WEBVTT - Computers vs. Brains 0:00:00.160 --> 0:00:07.240 Brought to you by Toyota. Let's go places. Welcome to 0:00:07.400 --> 0:00:14.800 Forward Thinking. Hey there, and welcome to Forward Thinking the 0:00:14.960 --> 0:00:17.319 podcast and looks at the Future, and says, and my head, 0:00:17.400 --> 0:00:20.080 I'd be scratching while my thoughts were busy, hatchin. I'm 0:00:20.200 --> 0:00:24.240 Jonathan Strickland, I'm Lauren bo and I'm Joe McCormick. So, uh, 0:00:25.360 --> 0:00:30.080 I was thinking, No, you weren't. I did. Once I did. Once, 0:00:30.160 --> 0:00:32.639 it was earlier today, I'll give it to you, okay. 0:00:32.760 --> 0:00:35.600 So yeah, I was thinking and thinking about let me guess, 0:00:35.680 --> 0:00:39.639 let me guess cinnamon toast. I actually was not thinking, well, 0:00:39.680 --> 0:00:41.760 now I am, because now you put the thought into 0:00:41.800 --> 0:00:43.839 my head. No, I was thinking about how our brains 0:00:44.520 --> 0:00:48.680 are different from computers. And we've talked about artificial intelligence 0:00:48.760 --> 0:00:51.600 multiple times and we've kind of alluded to that, but 0:00:51.720 --> 0:00:55.040 that we really wanted to go into a deeper look 0:00:55.240 --> 0:00:59.520 at the differences between the way computers process information the 0:00:59.520 --> 0:01:03.040 way our brains process information, and it really kind of 0:01:03.520 --> 0:01:06.240 dig down into that. You know, when you listen to 0:01:06.280 --> 0:01:11.399 some futurists talk about the singularity and the merging of 0:01:11.760 --> 0:01:15.480 mind and machine, one thing you often get the feeling 0:01:16.040 --> 0:01:19.520 of is that they sort of think of the brain 0:01:19.640 --> 0:01:22.760 as a computer. The brain is a computer, and if 0:01:22.800 --> 0:01:26.000 you can basically just get them sync up right there, 0:01:26.040 --> 0:01:29.039 right right, And it's a really sexy thought, especially since 0:01:29.080 --> 0:01:32.640 many futurists have backgrounds in computer science, and so it's 0:01:32.680 --> 0:01:34.480 kind of like, oh, yeah, obviously this is a great 0:01:34.480 --> 0:01:39.039 metaphor us, especially if they're thinking about, like we, with 0:01:39.240 --> 0:01:41.800 just the right amount of computing power, we'd be able 0:01:41.800 --> 0:01:45.080 to pour our brains over into computers and then achieve 0:01:45.120 --> 0:01:48.720 digital immortality. You know, that's a That's one of the 0:01:48.760 --> 0:01:52.640 many ways people have envisioned a kind of singularity events. 0:01:52.680 --> 0:01:56.400 Another thing that ties into that is sometimes they compare 0:01:56.800 --> 0:01:59.720 the power of a brain and the power of a 0:02:00.080 --> 0:02:03.720 uter as if they're both both. Basically just like scaling 0:02:03.840 --> 0:02:07.800 up this same chart with the same value. You know, 0:02:07.840 --> 0:02:10.720 it's just a number and a computer is higher or 0:02:10.840 --> 0:02:13.720 lower or something like that. But really, a brain and 0:02:13.760 --> 0:02:16.400 a computer, though they do some of the same things, 0:02:16.800 --> 0:02:20.080 are are in other ways fundamentally different. Sure, It's like 0:02:20.160 --> 0:02:22.400 it's like saying, you know, if if I'm able to 0:02:22.480 --> 0:02:24.760 lift a certain amount of weight and a machine were 0:02:24.760 --> 0:02:27.720 able to lift ten times that weight, that that machine 0:02:27.800 --> 0:02:29.880 is ten times stronger than I am. That's a pretty 0:02:29.919 --> 0:02:32.360 simple comparison. But if you then try and convert that 0:02:32.440 --> 0:02:37.000 over into the ability to process and understand and learn 0:02:37.200 --> 0:02:41.480 and and adapt, you know, that's that's totally different. It's 0:02:41.560 --> 0:02:44.919 it's the it's fundamentally different. Like you said, the way 0:02:44.919 --> 0:02:47.679 a brain and a computer work, using your analogy, be 0:02:47.760 --> 0:02:49.720 kind of like, well, yeah, okay, so the machine can 0:02:49.760 --> 0:02:52.760 lift more weight than you, but you have hands. So 0:02:52.880 --> 0:02:55.399 maybe you could pick up a heavy but delicate thing 0:02:55.480 --> 0:02:58.760 that the computer couldn't pick up without puncturing, or that 0:02:58.840 --> 0:03:01.080 you could realize that that they as a cat without 0:03:01.120 --> 0:03:04.280 having to be taught over the process of many, many 0:03:04.320 --> 0:03:06.920 weeks what a cat looks like, and that ties into 0:03:07.000 --> 0:03:09.720 what we're gonna be talking about in this episode. So 0:03:10.480 --> 0:03:12.640 I think we should start by looking at some of 0:03:12.680 --> 0:03:15.840 the big high profile computers people have seen. Is the 0:03:15.880 --> 0:03:19.519 really smart ones, the kinds that compete with human intelligence 0:03:19.560 --> 0:03:23.000 in a very recognizable way, like Deep Blue. So Deep 0:03:23.000 --> 0:03:27.040 Blue this is an IBM computer that was designed specifically 0:03:27.120 --> 0:03:30.320 to compete in chess tournaments. So this was one of 0:03:30.400 --> 0:03:34.080 those things where various computer scientists had been predicting that 0:03:34.120 --> 0:03:37.280 a computer would be able to beat an expert at chess. 0:03:38.040 --> 0:03:43.040 Uh eventually given enough processing power, really and Deep Blue 0:03:43.120 --> 0:03:45.680 was the first one to really achieve that it was 0:03:45.840 --> 0:03:49.760 able to beat a world chess champion, Gary Kasparov. Specifically, 0:03:50.120 --> 0:03:53.960 it was the second of the great Deep Blue Kasparov matchups. 0:03:54.320 --> 0:03:57.080 The first one did not go in Deep Blues favor, 0:03:57.160 --> 0:04:01.200 but they IBM kind of revisited it, did some adjustments. 0:04:01.200 --> 0:04:04.200 There was a second tournament. It was the best of 0:04:04.520 --> 0:04:07.800 six games, which I guess if you really think about it, 0:04:07.840 --> 0:04:11.400 there could have been a complete draw there. But in fact, 0:04:11.440 --> 0:04:15.320 Deep Blue one two matches against Kasparov's one match, and 0:04:15.320 --> 0:04:18.599 then they drew in the remaining matches, so Deep Blue 0:04:18.640 --> 0:04:22.000 came out the overall winner. Immediately, IBM retired Deep Blue 0:04:22.320 --> 0:04:24.520 because they said that was exactly what they set out 0:04:24.520 --> 0:04:27.600 to achieve, was to make a computer that could compete 0:04:27.640 --> 0:04:31.840 at a world chess champion level. And um, straight from 0:04:31.880 --> 0:04:34.880 the after party to the burner, Yeah, exactly, like you're 0:04:34.920 --> 0:04:43.400 just right at least deposit chess master computer into incinerator slot. Well, 0:04:43.839 --> 0:04:47.560 I'm not gonna say they destroyed it, they just retired it. 0:04:48.400 --> 0:04:51.320 They anyway, this particular computer was able to analyze two 0:04:51.400 --> 0:04:55.839 hundred million moves per second, or fifty billion possible positions 0:04:55.880 --> 0:04:59.400 within the three minute time limit that chess players get 0:04:59.440 --> 0:05:04.560 per turn. So that's kind of interesting because obviously I 0:05:04.560 --> 0:05:07.800 am not a chess grand master, uh and I don't 0:05:07.800 --> 0:05:09.680 know all that much about chess, but I would think 0:05:09.720 --> 0:05:14.040 to some extent, chess has to be kind of intuitive, 0:05:14.240 --> 0:05:17.600 right like a like a very very smart person could 0:05:17.839 --> 0:05:22.480 think many moves ahead, but the very smart person cannot 0:05:22.640 --> 0:05:27.000 think fifty moves ahead. I'd bet most chess champions would 0:05:27.040 --> 0:05:29.680 not be able to think nearly as far ahead. But 0:05:29.800 --> 0:05:32.120 the other thing to take into consideration is not just 0:05:32.200 --> 0:05:35.680 thinking ahead, but anticipating what the other moves are going 0:05:35.720 --> 0:05:38.800 to be. So, for example, I'm a terrible chess player. 0:05:39.080 --> 0:05:43.280 I love playing, but I against anyone who's who's competent 0:05:43.360 --> 0:05:46.039 at chess, I am almost guaranteed to lose. And it's 0:05:46.080 --> 0:05:48.560 partly because my brain just does not work very well 0:05:48.600 --> 0:05:51.560 when it comes to planning out moves and anticipating what 0:05:51.600 --> 0:05:54.240 my opponent will do. I might anticipate what my opponent 0:05:54.279 --> 0:05:57.279 will do based upon my particular circumstances at that moment, 0:05:57.560 --> 0:06:00.240 but I don't necessarily consider weight when I make this move. 0:06:00.279 --> 0:06:06.080 It's going to change those circumstances, which then yeah, and 0:06:06.120 --> 0:06:08.800 then they're all also thinking ahead and they may be 0:06:09.000 --> 0:06:12.200 changing their plans dynamically as I make my moves. The 0:06:12.200 --> 0:06:15.240 computer was much more adept at looking at all the 0:06:15.240 --> 0:06:20.400 potential possibilities and picking the most advantageous uh choice out 0:06:20.400 --> 0:06:24.720 of all of them. Now, even so, humans are really 0:06:24.880 --> 0:06:29.000 unpredictable creatures, and uh, there were other computer programs that 0:06:29.040 --> 0:06:33.520 didn't do nearly as well against human chess champions. Even 0:06:33.600 --> 0:06:37.240 after Deep Blue, it would take a while for that 0:06:37.320 --> 0:06:40.000 to really develop. And even even people who are chess 0:06:40.040 --> 0:06:42.960 champions who look back on the Deep Blue Kasparov matches 0:06:43.400 --> 0:06:45.440 say that Kasparov was just kind of off his game 0:06:45.520 --> 0:06:49.400 on that that particular tournament, and that if Kasparov had 0:06:49.839 --> 0:06:52.320 played just a little differently, he probably would have come 0:06:52.320 --> 0:06:55.920 out victorious. So it was. It was even in this 0:06:56.080 --> 0:06:58.960 very specific instance where you've got a limited number and 0:06:58.960 --> 0:07:01.279 it's a huge number, but it's a limited number of 0:07:01.279 --> 0:07:04.400 moves you can make in any given situation, the computer 0:07:04.480 --> 0:07:06.880 was very, very good at it, better than the world 0:07:06.920 --> 0:07:09.280 chess champion. But that was a very specific use case 0:07:09.320 --> 0:07:11.320 for that. Oh sure, well, I mean from a computer's 0:07:11.320 --> 0:07:14.960 point of view, Chess is about probability and and logic 0:07:15.040 --> 0:07:17.600 solving and and those are two things that computers do 0:07:17.640 --> 0:07:20.640 incredibly well. Yeah right, Well, I mean, if you've got 0:07:20.680 --> 0:07:24.440 the space in your memory and the time to look 0:07:24.840 --> 0:07:28.200 you know, at what was it two million moves per second, 0:07:28.800 --> 0:07:32.760 that it doesn't really require intelligence. You just kind of 0:07:32.800 --> 0:07:36.400 have to crank the numbers well. And and again, even 0:07:36.440 --> 0:07:38.960 with Deep Blue and being so great at chess, if 0:07:39.000 --> 0:07:41.160 you put Deep Blue up against a human in a 0:07:41.160 --> 0:07:43.880 different type of game, it wouldn't have done as well. 0:07:43.920 --> 0:07:46.320 It wasn't It wasn't designed to do that, right, You mean, 0:07:46.360 --> 0:07:48.200 if you put it in front of a checker's board, 0:07:48.240 --> 0:07:51.360 it would just violate the rules and get disqualified or 0:07:51.440 --> 0:07:56.360 connect four, or it would be terrible at twister. Yeah, okay, 0:07:56.640 --> 0:07:58.520 but no, the point I'm trying to get at your 0:07:58.680 --> 0:08:03.120 jokesters is that this these computers are really really good 0:08:03.160 --> 0:08:06.560 at the specific applications they're meant for, but they aren't 0:08:06.600 --> 0:08:09.640 any good at anything outside of that, whereas a human 0:08:10.040 --> 0:08:13.560 could be good at lots of different stuff. Yeah, programmatic behavior, 0:08:13.640 --> 0:08:16.000 and we'll talk more about that later. How about another 0:08:16.000 --> 0:08:19.400 one sort of along the lines of Deep Blue Watson. Okay, 0:08:19.440 --> 0:08:22.200 so another IBM computer. A lot of IBM is going 0:08:22.240 --> 0:08:24.400 to be talked about in this in this particular episode, 0:08:24.440 --> 0:08:26.880 and the next episode will be doing well studies show 0:08:27.000 --> 0:08:30.200 they make computers. They do, they've been doing that for 0:08:30.240 --> 0:08:33.400 a while in fact. But Watson, of course, is the 0:08:33.480 --> 0:08:36.920 Jeopardy Jeopardy UH computer. It's doing a lot more than 0:08:36.960 --> 0:08:40.120 just playing Jeopardy. Yes, it's no longer just resting on 0:08:40.120 --> 0:08:44.560 its laurels as Jeopardy champion. Now Watson wasn't just one computer, No, 0:08:44.679 --> 0:08:46.960 this was a computer cluster. It's actually a cluster of 0:08:47.160 --> 0:08:50.959 ninety Linux based servers with a total of two thousand 0:08:51.040 --> 0:08:55.520 eighty processor cores. So it's built for parallel processing. That's 0:08:55.559 --> 0:08:57.800 something else we'll talk about with the human brain, about 0:08:57.800 --> 0:09:01.439 how the human brain works compared to say computer, a 0:09:01.480 --> 0:09:06.240 classic computer model. So it's able to solve more in parallel, 0:09:06.280 --> 0:09:08.240 which was very useful when you had to do things 0:09:08.280 --> 0:09:12.400 like search all of the data banks for information that 0:09:12.520 --> 0:09:16.280 seemed to fit any particular clue in Jeopardy uh, and 0:09:16.320 --> 0:09:21.000 then assign a probability for how how sure quote unquote 0:09:21.080 --> 0:09:23.359 is the computer that that would be the right response 0:09:23.400 --> 0:09:26.200 to any given query? And if it if it met 0:09:26.240 --> 0:09:28.880 the threshold, it would give that response. If it didn't 0:09:28.880 --> 0:09:33.719 meet the threshold, Watson would stay conspicuously silent. Now, from 0:09:33.760 --> 0:09:37.560 what I understand, Watson had some interesting intelligence and that 0:09:37.760 --> 0:09:42.600 it was even okay at parsing some of the word play, 0:09:42.679 --> 0:09:45.920 which is pretty impressive, though that was ultimately where it 0:09:46.000 --> 0:09:49.800 performed the weakest. Right, Yeah, so yeah, I love if 0:09:49.800 --> 0:09:52.920 you've ever watched Jeopardy. In case you haven't watched Jeopardy, 0:09:53.080 --> 0:09:55.640 some of the the clues are in the form of 0:09:55.679 --> 0:09:59.720 puns or a lot of hominem's things like that, where 0:10:00.040 --> 0:10:02.800 they'll they'll give a clue that you requires you to 0:10:02.880 --> 0:10:05.560 think outside of just this is this is the quote 0:10:05.640 --> 0:10:08.280 unquote question, or here's the answer. What is the question 0:10:08.360 --> 0:10:11.280 to that answer? Um? And it may be that it 0:10:11.280 --> 0:10:13.520 involves a little a little trick. You have to think 0:10:13.559 --> 0:10:17.600 in a creative way, and Watson was okay at that, 0:10:17.720 --> 0:10:20.360 not nearly as good as the human champions were. So 0:10:20.440 --> 0:10:23.680 any question, any category that did depend on that, Watson 0:10:23.720 --> 0:10:26.760 had to work a little harder, I imagine to come 0:10:26.800 --> 0:10:30.520 up with an answer. Yeah, I probably think about it, like, 0:10:30.679 --> 0:10:34.840 Watson was really good at questions that you yourself could 0:10:34.880 --> 0:10:39.439 easily solve by googling keywords. Yeah, and when you think 0:10:39.440 --> 0:10:43.839 about this cluster, this nineties server cluster with two thousand 0:10:44.760 --> 0:10:49.439 processor course, sixteen terabytes of memory, four terabytes of clustered storage, 0:10:49.720 --> 0:10:52.600 able to do a hundred eighty thousand gigabytes per second 0:10:52.640 --> 0:10:58.160 processing power, and it edged out the the Jeopardy champions. 0:10:58.160 --> 0:11:00.640 I mean some would say it beat them early soundly, 0:11:00.679 --> 0:11:02.760 but even so, you're looking at look at how much 0:11:02.880 --> 0:11:07.560 raw power was right, and this was one that that 0:11:07.800 --> 0:11:11.640 you know, it's it's still outperformed Jeopardy champions. And just 0:11:12.720 --> 0:11:16.320 this one way, like perhaps on another day or another week, 0:11:16.400 --> 0:11:18.880 maybe the champions, the human champions, maybe they would have 0:11:19.000 --> 0:11:22.080 won against Watson, or you know, they challenge Watson to 0:11:22.160 --> 0:11:24.640 some other game like hop scotch. It's only they win. 0:11:24.840 --> 0:11:27.520 Although to be fair, I couldn't have won against those 0:11:27.600 --> 0:11:33.240 Jeopardy champions, so well my argument is invalidated. Okay. I 0:11:33.240 --> 0:11:37.560 think we should break down computers and brains and start 0:11:37.640 --> 0:11:39.920 to think about them in terms of what each one 0:11:40.080 --> 0:11:42.600 does and how they do them differently. So we started 0:11:42.600 --> 0:11:45.360 off talking about the idea of using a computer as 0:11:45.400 --> 0:11:48.439 sort of a an analogy to think about a brain. 0:11:48.600 --> 0:11:51.920 It's like, yeah, brain is basically like a computer. Does 0:11:52.040 --> 0:11:56.720 that analogy hold not at all? And why doesn't it hold? Well? 0:11:56.760 --> 0:11:59.559 I mean there are some similarities right in the sense 0:11:59.600 --> 0:12:03.560 that both can process information, sure, but the way that 0:12:03.600 --> 0:12:07.280 computers process information the way our brains process information, uh, 0:12:07.320 --> 0:12:11.000 in fact, saying brains, that's really pretty limited. The way 0:12:11.040 --> 0:12:15.320 our nervous systems process information is very different. Well, both 0:12:15.360 --> 0:12:20.199 do use electrical signals to transmit that information. I mean 0:12:20.280 --> 0:12:23.600 both are able to send messages via those electrical signals. Yeah. 0:12:23.840 --> 0:12:27.640 Both they have input and output, right, yeah, yeah, you can. 0:12:28.320 --> 0:12:31.480 They have memory and you can add to that memory. Yeah, 0:12:31.600 --> 0:12:34.440 that's true. Um, both require energy in order to do 0:12:34.480 --> 0:12:38.199 this work. Yes, very true. Yeah, and both can be 0:12:38.520 --> 0:12:41.640 changed or modified. Yeah, we can learn, we can make 0:12:41.640 --> 0:12:44.920 our brains stronger, we can we can suffer injury or 0:12:44.960 --> 0:12:49.240 illness that can affect the ability for our brains to work. 0:12:49.480 --> 0:12:52.400 And computers you can you can change or modify those 0:12:52.440 --> 0:12:56.320 pretty easily. That's pretty much what they've been designed to do. Okay, So, actually, 0:12:56.320 --> 0:12:58.560 at a bird's eye view, a brain is a lot 0:12:58.640 --> 0:13:01.240 like a computer. But it's when use zoom in that's 0:13:01.240 --> 0:13:03.720 when it really the different differences show up. So let's 0:13:03.720 --> 0:13:07.720 start with electricity. Sure, so a computer has electrical on 0:13:07.800 --> 0:13:10.679 and off switches, and that's how it manages information. Now, 0:13:10.960 --> 0:13:14.280 I don't think we even really understand fully how a 0:13:14.440 --> 0:13:18.640 brain manages information. But what's basically going on when we're thinking? 0:13:18.679 --> 0:13:20.800 All right, so you've got you got neurons because your 0:13:20.840 --> 0:13:24.040 little brain cells, right, and your neurons. Uh, there are 0:13:24.080 --> 0:13:27.200 several different types of neurons, and what they do is 0:13:27.240 --> 0:13:32.200 they use electrochemical reactions. You've got these these various ions 0:13:32.240 --> 0:13:35.600 that get released within the neuron, which changes the electrical 0:13:35.600 --> 0:13:40.800 potential of the cell membrane. This ends up creating another 0:13:40.880 --> 0:13:44.439 way of releasing some ions in a synapse. Synapse is 0:13:44.480 --> 0:13:47.440 where you have to nerve endings kind of uh, there's 0:13:47.440 --> 0:13:49.960 a gap, they're not actually touching one another, and you 0:13:50.000 --> 0:13:52.320 have a chemical message going between one to the other 0:13:52.360 --> 0:13:55.679 and it propagates throughout the nervous system. This way, it's very, 0:13:55.760 --> 0:13:57.800 very different from the way a computer works, where it's 0:13:57.800 --> 0:14:00.640 not an electrochemical response. There's nothing to do with any 0:14:00.679 --> 0:14:05.520 kind of ions there. It's strictly electricity using electrons going 0:14:05.559 --> 0:14:10.520 through transistors to process information to represent numbers, really to 0:14:10.559 --> 0:14:14.560 represent zeros and ones, so very very different approach. Yeah. 0:14:14.679 --> 0:14:18.920 Another thing would be that, uh, computer instructions are executed 0:14:18.960 --> 0:14:22.760 in in binary code. Basically we understand the way information 0:14:22.800 --> 0:14:26.960 is encoded in a computer. How is information encoded in 0:14:27.000 --> 0:14:30.960 a brain. Well, that's a great question. So science doesn't 0:14:30.960 --> 0:14:33.440 know yet. Think things like memories and stuff. We we've 0:14:33.480 --> 0:14:36.480 seen that as people think of things, certain neural pathways 0:14:36.920 --> 0:14:40.160 uh pop up, and in fact, neural pathways may represent 0:14:40.280 --> 0:14:44.280 things like memories, like the specific pathway represents the specific memory. However, 0:14:44.680 --> 0:14:47.560 every time you think back on that memory, that pathway 0:14:47.600 --> 0:14:51.760 may change in subtle ways, which one is another illustration 0:14:51.760 --> 0:14:54.880 of how memory is not an entirely reliable or infallible 0:14:54.920 --> 0:14:58.240 source of information. And to suggest that we got to 0:14:58.320 --> 0:15:00.000 learn a lot more about the brain to really under 0:15:00.000 --> 0:15:02.360 stand how it works, because certainly that's not the way 0:15:02.400 --> 0:15:05.400 a computer works with memory. It's a very different model. 0:15:05.480 --> 0:15:10.360 So yeah, until we really understand more fully how the 0:15:10.440 --> 0:15:14.960 brain and neural pathways work, it's hard to really even 0:15:15.320 --> 0:15:17.760 you know, describe it in any accurate terms. You're really 0:15:17.800 --> 0:15:21.000 just talking in generalities the stuff that we've observed so far, 0:15:21.120 --> 0:15:24.120 but we don't fully understand it's also harder to upgrade 0:15:24.120 --> 0:15:26.080 a brain. I mean you can't just add a second 0:15:26.080 --> 0:15:29.040 brain to yours, or I mean you know, you can't 0:15:29.080 --> 0:15:32.720 strengthen the neural connection. Yeah, yeah you can. You can learn, 0:15:32.840 --> 0:15:34.760 you can read, you can you can do a lot 0:15:34.800 --> 0:15:38.280 of things that that essentially nourish your brain. Well, good 0:15:38.320 --> 0:15:43.000 nourishments also important, obviously, So that is good. You want 0:15:43.040 --> 0:15:45.720 some you want some energy in there. But yeah, you 0:15:45.720 --> 0:15:48.040 can do stuff that will strengthen your brain, but it's 0:15:48.040 --> 0:15:50.800 not as simple as you know, popping open the skull 0:15:50.840 --> 0:15:55.360 and sliding in another memory card. We've got an interesting 0:15:55.400 --> 0:15:58.640 note here that says computers are great at multitasking and 0:15:58.720 --> 0:16:01.280 brains most of the time aren't. And I think that's 0:16:01.320 --> 0:16:04.760 basically true. But that might seem counterintuitive because we were 0:16:04.800 --> 0:16:09.600 just talking about how computers are far outstripped by brains 0:16:09.600 --> 0:16:13.040 in terms of parallel processing. Brains can have a lot 0:16:13.120 --> 0:16:16.160 of different things going on that you're making different connections 0:16:16.320 --> 0:16:19.920 while computer executes one instruction at a time. Really, it 0:16:19.960 --> 0:16:22.760 depends on how you're looking at multitasking. If you're talking 0:16:22.800 --> 0:16:26.840 about a cognitive approach, like you're actually thinking about things 0:16:26.880 --> 0:16:30.960 like you are actively engaged, engaged in an activity or 0:16:31.000 --> 0:16:34.840 task or whatever. Then we're terrible at multitasking. And anyone 0:16:34.840 --> 0:16:37.760 who says that they're good at multitasking is probably lying 0:16:37.800 --> 0:16:41.600 to themselves and or to you, because statistically improbable, there's 0:16:41.640 --> 0:16:44.320 a very tiny number of human beings on this planet 0:16:44.320 --> 0:16:47.240 who are actually supertaskers. They're not trying to deceive you 0:16:47.280 --> 0:16:49.960 on purpose. They're just texting at the same time they're 0:16:49.960 --> 0:16:53.040 talking to you, and so they they're not really they're 0:16:53.160 --> 0:16:57.120 they're so. So computers are very good at being able 0:16:57.160 --> 0:16:59.640 to run multiple programs at the time and continue those 0:16:59.640 --> 0:17:03.240 process sees. But depending on the type of computer you have, 0:17:03.280 --> 0:17:06.280 our computers at work, maybe not so much. But you know, 0:17:06.800 --> 0:17:11.240 typical good computer, yes, But people are not good at that. 0:17:11.480 --> 0:17:14.159 So while we are able to do a lot of 0:17:14.160 --> 0:17:17.440 things in parallel, there's some things we're doing great with multitasking, 0:17:17.440 --> 0:17:20.160 but it's all the unconscious stuff, right, all the blinking 0:17:20.200 --> 0:17:23.359 of our eyes, the breathing, the heartbeats, the monitoring our 0:17:23.400 --> 0:17:25.720 body temperature, stuff that we don't have to think about. 0:17:26.119 --> 0:17:29.159 Our brains are fantastic at that kind of multitasking, but 0:17:29.240 --> 0:17:31.439 when it comes to actually stuff that we are thinking 0:17:31.520 --> 0:17:35.400 actively on, not so much. Yeah, I'd suggests that computers 0:17:35.400 --> 0:17:38.160 are good at multitasking because computers are good at keeping 0:17:38.200 --> 0:17:41.840 tasks discrete. So you have one application running and it 0:17:41.960 --> 0:17:45.040 sends an instruction to the processor and executes it and 0:17:45.080 --> 0:17:47.600 comes back with the result, and then maybe another one 0:17:47.640 --> 0:17:50.840 sends an instruction, and it all happens so fast it 0:17:50.880 --> 0:17:53.040 seems like everything's going on at the same time, but 0:17:53.080 --> 0:17:56.320 the processes are kept to discrete. In your brain, it's 0:17:56.359 --> 0:17:59.400 hard to keep different activities discrete. They bleed over into 0:17:59.400 --> 0:18:02.000 each other. If somebody's talking to you while you're taking 0:18:02.000 --> 0:18:04.119 notes on a sheet of paper, you'll end up writing 0:18:04.160 --> 0:18:06.560 down the words they're saying by accident, right, Or if 0:18:06.560 --> 0:18:08.840 you're listening to a lot of you have this confusion 0:18:08.960 --> 0:18:10.840 listening to a lot of music with lyrics in it, like, 0:18:10.880 --> 0:18:13.520 I can't. I can't do research and listen to the 0:18:13.560 --> 0:18:15.639 two songs with lyrics in them or else it. It 0:18:15.760 --> 0:18:18.520 just starts to distract me while I'm trying to read. 0:18:18.520 --> 0:18:21.439 Even if I'm not actively listening, it does kind of 0:18:21.720 --> 0:18:23.439 been I can't even listen to something with a melody 0:18:23.480 --> 0:18:28.919 I listened to like a rain Generators online. I listened 0:18:28.920 --> 0:18:30.960 to the same melodies over and over again, because I've 0:18:31.000 --> 0:18:34.800 got my music my film score collection on and it 0:18:34.840 --> 0:18:37.240 has the same three composers, and I swear they just 0:18:37.320 --> 0:18:40.600 use the same score repeatedly. But anyway, one more thing 0:18:40.680 --> 0:18:43.000 we're going to touch on more later is that brains 0:18:43.000 --> 0:18:46.600 have the ability to repair and regenerate to a certain extent, 0:18:46.640 --> 0:18:51.400 which computers don't without outside intervention. Yep. Uh. Now, you can, 0:18:51.520 --> 0:18:55.200 of course suffer irreparable brain damage, that certainly, because certainly 0:18:55.240 --> 0:18:57.720 in many different ways, but but in general, low levels 0:18:57.720 --> 0:19:01.719 of brain damage can be quote unquot repaired by by 0:19:01.760 --> 0:19:04.520 the brain just finding a different neural pathway. Sure, yeah, 0:19:04.560 --> 0:19:07.919 you can reroute the way that you would normally do 0:19:08.000 --> 0:19:11.000 a task, depending upon I mean, this is very specific 0:19:11.000 --> 0:19:13.320 case to case, but computers can't do this in general. 0:19:13.880 --> 0:19:17.160 There are a lot of interesting research projects out there 0:19:17.200 --> 0:19:19.959 that are working on ways of making transistors that can 0:19:20.000 --> 0:19:22.919 do this kind of thing, where they can reroute a 0:19:23.160 --> 0:19:26.399 process so that if there were physical damage done to 0:19:26.680 --> 0:19:29.159 a chip it was it would be able to continue working. 0:19:29.520 --> 0:19:32.399 But this is not something that is naturally quote unquote 0:19:32.440 --> 0:19:35.760 naturally built into computers. Um. It's something that you know, 0:19:35.800 --> 0:19:39.280 people have had to innovate around. Whereas it's just a 0:19:39.280 --> 0:19:42.119 component of who we are as you know, that's one 0:19:42.160 --> 0:19:44.960 of those things that brains can do. Yeah, okay, So 0:19:45.240 --> 0:19:47.840 how do machines actually work? If you want to look 0:19:47.880 --> 0:19:50.760 at the way a computer thinks and zoom way in 0:19:51.080 --> 0:19:53.960 when it's worrying, it's got the little machine brain going 0:19:54.000 --> 0:19:57.600 in circles, the hour glasses flipping or the little pin wheel, 0:19:58.280 --> 0:20:01.480 the little wheel, what's how happening there? Uh? The first 0:20:01.480 --> 0:20:03.000 thing I think we should talk about, I guess, is 0:20:03.040 --> 0:20:07.639 something called the von Neuman architecture that. Uh, if you 0:20:07.680 --> 0:20:09.840 have a laptop sitting in front of you, it's almost 0:20:09.920 --> 0:20:13.199 definitely a von Neuman architecture machine. You know. If it's not, 0:20:13.240 --> 0:20:17.440 then you're working for someone pretty cool, possibly the military 0:20:17.480 --> 0:20:22.480 call us. The vast majority of typical computers are von Neuman. So. 0:20:22.560 --> 0:20:25.520 John von Neuman published papers in the nineteen forties about 0:20:25.640 --> 0:20:30.680 the requirements for a general purpose electronic computer, and those 0:20:30.720 --> 0:20:34.480 thoughts ended up becoming the architecture upon which we base 0:20:35.160 --> 0:20:40.040 computers today. Most computers, the vast majority of computers. So 0:20:40.440 --> 0:20:44.119 he identified four main quote unquote organs for a general 0:20:44.160 --> 0:20:49.399 purpose computing machine, which were arithmetic, memory, control, and user interface. 0:20:49.920 --> 0:20:53.679 So ultimately This spoils down to what we think of 0:20:53.720 --> 0:20:56.760 as the CPU and memory and plus some some sort 0:20:56.800 --> 0:21:00.240 of user interface. But input and output, well not even 0:21:00.280 --> 0:21:04.399 input and output you're talking about really the two input 0:21:04.440 --> 0:21:07.720 outputs what you get from this. But CPU and RAM, 0:21:07.720 --> 0:21:09.560 those are the two elements that you need in order 0:21:09.720 --> 0:21:13.880 to make any sense of anything. The other elements sure sure, 0:21:13.920 --> 0:21:16.120 sure yeah, control would be in that as well. Yeah, 0:21:16.320 --> 0:21:22.240 so CPU central processing unit. The job is to execute instructions, 0:21:22.280 --> 0:21:25.720 so essentially, think of that as some sort of mathematical process. 0:21:26.080 --> 0:21:31.400 Increment this value by one, right, delete this value, multiply 0:21:31.680 --> 0:21:35.320 by whatever you know, multiplied by the closest prime number 0:21:35.359 --> 0:21:38.359 to that, to that number, anything along those lines, and 0:21:38.680 --> 0:21:42.040 the instructions will change as whatever it is you're doing changes. 0:21:42.480 --> 0:21:45.520 The Now, those instructions have to be executed upon something. 0:21:45.520 --> 0:21:47.359 It doesn't make sense to you for you to just 0:21:47.400 --> 0:21:51.520 say add You need things to add stuff too. So 0:21:51.600 --> 0:21:53.960 that's where the RAM comes in. The random axis memory. 0:21:54.040 --> 0:21:57.840 This is where the computer holds information that it is 0:21:57.880 --> 0:22:01.639 going to execute instructions upon. So you've got the instructions 0:22:01.680 --> 0:22:03.920 that you you need, and then you've got the data 0:22:03.960 --> 0:22:06.000 that you need, and you do the two together and 0:22:06.000 --> 0:22:08.600 that's where you get the computation. Yeah. So in the memory, 0:22:08.600 --> 0:22:11.119 you might have slot A and slot B, and you 0:22:11.160 --> 0:22:15.639 could execute the instruction that says multiply what's in slot 0:22:15.680 --> 0:22:18.080 A by what's in slot B and put the answer 0:22:18.119 --> 0:22:21.400 in slot C. Yeah. Uh. And so anytime you're talking 0:22:21.400 --> 0:22:23.600 about any kind of input into a computer, let's say 0:22:23.640 --> 0:22:25.960 that you're just playing a video game. Every time you're 0:22:25.960 --> 0:22:28.400 taking an action in that video game, it's sending an 0:22:28.400 --> 0:22:32.439 instruction down to the processor. Ultimately, actually it's sending lots 0:22:32.440 --> 0:22:35.520 of instructions. No single task is going to be just 0:22:35.720 --> 0:22:39.160 one instruction and then you're done. But it then takes 0:22:39.200 --> 0:22:42.520 in all the data that needs it, executes the instructions 0:22:42.560 --> 0:22:45.240 in order, and then gives you the output that whatever 0:22:45.240 --> 0:22:47.040