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    <font size="+1">nicely said.<br>
      <br>
    </font>
    <div class="moz-cite-prefix">On 1/26/14 2:43 PM, Geoffrey Hinton
      wrote:<br>
    </div>
    <blockquote
cite="mid:CAK8NvqqMEReJ2NpM65OXef0A8wZgxg3UChvDBqdVer-E7UyDbg@mail.gmail.com"
      type="cite">
      <div dir="ltr">
        <div>I can no longer resist making one point. <br>
          <br>
          A lot of the discussion is about telling other people what
          they should NOT be doing. I think people should just get on
          and do whatever they think might work.  Obviously they will
          focus on approaches that make use of their particular skills.
          We won't know until afterwards which approaches led to major
          progress and which were dead ends. Maybe a fruitful approach
          is to  model every connection in a piece of retina in order to
          distinguish between detailed theories of how cells get to be
          direction selective. Maybe its building huge and very
          artificial neural nets that are much better than other
          approaches at some difficult task.  Probably its both of these
          and many others too. The way to really slow down the expected
          rate of progress in understanding how the brain works is to
          insist that there is one right approach and nearly all the
          money should go to that approach.  <br>
          <br>
        </div>
        Geoff<br>
        <br>
      </div>
      <div class="gmail_extra"><br>
        <br>
        <div class="gmail_quote">On Sat, Jan 25, 2014 at 3:00 PM, Brad
          Wyble <span dir="ltr"><<a moz-do-not-send="true"
              href="mailto:bwyble@gmail.com" target="_blank">bwyble@gmail.com</a>></span>
          wrote:<br>
          <blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0
            .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex">
            <div dir="ltr">I am extremely pleased to see such vibrant
              discussion here and my thanks to Juyang for getting the
              ball rolling.
              <div>
                <br>
              </div>
              <div>Jim, I appreciate  your comments and I agree in large
                measure, but I have always disagreed with you as regards
                the necessity of simulating everything down to a lowest
                common denominator .  Like you, I enjoy drawing lessons
                from the history of other disciplines, but unlike you, I
                don't think the analogy between neuroscience and physics
                is all that clear cut.  The two fields deal with vastly
                different levels of complexity and therefore I don't
                think it should be expected that they will (or should)
                follow the same trajectory.  </div>
              <div><br>
              </div>
              <div>To take your Purkinje cell example, I imagine that
                there are those who view any such model that lacks an
                explicit simulation of the RNA as being incomplete.  To
                such a person, your models would also be unfit for the
                literature. So would we then change the standards such
                that no model can be published unless it includes an
                explicit simulation of the RNA?  And why stop there?
                 Where does it end?  In my opinion, we can't make
                effective progress in this field if everyone is bound to
                the molecular level.  </div>
              <div><br>
              </div>
              <div>I really think that neuroscience presents a
                fundamental challenge that is not present in physics,
                which is that progress can only occur when theory is
                developed at different levels of abstraction that
                overlap with one another.  The challenge is not how to
                force everyone to operate at the same level of formal
                specificity, but how to allow effective communication
                between researchers operating at different levels.  </div>
              <div><br>
              </div>
              <div>In aid of meeting this challenge, I think that our
                field should take more inspiration from engineering, a
                 model-based discipline that already has to work
                simultaneously at many different scales of complexity
                and abstraction. </div>
              <div><br>
              </div>
              <div><br>
              </div>
              <div>Best, </div>
              <div>Brad Wyble</div>
              <div>
                <div><br>
                </div>
                <div><br>
                </div>
              </div>
            </div>
            <div class="gmail_extra">
              <div>
                <div class="h5"><br>
                  <br>
                  <div class="gmail_quote">On Sat, Jan 25, 2014 at 9:59
                    AM, james bower <span dir="ltr"><<a
                        moz-do-not-send="true"
                        href="mailto:bower@uthscsa.edu" target="_blank">bower@uthscsa.edu</a>></span>
                    wrote:<br>
                    <blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0
                      .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex">
                      <div style="word-wrap:break-word">Thanks for your
                        comments Thomas, and good luck with your effort.
                        <div><br>
                        </div>
                        <div>
                          I can’t refrain myself from making the
                          probably culturist remark that this seems a
                          very practical approach.</div>
                        <div><br>
                        </div>
                        <div>I have for many years suggested that those
                          interested in advancing biology in general and
                          neuroscience in particular to a ‘paradigmatic’
                          as distinct from a descriptive / folkloric
                          science, would benefit from understanding this
                          transition as physics went through it in the
                          15th and 16th centuries.  In many ways, I
                          think that is where we are today, although
                          with perhaps the decided disadvantage that we
                          have a lot of physicists around who, again in
                          my view, don’t really understand the origins
                          of their own science.  By that, I mean, that
                          they don’t understand how much of their
                          current scientific structure, for example the
                          relatively clean separation between
                          ‘theorists’ and ‘experimentalists’, is
                          dependent on the foundation build by those
                          (like Newton) who were both in an earlier
                          time.  Once you have a sold underlying
                          computational foundation for a science, then
                          you have the luxury of this kind of
                          specialization - as there is a framework that
                          ties it all together.  The Higgs effort being
                          a very visible recent example.</div>
                        <div><br>
                        </div>
                        <div>Neuroscience has nothing of the sort.  As I
                          point out in the article I linked to in my
                          first posting - while it was first proposed 40
                          years ago (by Rodolfo Llinas) that the
                          cerebellar Purkinje cell had active dendrites
                          (i.e. that there were non
                          directly-synaptically associated voltage
                          dependent ion channels in the dendrite that
                          governed its behavior), and 40 years of
                          anatomically and physiologically realistic
                          modeling has been necessary to start to
                          understand what they do - many cerebellar
                          modeling efforts today simply ignore these
                          channels.  While that again, to many on this
                          list, may seem too far buried in the details,
                          these voltage dependent channels make the
                          Purkinje cell the computational device that it
                          is.  </div>
                        <div><br>
                        </div>
                        <div>Recently, I was asked to review a
                          cerebellar modeling paper in which the authors
                          actually acknowledged that their model lacked
                          these channels because they would  have been
                          too computationally expensive to include.
                           Sadly for those authors, I was asked to
                          review the paper for the usual reason - that
                          several of our papers were referenced
                          accordingly.  They likely won’t make that
                          mistake again - as after of course
                          complementing them on the fact that they were
                          honest (and knowledgable) enough to have
                          remarked on the fact that their Purkinje cells
                          weren’t really Purkinje cells - I had to
                          reject the paper for the same reason.</div>
                        <div><br>
                        </div>
                        <div>As I said, they likely won’t make that
                          mistake again - and will very likely get away
                          with it.</div>
                        <div><br>
                        </div>
                        <div>Imagine a comparable situation in a field
                          (like physics) which has established a
                          structural base for its enterprise.  “We found
                          it computational expedient to ignore the
                          second law of thermodynamics in our
                          computations - sorry”.  BTW, I know that
                          details are ignored all the time in physics as
                          one deals with descriptions at different
                          levels of scale - although even there, the
                          field clearly would like to have a way to link
                          across different levels of scale.   I would
                          claim, however, that that is precisely the
                          “trick’ that biology uses to ‘beat’ the second
                          law - linking all levels of scale together -
                          another reason why you can’t ignore the
                          details in biological models if  you really
                          want to understand how biology works.  (too
                          cryptic a comment perhaps).</div>
                        <div><br>
                        </div>
                        <div>Anyway, my advice would be to consider how
                          physics made this transition many years ago,
                          and ask the question how neuroscience (and
                          biology) can now.  Key points I think are:</div>
                        <div><span style="white-space:pre-wrap"> </span>-
                          you need to produce students who are REALLY
                          both experimental and theoretical (like
                          Newton).  (and that doesn’t mean programs that
                          “import” physicists and give them enough
                          biology to believe they know what they are
                          doing, or programs that link experimentalists
                          to physicists to solve their computational
                          problems)</div>
                        <div><span style="white-space:pre-wrap"> </span>-
                          you need to base the efforts on models (and
                          therefore mathematics) of sufficient
                          complexity to capture the physical reality of
                          the system being studied (as Kepler was forced
                          to do to make the sun centric model of the
                          solar system even as close to as accurate as
                          the previous earth centered system)</div>
                        <div><span style="white-space:pre-wrap"> </span>-
                          you need to build a new form of collaboration
                          and communication that can support the
                          complexity of those models.  Fundamentally, we
                          continue to use the publication system (short
                          papers in a journal) that was invented as part
                          of the transformation for physics way back
                          then.  Our laboratories are also largely
                          isolated and non-cooperative, more appropriate
                          for studying simpler things (like those in
                          physics).  Fortunate for us, we have a new
                          communication tool (the Internet) although, as
                          can be expected, we are mostly using it to
                          reimplement old style communication systems
                          (e-journals) with a few twists (supplemental
                          materials).</div>
                        <div><span style="white-space:pre-wrap"> </span>-
                          funding agencies need to insist that anyone
                          doing theory needs to be linked to the
                          experimental side REALLY, and vice versa.  I
                          proposed a number of years ago to NIH that
                          they would make it into the history books if
                          they simply required the following monday,
                           that any submitted experimental grant include
                          a REAL theoretical and computational component
                          - Sadly, they interpreted that as meaning that
                          P.I.s should state "an hypothesis" - which
                          itself is remarkable, because most of the
                          ‘hypotheses’ I see stated in Federal grants
                          are actually statements of what the P.I.
                          believes to be true.  Don’t get me started on
                          human imaging studies.  arggg</div>
                        <div><span style="white-space:pre-wrap"> </span>-
                          As long as we are talking about what funding
                          agencies can do, how about the following
                          structure for grants - all grants need to be
                          submitted collaboratively by two laboratories
                          who have different theories (better models)
                          about how a particular part of the brain
                          works.  The grant should support at set of
                          experiments, that both parties agree
                          distinguish between their two points of view.
                           All results need to be published with joint
                          authorship.  In effect that is how physics
                          works - given its underlying structure.</div>
                        <div><span style="white-space:pre-wrap"> </span>-
                          You need to get rid, as quickly as possible,
                          the pressure to “translate” neuroscience
                          research explicitly into clinical significance
                          - we are not even close to being able to do
                          that intentionally - and the pressure (which
                          is essentially a give away to the pharma and
                          bio-tech industries anyway) is forcing
                          neurobiologists to link to what is arguably
                          the least scientific form of research there is
                          - clinical research.  It just has to be the
                          case that society needs to understand that an
                          investment in basic research will eventually
                          result in all the wonderful outcomes for
                          humans we would all like, but this distortion
                          now is killing real neuroscience just at a
                          critical time, when we may finally have the
                          tools to make the transition to a paradigmatic
                          science.  </div>
                        <div><span style="white-space:pre-wrap"> </span></div>
                        <div>As some of you know, I have been all about
                          trying to do these things for many years -
                          with the GENESIS project, with the original
                          CNS graduate program at Caltech, with the CNS
                          meetings, (even originally with NIPS) and with
                          the first  ‘Methods in Computational
                          Neuroscience Course" at the Marine Biological
                          laboratory, whose latest incarnation in Brazil
                          (LASCON) is actually wrapping up next week,
                          and of course with my own research and
                          students.  Of course, I have not been alone in
                          this, but it is remarkable how little impact
                          all that has had on neuroscience or
                          neuro-engineering.  I have to say, honestly,
                          that the strong tendency seems to be for these
                          efforts to snap back to the non-realistic,
                          non-biologically based modeling and
                          theoretical efforts.</div>
                        <div><br>
                        </div>
                        <div>Perhaps Canada, in its usual practical and
                          reasonable way (sorry) can figure out how to
                          do this right.</div>
                        <div><br>
                        </div>
                        <div>I hope so.</div>
                        <div><br>
                        </div>
                        <div>Jim</div>
                        <div><br>
                        </div>
                        <div>p.s. I have also been proposing recently
                          that we scuttle the ‘intro neuroscience’
                          survey courses in our graduate programs
                          (religious instruction)  and instead organize
                          an introductory course built around the
                          history of the discovery of the origin of the
                          axon potential that culminated in the first
                          (and last) Nobel prize work in computational
                          neuroscience for the Hodkin Huxley model.  The
                          50th anniversary of that prize was celebrated
                          last year, and the year before I helped to
                          organize a meeting celebrating the 60th
                          anniversary of the publication of the original
                          papers (which I care much more about anyway).
                           That meeting was, I believe, the first
                          meeting in neuroscience ever organized around
                          a single (mathematical) model or theory - and
                          in organizing it, I required all the speakers
                          to show the HH model on their first slide,
                          indicating which term or feature of the model
                          their work was related to.  Again, a first -
                          but possible, as this is about the only
                          “community model’ we have.</div>
                        <div><br>
                        </div>
                        <div>Most Neuroscience textbooks today don’t
                          include that equation (second order
                          differential) and present the HH model
                          primarily as a description of the action
                          potential.   Most theorists regard the HH
                          model as a prime example of how progress can
                          be made by ignoring the biological details.
                           Both views and interpretations are
                          historically and practically incorrect.  In my
                          opinion, if you can’t handle the math in the
                          HH model, you shouldn’t be a neurobiologist,
                          and if you don’t understand the profound
                          impact of HH’s knowledge and experimental
                          study of the squid giant axon on the model,
                           you shouldn’t be a neuro-theorist either.
                           just saying.   :-)</div>
                        <div>
                          <div>
                            <div><br>
                            </div>
                            <div><br>
                              <div>
                                <div>On Jan 25, 2014, at 6:58 AM, Thomas
                                  Trappenberg <<a
                                    moz-do-not-send="true"
                                    href="mailto:tt@cs.dal.ca"
                                    target="_blank">tt@cs.dal.ca</a>>
                                  wrote:</div>
                                <br>
                                <blockquote type="cite">
                                  <div dir="ltr">
                                    <p dir="ltr">James, enjoyed your
                                      writing. </p>
                                    <p dir="ltr">So, what to do? We are
                                      trying to get organized in Canada
                                      and are thinking how we fit in
                                      with your (US) and the European
                                      approaches and big money. My
                                      thought is that our advantage
                                      might be flexibility by not having
                                      a single theme but rather a
                                      general supporting structure for
                                      theory and theory-experimental
                                      interactions. I believe the
                                      ultimate place where we want to be
                                      is to take theoretical proposals
                                      more seriously and try to make
                                      specific experiments for them;
                                      like the Higgs project. (Any other
                                      suggestions? Canadians, see <a
                                        moz-do-not-send="true"
                                        href="http://www.neuroinfocomp.ca/"
                                        target="_blank">http://www.neuroinfocomp.ca</a> 
                                      if you are not already on there.)</p>
                                    <p dir="ltr">Also, with regards to
                                      big data, I believe that one very
                                      fascinating thing about the brain
                                      is that it can function with
                                      'small data'.</p>
                                    <p>Cheers, Thomas<br>
                                    </p>
                                    <p dir="ltr"><br>
                                    </p>
                                    <div class="gmail_quote">On
                                      2014-01-25 12:09 AM, "james bower"
                                      <<a moz-do-not-send="true"
                                        href="mailto:bower@uthscsa.edu"
                                        target="_blank">bower@uthscsa.edu</a>>
                                      wrote:<br type="attribution">
                                      <blockquote class="gmail_quote"
                                        style="margin:0px 0px 0px
                                        0.8ex;border-left:1px solid
                                        rgb(204,204,204);padding-left:1ex">
                                        <div
                                          style="word-wrap:break-word">
                                          <div>Ivan thanks for the
                                            response,</div>
                                          <div><br>
                                          </div>
                                          <div>Actually, the talks at
                                            the recent Neuroscience
                                            Meeting about the Brain
                                            Project either excluded
                                            modeling altogether  -  or
                                            declared we in the US could
                                            leave it to the Europeans.
                                             I am not in the least bit
                                            nationalistic - but,
                                            collecting data without
                                            having models (rather than
                                            imaginings) to indicate what
                                            to collect, is simply
                                            foolish, with many examples
                                            from history to demonstrate
                                            the foolishness.  In fact,
                                            one of the primary
                                            proponents (and likely
                                            beneficiaries) of this Brain
                                            Project, who gave the big
                                            talk at Neuroscience on the
                                            project (showing lots of
                                            pretty pictures), started
                                            his talk by asking: “what
                                            have we really learned since
                                            Cajal, except that there are
                                            also inhibitory neurons?”
                                             Shocking, not only because
                                            Cajal actually suggested
                                            that there might be
                                            inhibitory neurons - in
                                            fact.  To quote “Stupid is
                                            as stupid does”.</div>
                                          <div><br>
                                          </div>
                                          <div>Forbes magazine estimated
                                            that finding the Higgs Boson
                                            cost over $13BB,
                                            conservatively.  The Higgs
                                            experiment was absolutely
                                            the opposite of a Big Data
                                            experiment - In fact, can
                                            you imagine the amount of
                                            money and time that would
                                            have been required if one
                                            had simply decided to
                                            collect all data at all
                                            possible energy levels?  
                                            The Higgs experiment is all
                                            the more remarkable because
                                            it had the nearly unified
                                            support of the high energy
                                            physics community, not that
                                            there weren’t and aren’t
                                            skeptics, but still,
                                            remarkable that the large
                                            majority could agree on the
                                            undertaking and effort.  The
                                            reason is, of course, that
                                            there was a theory - that
                                            dealt with the particulars
                                            and the details - not
                                            generalities.  In contrast,
                                            there is a GREAT DEAL of
                                            skepticism (me included)
                                            about the Brain Project -
                                            its politics and its effects
                                            (or lack therefore), within
                                            neuroscience.  (of course,
                                            many people are burring
                                            their concerns in favor of
                                            tin cups - hoping).
                                             Neuroscience has had genome
                                            envy for ever - the
                                            connectome is their response
                                            - who says its all in the
                                            connections? (sorry
                                            ‘connectionists’)  Where is
                                            the theory?  Hebb?  You
                                            should read Hebb if you
                                            haven’t - rather remarkable
                                            treatise.  But very far from
                                            a theory.</div>
                                          <div><br>
                                          </div>
                                          <div>If you want an honest
                                            answer to your question - I
                                            have not seen any good
                                            evidence so far that the
                                            approach works, and I deeply
                                            suspect that the nervous
                                            system is very much NOT like
                                            any machine we have built or
                                            designed to date. I don’t
                                            believe that Newton would
                                            have accomplished what he
                                            did, had he not, first, been
                                            a remarkable
                                            experimentalist, tinkering
                                            with real things.  I feel
                                            the same way about
                                            Neuroscience.  Having spent
                                            almost 30 years building
                                            realistic models of its
                                            cells and networks (and also
                                            doing experiments, as
                                            described in the article I
                                            linked to) we have made some
                                            small progress - but only by
                                            avoiding abstractions and
                                            paying attention to the
                                            details.  OF course, most
                                            experimentalists and even
                                            most modelers have paid
                                            little or no attention.  We
                                            have a sociological and
                                            structural problem that, in
                                            my opinion, only the right
                                            kind of models can fix,
                                            coupled with a real
                                            commitment to the biology -
                                            in all its complexity.  And,
                                            as the model I linked tries
                                            to make clear - we also have
                                            to all agree to start
                                            working on common “community
                                            models’.  But like big horn
                                            sheep, much safer to stand
                                            on your own peak and make a
                                            lot of noise.  </div>
                                          <div><br>
                                          </div>
                                          <div>You can predict with
                                            great accuracy the movement
                                            of the planets in the sky
                                            using circles linked to
                                            other circles - nice and
                                            easy math, and very
                                            adaptable model (just add
                                            more circles when you need
                                            more accuracy, and invent
                                            entities like equant points,
                                            etc).  Problem is, without
                                            getting into the nasty math
                                            and reality of ellipses- you
                                            can’t possible know anything
                                            about gravity, or the
                                            origins of the solar system,
                                            or its various and eventual
                                            perturbations.  </div>
                                          <div><br>
                                          </div>
                                          <div>As I have been saying for
                                            30 years:  Beware Ptolemy
                                            and curve fitting.</div>
                                          <div><br>
                                          </div>
                                          <div>The details of reality
                                            matter.</div>
                                          <div><br>
                                          </div>
                                          <div>Jim</div>
                                          <div><br>
                                          </div>
                                          <div><br>
                                          </div>
                                          <div><br>
                                          </div>
                                          <div><br>
                                          </div>
                                          <br>
                                          <div>
                                            <div>On Jan 24, 2014, at
                                              7:02 PM, Ivan Raikov <<a
                                                moz-do-not-send="true"
                                                href="mailto:ivan.g.raikov@gmail.com"
                                                target="_blank">ivan.g.raikov@gmail.com</a>>
                                              wrote:</div>
                                            <br>
                                            <blockquote type="cite">
                                              <div dir="ltr"><br>
                                                <div class="gmail_extra">I
                                                  think perhaps the
                                                  objection to the Big
                                                  Data approach is that
                                                  it is applied to the
                                                  exclusion of all other
                                                  modelling approaches.
                                                  While it is true that
                                                  complete and detailed
                                                  understanding of 
                                                  neurophysiology and
                                                  anatomy is at the
                                                  heart of neuroscience,
                                                  a lot can be learned
                                                  about signal
                                                  propagation in
                                                  excitable branching
                                                  structures using
                                                  statistical physics,
                                                  and a lot can be
                                                  learned about
                                                  information
                                                  representation and
                                                  transmission in the
                                                  brain using
                                                  mathematical theories
                                                  about distributed
                                                  communicating
                                                  processes. As these
                                                  modelling approaches
                                                  have been successfully
                                                  used in various areas
                                                  of science, wouldn't
                                                  you agree that they
                                                  can also be used to
                                                  understand at least
                                                  some of the
                                                  fundamental properties
                                                  of brain structures
                                                  and processes? <br>
                                                  <br>
                                                </div>
                                                <div class="gmail_extra"> 
                                                  -Ivan Raikov<br>
                                                </div>
                                                <div class="gmail_extra"><br>
                                                  <div
                                                    class="gmail_quote">On
                                                    Sat, Jan 25, 2014 at
                                                    8:31 AM, james bower
                                                    <span dir="ltr"><<a
moz-do-not-send="true" href="mailto:bower@uthscsa.edu" target="_blank">bower@uthscsa.edu</a>></span>
                                                    wrote:<br>
                                                    <blockquote
                                                      class="gmail_quote"
                                                      style="margin:0px
                                                      0px 0px
                                                      0.8ex;border-left:1px
                                                      solid
                                                      rgb(204,204,204);padding-left:1ex">[snip]
                                                      <br>
                                                    </blockquote>
                                                    <blockquote
                                                      class="gmail_quote"
                                                      style="margin:0px
                                                      0px 0px
                                                      0.8ex;border-left:1px
                                                      solid
                                                      rgb(204,204,204);padding-left:1ex">
                                                      <div
                                                        style="word-wrap:break-word">
                                                        <div>An enormous
                                                          amount of
                                                          engineering
                                                          and
                                                          neuroscience
                                                          continues to
                                                          think that the
                                                          feedforward
                                                          pathway is
                                                          from the
                                                          sensors to the
                                                          inside -
                                                          rather than
                                                          seeing this as
                                                          the actual
                                                          feedback loop.
                                                           Might to some
                                                          sound like a
                                                          semantic
                                                          quibble,  but
                                                          I assure you
                                                          it is not.</div>
                                                        <div><br>
                                                        </div>
                                                        <div>If you
                                                          believe as I
                                                          do, that the
                                                          brain solves
                                                          very hard
                                                          problems, in
                                                          very
                                                          sophisticated
                                                          ways, that
                                                          involve, in
                                                          some sense the
                                                          construction
                                                          of complex
                                                          models about
                                                          the world and
                                                          how it
                                                          operates in
                                                          the world, and
                                                          that those
                                                          models are
                                                          manifest in
                                                          the complex
                                                          architecture
                                                          of the brain -
                                                          then
                                                          simplified
                                                          solutions are
                                                          missing the
                                                          point.</div>
                                                        <div><br>
                                                        </div>
                                                        <div>What that
                                                          means
                                                          inevitably, in
                                                          my view, is
                                                          that the only
                                                          way we will
                                                          ever
                                                          understand
                                                          what
                                                          brain-like is,
                                                          is to pay
                                                          tremendous
                                                          attention
                                                          experimentally
                                                          and in our
                                                          models to the
                                                          actual
                                                          detailed
                                                          anatomy and
                                                          physiology of
                                                          the brains
                                                          circuits and
                                                          cells.</div>
                                                        <br>
                                                      </div>
                                                    </blockquote>
                                                  </div>
                                                </div>
                                              </div>
                                            </blockquote>
                                          </div>
                                          <br>
                                          <div>
                                            <div
style="text-indent:0px;letter-spacing:normal;font-variant:normal;font-style:normal;font-weight:normal;line-height:normal;text-transform:none;white-space:normal;font-family:Helvetica;word-wrap:break-word;word-spacing:0px">
                                              <p class="MsoNormal"> </p>
                                              <p class="MsoNormal"> </p>
                                              <p class="MsoNormal"><span
style="font-size:14pt;font-family:Verdana;color:rgb(149,0,4)">Dr. James
                                                  M. Bower Ph.D.</span></p>
                                              <p class="MsoNormal">
                                                <span
                                                  style="font-size:11pt;font-family:'Times
                                                  New Roman'">Professor
                                                  of Computational
                                                  Neurobiology</span></p>
                                              <p class="MsoNormal"><span
                                                  style="font-family:'Times
                                                  New
                                                  Roman';color:rgb(66,0,168)">Barshop
                                                  Institute for
                                                  Longevity and Aging
                                                  Studies.</span><span
                                                  style="font-family:'Times
                                                  New Roman'"></span></p>
                                              <p class="MsoNormal"><span
                                                  style="font-size:11pt;font-family:'Times
                                                  New Roman'">15355
                                                  Lambda Drive</span><span
                                                  style="font-family:'Times
                                                  New Roman'"></span></p>
                                              <p class="MsoNormal"><span
                                                  style="font-size:11pt;font-family:'Times
                                                  New Roman'">University
                                                  of Texas Health
                                                  Science Center </span><span
                                                  style="font-family:'Times
                                                  New Roman'"></span></p>
                                              <p class="MsoNormal"><span
                                                  style="font-size:11pt;font-family:'Times
                                                  New Roman'">San
                                                  Antonio, Texas  78245</span><span
                                                  style="font-family:'Times
                                                  New Roman'"></span></p>
                                              <div><span
                                                  style="font-family:'Times
                                                  New Roman'"> </span><br>
                                              </div>
                                              <p class="MsoNormal"><b><span
                                                    style="font-size:13pt;font-family:'Times
                                                    New Roman'">Phone:  <a
moz-do-not-send="true" href="tel:210%20382%200553" value="+12103820553"
                                                      target="_blank">210
                                                      382 0553</a></span></b><span
                                                  style="font-family:'Times
                                                  New Roman'"></span></p>
                                              <p class="MsoNormal"><span
                                                  style="font-family:'Times
                                                  New Roman'">Email: <a
moz-do-not-send="true" href="mailto:bower@uthscsa.edu" target="_blank">bower@uthscsa.edu</a></span></p>
                                              <p class="MsoNormal"><span
                                                  style="font-family:'Times
                                                  New Roman'">Web: <a
                                                    moz-do-not-send="true"
href="http://www.bower-lab.org/" target="_blank">http://www.bower-lab.org</a></span></p>
                                              <p class="MsoNormal"><span
                                                  style="font-family:'Times
                                                  New Roman'">twitter:
                                                  superid101</span></p>
                                              <p class="MsoNormal"><span
                                                  style="font-family:'Times
                                                  New Roman'">linkedin:
                                                  Jim Bower</span></p>
                                              <div><span
                                                  style="font-family:'Times
                                                  New Roman'"> </span><br>
                                              </div>
                                              <p class="MsoNormal"><span
                                                  style="font-family:'Times
                                                  New
                                                  Roman';color:rgb(177,89,19)">CONFIDENTIAL
                                                  NOTICE:</span></p>
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                                                  New Roman'"> </span><br>
                                              </div>
                                            </div>
                                          </div>
                                          <br>
                                        </div>
                                      </blockquote>
                                    </div>
                                  </div>
                                </blockquote>
                              </div>
                              <br>
                              <div>
                                <div
style="text-indent:0px;letter-spacing:normal;font-variant:normal;text-align:-webkit-auto;font-style:normal;font-weight:normal;line-height:normal;text-transform:none;white-space:normal;font-family:Helvetica;word-wrap:break-word;word-spacing:0px">
                                  <p class="MsoNormal"> </p>
                                  <p class="MsoNormal"> </p>
                                  <p class="MsoNormal"><span
                                      style="font-size:14pt;font-family:Verdana;color:rgb(149,0,4)">Dr.
                                      James M. Bower Ph.D.</span></p>
                                  <p class="MsoNormal">
                                    <span
                                      style="font-size:11pt;font-family:'Times
                                      New Roman'">Professor of
                                      Computational Neurobiology</span></p>
                                  <p class="MsoNormal"><span
                                      style="font-family:'Times New
                                      Roman';color:rgb(66,0,168)">Barshop
                                      Institute for Longevity and Aging
                                      Studies.</span><span
                                      style="font-family:'Times New
                                      Roman'"></span></p>
                                  <p class="MsoNormal"><span
                                      style="font-size:11pt;font-family:'Times
                                      New Roman'">15355 Lambda Drive</span><span
                                      style="font-family:'Times New
                                      Roman'"></span></p>
                                  <p class="MsoNormal"><span
                                      style="font-size:11pt;font-family:'Times
                                      New Roman'">University of Texas
                                      Health Science Center </span><span
                                      style="font-family:'Times New
                                      Roman'"></span></p>
                                  <p class="MsoNormal"><span
                                      style="font-size:11pt;font-family:'Times
                                      New Roman'">San Antonio, Texas
                                       78245</span><span
                                      style="font-family:'Times New
                                      Roman'"></span></p>
                                  <p class="MsoNormal"><span
                                      style="font-family:'Times New
                                      Roman'"> </span></p>
                                  <p class="MsoNormal"><b><span
                                        style="font-size:13pt;font-family:'Times
                                        New Roman'">Phone:  <a
                                          moz-do-not-send="true"
                                          href="tel:210%20382%200553"
                                          value="+12103820553"
                                          target="_blank">210 382 0553</a></span></b><span
                                      style="font-family:'Times New
                                      Roman'"></span></p>
                                  <p class="MsoNormal"><span
                                      style="font-family:'Times New
                                      Roman'">Email: <a
                                        moz-do-not-send="true"
                                        href="mailto:bower@uthscsa.edu"
                                        target="_blank">bower@uthscsa.edu</a></span></p>
                                  <p class="MsoNormal"><span
                                      style="font-family:'Times New
                                      Roman'">Web: <a
                                        moz-do-not-send="true"
                                        href="http://www.bower-lab.org"
                                        target="_blank">http://www.bower-lab.org</a></span></p>
                                  <p class="MsoNormal"><span
                                      style="font-family:'Times New
                                      Roman'">twitter: superid101</span></p>
                                  <p class="MsoNormal"><span
                                      style="font-family:'Times New
                                      Roman'">linkedin: Jim Bower</span></p>
                                  <p class="MsoNormal"><span
                                      style="font-family:'Times New
                                      Roman'"> </span></p>
                                  <p class="MsoNormal"><span
                                      style="font-family:'Times New
                                      Roman';color:rgb(177,89,19)">CONFIDENTIAL
                                      NOTICE:</span></p>
                                  <p class="MsoNormal"><span
                                      style="font-family:'Times New
                                      Roman';color:rgb(177,89,19)">The
                                      contents of this email and any
                                      attachments to it may be
                                      privileged or contain privileged
                                      and confidential information. This
                                      information is only for the
                                      viewing or use of the intended
                                      recipient. If you have received
                                      this e-mail in error or are not
                                      the intended recipient, you are
                                      hereby notified that any
                                      disclosure, copying, distribution
                                      or use of, or the taking of
                                      any action in reliance upon, any
                                      of the information contained in
                                      this e-mail, or</span></p>
                                  <p class="MsoNormal"><span
                                      style="font-family:'Times New
                                      Roman';color:rgb(177,89,19)">any
                                      of the attachments to this e-mail,
                                      is strictly prohibited and that
                                      this e-mail and all of the
                                      attachments to this e-mail, if
                                      any, must be</span></p>
                                  <p class="MsoNormal"><span
                                      style="font-family:'Times New
                                      Roman';color:rgb(177,89,19)">immediately
                                      returned to the sender or
                                      destroyed and, in either case,
                                      this e-mail and all attachments to
                                      this e-mail must be immediately
                                      deleted from your computer without
                                      making any copies hereof and any
                                      and all hard copies made must be
                                      destroyed. If you have received
                                      this e-mail in error,
                                      please notify the sender by e-mail
                                      immediately.</span><span
                                      style="font-family:'Times New
                                      Roman'"></span></p>
                                  <p class="MsoNormal"><span
                                      style="font-family:'Times New
                                      Roman'"> </span></p>
                                </div>
                              </div>
                              <br>
                            </div>
                          </div>
                        </div>
                      </div>
                    </blockquote>
                  </div>
                  <br>
                  <br clear="all">
                  <div><br>
                  </div>
                </div>
              </div>
              <span class="HOEnZb"><font color="#888888">-- <br>
                  <div dir="ltr">Brad Wyble<br>
                    Assistant Professor<br>
                    Psychology Department<br>
                    Penn State University
                    <div><br>
                    </div>
                    <div><a moz-do-not-send="true"
                        href="http://wyblelab.com" target="_blank">http://wyblelab.com</a></div>
                  </div>
                </font></span></div>
          </blockquote>
        </div>
        <br>
      </div>
    </blockquote>
    <br>
    <pre class="moz-signature" cols="72">-- 
Hava T. Siegelmann, Ph.D.
Professor
Director, BINDS Lab (Biologically Inspired Neural Dynamical Systems)
Dept. of Computer Science
Program of Neuroscience and Behavior
University of Massachusetts Amherst
Amherst, MA, 01003
Phone - Grant Administrator – Michele Roberts:  413-545-4389  
Fax:  413-545-1249 
LAB WEBSITE: <a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://binds.cs.umass.edu/">http://binds.cs.umass.edu/</a> 
</pre>
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