[dorkbotdc-blabber] Bayesian theory of the brain in New Scientist

[Philip Kohn]

Alberto Gaitán wrote:
> On our topic of modeling creativity, here's an interesting take on 
> modeling the human brain as a Bayesian engine:
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> http://reverendbayes.wordpress.com/2008/05/29/bayesian-theory-in-new-scientist/ 
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> .......dorkbot dc: people doing strange things with electricity.........
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Friston and Hinton are both at the top of my neuroscientist heroes list.
Neither is easy to understand without a strong background in math, 
neural networks and neurobiology.
Friston is particularly difficult.  I think he does it on purpose, but 
you need a whole Friston vocabulary
even to understand his text, no less his equations (which are always 
plentiful).

What Bayesian does is allow you to give information about how probable 
you think each outcome is.
Doctors always talk about looking for horses, not zebras, which means 
you look for the most likely
possibility before considering the rare diagnosis that also matchs the 
data (or may even match it better).
Bayesian biases the result based on these "prior" probabilities.

As far as creativity, maybe you turn it on its head, and pull out the 
zebras sometimes?

P.S., Congrats Alberto!!!