From: Phillip Huggan (cdnprodigy@yahoo.com)
Date: Wed Apr 12 2006 - 14:01:47 MDT
On 4/12/06, Phillip Huggan wrote:
> Actually it is both. Neurons have both the standard electrochemical
> propagation pathway and electrical currents too.
Well, yeah, that's HOW you get a voltage change. But electrochemical
flow is only locally across a membrane, not down the axon.
Martin
No. There are actually electrical synapses in addition to electrochemical synapses. Other non neuron=logic gate effects I can identify merely by pawning from the neuron wiki include the fact that axons also transmit to other axons. Glia also have information transmitting responsibilities (understanding that information here is not used as a synonym for "bits"). An *individual* neuron can actually function as an entire computer in some circumstances.
There are a handful of different neuron families and over 10000 different types of cells at play in constructing our brains. People here are talking about building consciousness and we haven't even delved into the *easy* chemical behaviour of certain brain centers. I suggest Google before making such grandoise claims as neurons = logic gates = human consciousness. For instance, the neuron wiki refutes that.
---------------------------------
How low will we go? Check out Yahoo! Messenger’s low PC-to-Phone call rates.
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.5 : Wed Jul 17 2013 - 04:00:56 MDT