Cognition and consciousness arise from analog computations, says new theory | MIT News | Massachusetts Institute of Technology
The brain's ability to generate quick, nimble volitional thought — and a unified awareness of thought and experience — arises from analog computations carried out by electrical waves, MIT neuroscientists argue in a new review paper.
A new theory, published in The Journal of Neuroscience by three scientists in The Picower Institute for Learning and Memory at MIT, offers an explanation of how the brain produces cognition and consciousness: It uses traveling waves of rhythmic neural activity to coordinate nimble neural networks with analog computations. The metaphor that the brain operates with “circuits” is incomplete, says Picower Professor Earl K. Miller, the paper’s senior author. Indubitably, the brain’s physically connected circuits provide the infrastructure to store our memories and represent our ongoing needs and…
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