Author: jlolds

Native Angeleno, professor of Neuroscience and Public Policy at George Mason University

Anastasia Vasilakis’ optimistic take on Augmented Cognition

Here’s a “glass is half-full” take on the augmented cognition meme in the context of our global challenges.

In the Atlantic, partily in response to Nicholas Carr’s now seminal article on Google making us stupid, Anastasia Vasilakis has penned a smart piece that sideswipes the brain-machine interface crowd.
Money quote:

Yet in one sense, the age of the cyborg and the super-genius has already arrived. It just involves external information and communication devices instead of implants and genetic modification. The bioethicist James Hughes of Trinity College refers to all of this as “exo cortical technology,” but you can just think of it as “stuff you already own.” Increasingly, we buttress our cognitive functions with our computing systems, no matter that the connections are mediated by simple typing and pointing. These tools enable our brains to do things that would once have been almost unimaginable

Half-way through the summer

A bit over a month from now, the University will begin gearing up for the Fall semester. It just seems like yesterday that the Spring semester drew to a close. Summer is short and sweet at the Krasnow Institute for Advanced Study.

As we pass the mid-point of summer, with many of our PI’s away on summer travel and research, I think it would be useful to preview some of what will await them and our students upon their return and the beginning of classes.
First, in late August, we’re opening up three brand-new labs in what’s currently called the new-wing of the Institute. One of those labs will embody the site of a new much closer collaboration between the Department of Neuroscience at Inova’s Fairfax Hospital and George Mason’s neuroscience research activities. The other two will be filled by Drs. Dan Cox and Nadine Kabbani. Dan works on drosophila neurobiology. Nadine is interested in the proteomics of dopamine and nicotinic receptor interactions within the central nervous system.
Second, probably in November we’ll commence construction of Phase II, or rather the “new” new wing of Krasnow, which will include eight new wet labs and associated support space, PI offices and a laboratory commons to complement the Great Room in the original building. That construction should be finished pretty much exactly a year from now so that we’ll take delivery of the new space in time for Fall of 2010. We’ll open up an intranet blog to post construction updates so that everyone at the Institute can coordinate their science. Hopefully the inconvenience will not be too great and what we gain will be both beautiful and functional.
Also, we’ve opened up a second “satellite” facility for Rob Axtell’s research in the new Volgenau Engineering Building. This space for agent-based modeling complements the existing Center for Social Complexity Space in the Research I building.
So the Institute continues to grow, even in these economically difficult times. That’s a tribute to the science that our faculty do.
Jim

Tyler Cowen’s new book

My colleague Tyler Cowen sent along his new book and I’m quite enjoying the read so far. It’s made more interesting by the fact that, having known Tyler for more than a decade, many of the ideas in the book are clearly manifested in Tyler the person–his encyclopedic knowledge of DC area ethnic restaurants comes to mind.

The tag-line of the title “The Path to Prosperity in a Disordered World” pretty much conveys the problem and hints at the solution I think. Clearly Cowen is a master-user of the net (at least among us adults born before the Web). As interesting is his notion that small-bits of culture (think i-tune single versus CD album) are equally enriching. I’m not sure that I buy that–although I fully understand his economic argument.
Jim

Innovation

My colleague and friend Chris Hill (not the diplomat) has a new piece here. In it he posits the demise of an innovation society based primarily on science and technology. I think Chris is dead wrong, but it’s an interesting challenge for those of us who come from the Vannevar Bush tradition.

Money quote from Hill’s article:

Just as the post-industrial society continues to require the products of agriculture and manufacturing for its effective functioning, so too will the post-scientific society continue to require the results of advanced scientific and engineering research. Nevertheless, the leading edge of innovation in the post-scientific society, whether for business, industrial, consumer, or public purposes, will move from the workshop, the laboratory, and the office to the studio, the think tank, the atelier, and cyberspace.

Jim

Whale brains and cognition

Reading Charles Sibert’s wonderful article in yesterday’s Sunday NYT Magazine, I was reminded by my own encounter with an Orca on the north shore of San Juan Island close to twenty years ago. I had been told that if I showed up at the rocky outcropping around 10 in the morning, I’d run into a pod of the huge creatures face to face.

This was no exaggeration. Pretty much exactly on time, I was face-to-face with a huge intelligent eye gazing across the species barrier. It’s a moment I’ve never forgotten. Read the entire article. The end is the most moving.
So how smart are whales? I think that’s a very interesting question. Certainly the fact that they possess the spindle neurons that humans and the great apes also have makes the question neurobiologically relevant.
Jim

University of California feels the pain

ScienceInsider has the details of the latest combination of cuts and furloughs proposed for our colleagues at UC here. It’s not a pretty story. Many of us consider the UC system to be the premier public university in the United States. It can’t stay that way for long if the great state of California doesn’t figure out some way to address its structural budget problems (which long pre-date the current crisis in my opinion). As a California native, and with many friends as faculty in the system, I really feel their pain.

Jim