It has been a busy summer at Numenta, and I’m pleased to share several updates.
Talks at Google: Jeff and Subutai on The Thousand Brains Theory of Intelligence
Our co-founder Jeff Hawkins and VP of Research & Engineering Subutai Ahmad recently participated in the Talks at Google series. In this one hour talk, they spoke to Google’s Director of Research Peter Norvig about The Thousand Brains Theory of Intelligence and how we are applying those concepts to machine learning.
New Peer-Reviewed Paper on the State of AI and The Thousand Brains Theory
A new peer-reviewed paper published in the journal SN Applied Sciences, offers an overview of the state of Artificial Intelligence and a summary of the Thousand Brains Theory of Intelligence. Lead author Kjell Hole, Director at Simula UiB in Norway, and co-author Subutai Ahmad make the case for why AI needs to implement neuroscience discoveries. Written for a broad audience, this paper offers a great starting point for anyone interested in learning more about the intersection between AI and neuroscience.
New Content: Posters, Papers and Presentations
In addition to the new peer-reviewed paper, our team has presented new content at several conferences. Everything is available on our website, but you can find the highlights here:
SNN (Sparsity in Neural Networks) Workshop
- How Can We Be So Slow? Realizing the Performance Benefits of Sparse Networks (poster and walkthrough)
CNS (Computational Neuroscience) Conference
- Hippocampal Spatial Mapping as Fast Graph Learning (poster and write-up)
- Going Beyond the Point Neuron: Active Dendrites and Sparse Representations for Continual Learning (poster and walkthrough)
New Podcasts: Jeff discusses A Thousand Brains with Sam Harris and Lex Fridman
Last month Jeff had the honor of appearing on The Lex Fridman Podcast and the Making Sense Podcast with Sam Harris. It was Jeff’s second time sitting down with Lex, and they spent a couple hours discussing the origins of intelligence, how to build super-intelligent AI, and whether AI will cause or prevent the self-destruction of human civilization. You can listen to Lex and Jeff’s episode here.
In his first appearance on Making Sense, Jeff spoke with Sam about the nature of intelligence and how the neocortex creates models of the world. They then debated AI risk, the alignment problem, and bad outcomes of AI vs existential risk. You can listen to the first half of the episode with Sam for free here. Subscriptions are required to listen to full episodes. You can reach out to Sam to request a free subscription.
Conversations on A Thousand Brains – Video Series
In the second episode of our video series ‘Conversations on A Thousand Brains’, we talked to Congressman Ro Khanna from California’s 17th district. Ro shared his key takeaways from A Thousand Brains and discussed the political challenges in developing AGI.
The “Conversations” series is designed to engage people from various fields about how the ideas in A Thousand Brains may impact their area of expertise. The first episode focused on the implications for pedagogy. Future episodes are planned for medical and behavioral implications.
We’d like to hear your thoughts on this new series. Do you find these conversations useful? Are there topics or guests you’d like to see on this series? Send your feedback or suggestions to press@numenta.com.
Estate Planning for Humanity – Noema Magazine
If you haven’t read A Thousand Brains yet, you might be interested in this excerpt published in Noema Magazine. From the chapter titled “Estate Planning for Humanity”, the piece explores how and why we should preserve our knowledge and record our humanity.
Keeping up with the News
We recently launched a new-and-improved Numenta News Digest. The digest is a collection of news articles, papers and announcements in the world of neuroscience, AI and machine learning that we find interesting. These weekly curated stories come with our analysis of what they mean and why we think they’re important.
Subscribe to the Numenta News Digest
We’re Hiring!
We’re looking for people to join our team! Check out our job openings below:
If you know anyone who might be a good fit, send them our way!
Thank you for your continued interest in Numenta. Don’t forget to follow us on Twitter to make sure you don’t miss any updates.
Christy Maver
VP of Marketing
Christy Maver • VP of Marketing