Principles of Neural Design
by Peter Sterling, Simon Laughlin · first published 2015
75% recommend25% neutral
Why HN recommends it
Explains why neural systems are built the way they are, reasoning from thermodynamic and information-theory principles; suits readers who want the engineering logic behind brains rather than just descriptions.
Summarised by Claude from recommending comments
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Also relevant: Principles of Neural Design by Sterling and Laughlin https://mitpress.mit.edu/neuraldesign%20
on “How to build a brain – An introduction to neurophysiology for engineers” ↗Kind of an odd title and book, but I think it may do a good job of what you're looking for: "Principles of Neural Design": https://www.amazon.com/Principles-Neural-Design-MIT-Press/dp...
on “Dopamine and Temporal Difference Learning” ↗…really but “Truth and Progress” a good place to start. If you want way more insight than Chalmers will ever provide then read either “The Quantum Thief” by Hannu Rajaniemi, or hardcore neuroscience: “Principles of Neural Design” by Sterling and Laughlin.
on “The Simulated World According to David Chalmers” ↗What a great question! The book that got me into neuroscience was Phantoms in the Brain by V. S Ramachandran and Sandra Blakeslee. A 22-year old book that wowed 20-year-old me. Principles of Neural Design by Peter Sterling and Simon Laughlin is a more recent book. It is brilliant, beautifully written and probably should be required reading for anyone looking to do graduate studies in neuroscience. In a…
on “Ask HN: Which book can attract anyone towards your field of study?” ↗…in our own book, Journey of the Mind (plug! https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/58085266-journey-of-the-...) "More recent books that we think are excellent and which also influenced us heavily include Principles of Neural Design by Peter Sterling and Simon Laughlin, Evolution of Nervous Systems by Jon Kaas, Thinking in Systems by Donella Meadows, The Evolution of the Sensitive Soul by Simona Ginsburg and Eva Jablonka, and Barbara…
on “How Did Consciousness Evolve? An Illustrated Guide” ↗I would suggest "Principles of Neural Design", a book that tries to explain why things might be engineered the way they are in biology: https://mitpress.mit.edu/neuraldesign%20
on “Brain Computation Is Organized via Power-of-Two-Based Permutation Logic” ↗I would argue that we have definitely scratched the tip, though there’s a lot more iceberg to go. To anyone interested in this, I would highly recommend picking up a copy of “Principles of Neural Design”. It’s a look at how and why brains operate the way they do, from thermodynamic and information theory axioms up. A lot of the biology went a good bit over my head, but the authors do a great job of developing…
on “The cortex is a neural network of neural networks” ↗As someone working at the intersection of neuroscience and machine learning: thank you, very much. You might enjoy this book we use as a bible in our lab: http://cognet.mit.edu/book/principles-of-neural-design
on “The Overfitted Brain: Dreams evolved to assist generalization” ↗…How Can The Human Mind Occur in the Physical Universe? - John Anderson 59. Spiking Neuron Models - Wulfram Gerstner & Werner Kistler 60. Neural Engineering - Chris Eliasmith & Charles H. Anderson 61. Principles of Neural Design - Peter Sterling & Simon Laughlin 62. Semantic Information Processing - Marvin Minsky 63. The SOAR Cognitive Architecture - John Laird 64. The Architecture of Cognition - John Anderson 65. Human Associative…
on “Ask HN: What projects are you working on now?” ↗Ongoing reads: * Principles of Neural Design by Peter Sterling * What Science Offers the Humanities by Edward Slingerland * Category Theory for Programmers by Bartosz Milewski * How Do You Feel? by Bud Craig Completed reads: * The Book of Why…
on “Ask HN: Books you read in 2018?” ↗Philosophical Foundations of Neuroscience, An Introductory Course in Computational Neuroscience, and Principles of Neural Design - all bought used for an okay price. Not exactly very theoretical books, but the topic fascinated me recently and I have to get started somewhere. Recommendations always welcome. Edit: I even have another…
on “Books I loved reading this year” ↗