I'm in the Brodmann camp myself. Note: this information is
not about "facts", but is about "concepts".
Along the surface of the cortex the neurons are vertical like
telephone poles. Axons stretch to the next 2 or 3 neurons like long
distance telephone lines. Dotted across this landscape of vertical
poles are clusters of 100 or so neurons, each called a micro-column.
In addition you will also find clusters of multiple micro-columns
called macro-columns consisting of 100's of micro-columns. It is
"generally accepted" in the brain community that these are the
concentration points for information, likely to be "concepts" (re:
private conversation with John Nolte, "The Human Brain" [the
definitive atlas of the features of the brain]).
If, and that's a good-sized "if", this is true, then there is a
finite number of columns along the cortex.
I believe that number is on the order of 50,000, but I haven't had
anyone check my numbers. Here are the brain numbers:
·
Brain Surface
Area: 1.5 meters²
·
Length of neuron: .1 mm to 1 meter
·
Cortical thickness: 2mm
·
Number of neurons in 1 mm² (average):
148,000
·
Number of neurons in Brain: 100 billion
·
Number of neurons in mini-column: ~100
·
Number of mini-columns in a macro-column: ~100
·
Number of neurons in macro-column: 10,000
·
Size of mini-column: .03 mm
·
Size of macro-column: 1.0 mm
·
Neuron skip distance (average): .5 mm
(these numbers are valid
approximations)
We could also speculate on how these clusters
are used by the brain. God only knows what the malloc() function
looks like. Mappings in the brain tend to remain fixed, and are not
modified unless there is severe trauma to the tissue. I don't think
the functions of these clusters are dynamically modified to
alternate functions. However, the data processed by the cluster is
certainly modified as inputs to the brain are changed.
(As a curious aside: the neuron that is 1 meter long runs from the
head to below the trunk. Glucose is sent via "walkers" (vesicles)
down a micro-tubule of the neuron to feed the neurons at the far
end. [Neurons and micro-tubules are 1-way streets and there are
coupled pair-clusters that are assigned together for communication
or transport.] It takes 2 or 3 days for a walker to get to the far
end of the neuron. The corresponding neurons in the Blue Whale are 6
meters long and it takes 20 to 25 days for the same trip to be made
to deliver glucose.
When the walker has delivered its load of glucose, it returns empty
(dead-head) to the neuron cell body along the surface of a
micro-tubule in the return direction. The vesicle machine is too
valuable to recycle and lose from service.
Neurons are assigned in pair clusters to facilitate "reciprocal
firings" that validate signals. The patterns of the cluster
impressed on the cortex represent a specific pattern agreed upon
during a training sequence.)
-John Bottoms
FirstStar Systems
Concord, MA (not far from Walden Pond)
On 5/22/2012 7:52 PM, Simon Spero wrote:
I'm not sure that there is any simple relationship
between the total amount of data that is stored on disk and the
number of known facts; I'm not even sure that there's there's a
simple relation between the amount of data and the amount of
information (especially where DNA and RNA sequence data; there's a
lot of similarity between Lampreys).
I'm also not sure that there are any useful answers without
further qualification to question of the number of known facts
in the universe that do not require accepting the KK-thesis
(that knowing something means that you know that you know it).
One could (de)generatively argue that the number is some
uncountable infinity (e.g. it is a fact that: {1.0} is a member
of the power set of real numbers, and that fact is known in the
universe).
Simon
On Tue, May 22, 2012 at 6:28 PM,
Obrst, Leo J. <lobrst@xxxxxxxxx>
wrote:
I
think if you consider the basic fact as either a
mono or binary predicate, and then everything else
is derived from those, you can gauge.
The
total sum of stored data has been estimated (not
quite the same notion):
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-12419672,
http://hardware.slashdot.org/story/11/02/12/1934244/the-sum-total-of-the-worlds-knowledge-250-exabytes.
But apparently that was as of 2007 and just
published in Science Express in February, 2011.
See
http://www.sciencemag.org/content/332/6025/60.abstract
for the original story, once you peel back the
blogger crap.
A
little knowledge is a dangerous thing.
Thanks,
Leo
From:
ontology-summit-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
[mailto:ontology-summit-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx]
On Behalf Of matthew lange
Sent: Tuesday, May 22, 2012 6:06 PM
To: lavern@xxxxxxxxxxxx;
[ontolog-forum]; [ontolog-summit]
Subject: Re: [ontology-summit] Estimating
number of all known facts
Billions is several orders of magnitude too
small, to be sure--but then again you were
talking about beholders, not the facts
themselves...wiuch leads me to think that we
perhaps could estimate a ballpark average number
of facts that a beholder needs to know for
various levels of sophistication in particular
knowledge domains--including "common sense".
In addition to ability--Malcolm Gladwell's,
10,000 hours must be roughly translatable in
terms of "knowable entities".
Just looking for ballpark here...surely someone
has investigated this in terms of knowledge
engineering...
On
Tue, May 22, 2012 at 2:28 PM, LaVern Pritchard
<lavern@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
wrote:
The
number of known facts is unknowable because a
fact is in the eye of the beholder or a label,
there are billions of beholders and labelers,
no way to know what they individually know or
how they label or to eliminate duplicates.
There are estimates I've seen from time to
time about the amount of "stuff" in
electronically stored form. But facts are
slippery things.
___________________________________________________
LaVern A. Pritchard - Pritchard Law Webs
Publisher, LawMoose / MooseBoost -
www.lawmoose.com
Practitioners' Legal Problem Solving Framework
Law Practice Intellectual Capital System
Semantic Legal Search Assistant
900 Flour Exchange, 310 4th Av S, Mpls, MN
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612-332-0102 -
lavern@xxxxxxxxxxxx
___________________________________________________
On 5/21/2012 2:59 PM, matthew lange wrote:
Hi everyone,
I am trying locate published works
related to estimates on how quickly
our web of knowledge is expanding: that
is, estimations on the number of
known facts in the universe, how quickly
this is growing, knowledge
domains with particular growth rates,
etc. I would be delighted if
someone could point me in the right
direction, especially toward peer
reviewed resources.
Also, my apologies for cross-posting, I
do practice good netiquette, but
I didn't know which list was more
appropriate--happy to receive guidance
here as well.
Best,
~mc
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