Brain Functioning and Neuroscience Applications   

Which areas of recent science and technological advancement will be the most impactful for the future of humanity and our biosphere?

I posed that question to ChatGPT 4o this summer and received the following response: Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning; Biotechnology and Genetic Engineering; Renewable Energy and Sustainability; Space Exploration and Satellites; Advanced Materials and Nanotechnology; Quantum Computing; the Environment and Agriculture; and Health and Longevity.

Several of these areas are ones that I have briefly profiled in PWJ articles in the last year, especially as these developments will influence the timber and forest products industry. There might well be one category of science and technology development, however, that is even more fundamental and consequential.  

What led to the discovery of the first primitive technologies and later the emergence of scientific endeavors? The answer is that we perceive and interact with the world by means of the roughly three pounds of organic matter called the human brain. As much as our brains inform all human pursuits, including science, the complexity of brain functioning is far from fully understood. Philosophy and science have long sought to explain the complex connection between human consciousness and the physical structure of the brain.

When I was in high school and college, there was very little attention placed on how brain chemistry and functioning govern our day-to-day lives. Courses in psychology and the behavioral sciences did introduce cognitive issues such as perception, memory, and decision making, but with almost no explanation of how our brains provide us with these cognitive abilities.

As many of us grow older, particularly into our retirement years, health science tells us that we benefit greatly from discovering continuing mental challenges. Recently, one of my own mental challenges has been developing some basic understanding of neuroscience and research on artificial neural networks that are being developed to mimic parts of the brain’s functioning.

Two books by neuroscientist Dr. David Eagleman motivated some of my curiosity. I remembered that Eagleman had been featured in a 2015 PBS program based on his book published that year, The Brain: The Story of You. I read that book and later a 2020 book of his called Livewired: The Inside Story of the Ever-Changing Brain. The second Eagleman book was especially provocative.  

The field of neuroscience is certainly vast and complex, with some contrasting views regarding consciousness and the thinking process. There seems general agreement, though, that consciousness arises from the activity of interconnected neural networks rather than from a single brain region. Brain waves or oscillations help coordinate activity across different parts of the brain, contributing to the integration of information necessary for conscious experiences. Neuroplasticity refers to the brain's amazing ability to change and adapt in response to bodily experiences, which is necessary for learning and memory.

David Eagleman concludes that brains sort out our diverse sensory inputs and learn how to drive our body parts. Brain neurons and their billions of connections are in a competitive struggle for survival, and these connections grow or decline depending upon their usage. Our brains are far from simply hardwired or preprogrammed, and they try various responses to inputs.   

Like the human brain, many scientists expect within the next decade that we’ll be able to design machines with neural networks that are beyond hardwired or preprogrammed. These robotic devices will interact with the outside world and then revise their own internal wiring. Multiple sensory inputs, whether biological or artificial in design, should have little difficulty in the future working together to process and act upon a massive amount of incoming information.

Research on neuroscience and neural networks has and will greatly influence AI advancements and their commercial applications. Geoffrey Hinton and John Hopfield recently were awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics for their work in the late 1970s into the 1980s. Drawing upon concepts in physics, they pioneered artificial neural networks that ignited and influenced the development of AI.

Discoveries in quantum science will also further explain subatomic properties of brain functioning that are not yet understood. Progress also in nanotechnology will lead to medical and other advances from this additional knowledge of quantum effects on brain chemistry and functioning.

There are risks and dangers associated with these merging advances in AI, neural networks, quantum physics, materials science, and nanotechnology. These risks must be carefully analyzed by technologists and government policymakers. Some experts, like computing genius, Ray Kurzweil, in his 2024 book, The Singularity is Nearer, seem largely optimistic about this future, while others are more pessimistic. A lot will depend upon the moral leadership of those such as Sam Altman and Elon Musk, in more innovative technological corporations.

Along with many others, Altman of OpenAI has emphasized the need for safeguards, infrastructure development, and global coalition leadership. Citing threats from China and authoritarian regimes, he called for a coalition of democratic countries to carefully monitor technology advances and arrive at a moral strategy. That strategy should include concerns for developing nations beyond those countries having greater technological capabilities.

The next five years will be a crucial testing period for the human wisdom needed to build a technological bridge that can successfully traverse some likely troubled waters.