professor Emeritus in 1972. After his retirement he remained active for a long time and maintained very strong links with the Institute, coming in regularly for discussions, in particular with J.T. Lewis.
STP, DIAS : Celebrating Synge Week - 23-30 March 2021. Day Five - Synge’s main lines of work were in general relativity and classical physics, but he also worked on various other topics including the hypercircle method in function space.
STP, DIAS : Celebrating Synge Week - 23-30 March 2021. Day Four - Synge presented Eamon de Valera with signed first editions of Relativity: The Special Theory (1956) & Relativity: The General Theory (1960). Both are housed in the de Valera Collection in the STP Library Retweeted by STP, DIAS