Seeking the mind in the brain. Posts about computational neuroscience, cognitive science, and random things in my life.
The fundamental principle of using AI for science is that it can help us do some things extremely efficiently, but it usually requires an 'oracle' or verifier. I'm of the opinion that we simply don't know enough about the brain at this point to fully trust algorithmic verifiers. This is why we are going to suck at using AI for neuroscience to its fullest capacity (at first) compared to other…
For starters, I sort of assumed NeuroAI was, well, the intersection of neuroscience and AI. I think that's pretty reasonable? And while that's *technically* true, you will see in a bit that it's a rather specific subset of the intersection, centered on---you guessed it---**computation**.
Are NeuroAI and AI4Neuro the new Computational Neuroscience and Computational Neuroscience?
I accidentally wrote a small book about a conference I went to. Again.
So why the hell did I write this thing? Let me re-iterate: this post isn't about being a good PhD student or being competent at research, it's about how to optimize your application so that you have the chance to do what you want to do in science, by first passing the hurdle of differentiating yourself enough in a batch of 300 applicants.
Not only was I lucky to meet the right people at the right time, I was lucky to be in those situations in the first place, which means having the privilege to be advised by a 'Second rate' neuroscientist (his words) at a first rate institution, and thus having the resources and good name to take advantage of those opportunities. I recognize all of that, that's what luck is: being able to…
I guess I'm writing this because this kind of stuff really gets me thinking about how amazingly weird life is. Sure, it was great that the collaboration ended up being productive and we had a friendly editor, but it's not what I'm gonna be thinking about when I'm dead, you know? All that stuff pales in comparison to the memories of '...uh is that Zach Mainen DJing at this club party?', and walking…
How this project started had nothing to do with science, we didn't set out to measure timescale in humans because we inferred that it was an open question. Like I said, zero clue what that was. No, it was much more pedestrian than that.
It's like one of those movie scenes, where you get invited to Charlie's chocolate factory, and somebody opens the front gate and all of a sudden what looks like a shack from the outside is actually a gigantic compound with thousands of oompa loompas scrambling to put stuff together (not saying NMA folks are oompa loompas...), and you're standing there jaws wide open until one of them crosses in…
Black lives matter. Or, they should matter, but currently, they don’t. That’s it. You can stop reading here. If you do go on, please note that there are some discomforting, charged, and potentially triggering words about death and our current way of life. They are meant to make you uncomfortable, not traumatized.