New Book from MIT Press

[dana@cs.rochester.edu]

**********************NEW BOOK FROM MIT PRESS *************************


Dana H. Ballard
An Introduction to Natural Computation

It is now clear that the brain is unlikely to be understood without
recourse to computational theories. The theme of An Introduction to Natural
Computation is that ideas from diverse areas such as neuroscience,
information theory, and optimization theory have recently been extended in
ways that makes them useful for describing the brain's program. The book
provides a comprehensive introduction to the computational material that
will form the underpinnings of the ultimate set of brain models. It
stresses the broad spectrum of learning models--ranging from neural network
learning through reinforcement learning to genetic learning--and situates
the various models in their appropriate neural context.

Writing about models of the brain before the brain is fully understood is a
delicate matter. At one extreme are very detailed models of the neural
circuitry. Such models are in danger of losing track of the task the brain
is trying to solve. At the other extreme are very abstract models
representing cognitive constructs that can be readily tested. Such models
can be so abstract that they lose all relationship to neurobiology. To
avoid both dangers, An Introduction to Natural Computation takes the middle
ground and stresses the computational task while staying near the
neurobiology. The material is accessible to advanced undergraduates as well
as beginning graduate students.

Dana Ballard is a Professor in the Department of Computer Science and 
Brain and Cognitive Sciences at the University of Rochester.

For more information see:

http://mitpress.mit.edu/book-home.tcl?isbn=0262024209

and 

http://www.cs.rochester.edu:80/users/faculty/dana/