
Scientists threaten to boycott €1.2bn Human Brain Project - jonbaer
http://www.theguardian.com/science/2014/jul/07/human-brain-project-researchers-threaten-boycott
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kgarten
"The main apparent goal of building the capacity to construct a larger-scale
simulation of the human brain is radically premature," Peter Dayan. How could
they even got funding for this?

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tim333
There are a number of arguments for funding the thing but from my point of
view I like it because it's kind of cool - they've already done some neat
stuff. €1.2bn over 724 EU citizens is 1.65/head or a bit less than the typical
cup of coffee. For me the stuff they've done already is worth 55% of the 3
euro latte I'm just drinking. See
[http://vimeo.com/52664485](http://vimeo.com/52664485) . Compare with EU
agricultural policy with costs about 200 euro per person per year. I'd say
ditch subsidising the farmers and fund scientific progress instead.

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kgarten
Sorry from the movie I cannot see what's the point. Very slick design, nice
documentary. Yet, 4 years into the project already and there no implications
at all of the research ... There's not breakthrough there's nothing of impact.
This is shocking ... he even got project money for the blue brain project
(same goal) and did not deliver. Now he got the brain project (and won't
deliver as well I guess). Markram is amazing in getting funding!!!

I agree with you on the farmrs part :)

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tim333
Actually I have to admit I hadn't at the time watched Blue Brain part 4. I
just did and I can see your point. While I'm still a believer that computer
simulation will be a major tool in understanding the brain I think there may
be more progress from small teams like the google car guys, Kurzweil's lot at
Google and the IBM Watson guys rather than something like the Human Brain
Project which seems to be shaping into a big enterprise fixed in one direction
rather than small groups trying hacking different approaches. In fact I don't
think anyones managed a good simulation of Caenorhabditis elegans which could
probably be attempted ok by a PhD student with a laptop. Although people are
trying
[http://www.artificialbrains.com/openworm](http://www.artificialbrains.com/openworm)

