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Quote by Edward Boyden

“One of the things that got me transitioning from physical science to brain science was asking, Why do we understand so much about the universe?”

Quote by Edward Boyden

Author

Edward Boyden is a renowned neuroscientist born on August 18, 1979. He has made significant contributions to the field of neuroscience, particularly in the areas of optogenetics and neural circuit engineering. Professor Boyden holds a faculty position at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and is dedicated to exploring how the brain works and how to enhance brain function through technological means. more

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“It's actually kind of weird that we can comprehend the law of gravity, or that we can understand quantum mechanics, enough at least to make computers.”

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“It's surprising that the world is understandable to the extent that it is.”

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“If our brain is understanding some parts of the universe and not understanding other parts, and those understandings are about the laws of physics that our brains are built on top of, then it's kind of a loop, right?”

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“Suppose there are some things that we don't understand about the universe, but if you understand human intelligence and you understand the gaps in our abilities to think about things, maybe we can engineer in a computer more advanced intelligences that can help augment our ability to think.”

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“There are many things that we still don't understand about the universe, right? Einstein struggled to bring quantum mechanics and gravity together and never succeeded, and that's a problem that to this day is not well understood. Well, maybe to comprehend some of these things, we need to augment our intelligence. If we do, who knows?”

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“Maybe we'll understand more about how the universe came to be, and what forces drove it in the early days and which forces drive it now.”

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“The brain is really hard to see. The whole thing is very large - the human brain is several pounds in weight - but the connections between brain cells, known as synapses, are really tiny. They're nanoscale in dimension. So if you want to see how the cells of the brain are connected in networks, you have to see those connections, those synapses.”

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“If you could map out a human brain, an open question is, if you simulated it, would it be you? Now, as we discussed earlier, we don't have a great definition or even a good technological handle to know whether something is conscious or not just by looking at it, so there's that aspect that we're not ready to answer, I would argue. But it raises very interesting questions about the nature of identity.”

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“Work backward from your goal.”

Author:Edward Boyden

“If you think backwards from a big problem, and you talk to all these other people who have skills and who think forward from their skills, it's very easy to form collaborations because everyone is incentivized to work together.”

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