Talk:Neural circuit

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Biological neural network
I made some changes (hopefully you will see them as improvements) in the first few paragraphs. I think this is a good start! --Smithfarm 11:26, 12 Apr 2005 (UTC)


 * I saw it, thanks a lot! Ben (talk) 11:32, Apr 12, 2005 (UTC)

An idea how to rename the section "earlier models", or maybe a more general idea about how to structure the article? Ben (talk) 11:45, Apr 12, 2005 (UTC)

Another naming issue
Why the use the plural Biological neural networks instead of Biological neural network? Besides being consistent with Artificial neural network, the latter seems to better follow the naming conventions. Wmahan. 03:15, 2005 Apr 13 (UTC)


 * right, my mistake. I'll rename it. Ben (talk) 05:59, Apr 13, 2005 (UTC)

next rough sketch

 * I think the structure of the article is now more or less clear. I think the most important parts (and where I plan to work on) will be "connections" and "representations", especially theories of neuronal coding. I also put some new links in the external links section they will give some fast information on some topics. Ben talk contr 11:45, Apr 14, 2005 (UTC)

history section
The section could use material from articles in the Category:History of neuroscience. Anybody? Ben T/C 06:36, Jun 6, 2005 (UTC)

Potassium channels?
In the description of the electrochemical mechanisms responsible for precluding the backpropagation of AP's along the axon toward the soma, you neglect to mention the involvement of voltage-gated potassium channels, instead choosing to focus exclusively on sodium. Might you consider mentioning the role of K+ channels in engaging repolarization and undershoot, creating the time-delay that helps prevent backfiring? Or would that be more than this article needs to cover?


 * I'm not sure of the terminology in neuroscience literature, but the papers I read that focus on the biophysics of neuronal nets use backpropagation to refer to the propagation of an action potential back through the dendritic arbor, which does occur in some areas of the brain and has been observed since the 1950s. See neural backpropagation for details. In the meantime, I will add a clarifying paragraph. SamuelRiv (talk) 00:23, 21 November 2007 (UTC)

Serious issues with first paragraph
The opening sentence reads terribly. Contrast this: "In neuroscience, a neural network is a bit of conceptual juggernaut: the conceptual transition from neuroanatomy, a rigorously descriptive discipline of observed structure, to the designation of the parameters delimiting a 'network' can be problematic." as an opening sentence, with a possible alternative introduction: "In neuroscience, a neural network is a population of neurons whose inputs or signalling targets define a recognizable circuit." Does anyone else agree? AdamSebWolf 00:30, 20 April 2007 (UTC)

Sound, not electrical impulses
Newer research by the physicists Thomas Heimburg and Andrew Jackson at the University of Copenhagen, the neural impulses are made of sound, not electricity. The elctricity is just a bi-product. Maybe worth to mention in the article. 217.68.114.116 (talk) 15:34, 21 January 2008 (UTC)


 * No, there's already mention on WP. See soliton model. Also, you have the wrong idea about the importance of electricity in the model - they make no statement of the sort that ion currents are a byproduct. Finally, it has not yet been applied to network models. SamuelRiv (talk) 22:53, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

Proposal to rename and restart
I've been working on the ecology article for a number of years. I recently (two days ago) migrated over to food web and want to improve that page. I was looking to make a wikilink to network, because a food web is a kind of biological network. There is no page on biological networks. Hence, I am going to take a bold move and rename this page neural network and create a new page called biological network. Networks are used extensively throughout biology - including evolutionary biology (phylogenetic trees) and ecology (food webs).Thompsma (talk) 18:15, 10 June 2011 (UTC)


 * Actually...I did a bit of research and found the problem. The disambig page for network only links here, but there is already a page called network biology. I think it should be renamed biological network and will try to fix this network of terms.Thompsma (talk) 18:15, 10 June 2011 (UTC)


 * I just tagged neural network for a Criteria for speedy deletion. This page should be renamed neural network. The other pages include: Biological network, Ecological network, and Artificial neural network. It makes sense to rename this page neural network. I'll hunt down the process for doing this.Thompsma (talk) 19:26, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

Requested move
Biological neural network → Neural network – This page is about neural networks, there are other pages for Biological network and Artificial neural network. I recently tagged neural network for a speedy deletion because it duplicated these pages and was causing confusion. The names were redundant and duplicative.Thompsma (talk) 19:23, 10 June 2011 (UTC)


 * Oppose the move per se, although I'm receptive to the ideas behind it. The CSD at the other page has been challenged by multiple editors, so it's not going to go through, which makes the rationale for a move pretty much moot. As discussed at Talk:Neural network, which please see, the consensus seems to be, instead, to use content merges to accomplish whatever may need to be done. Now, that said, I think there is, indeed, a good case that it's redundant to have "Biological neural network" in addition to "Neural network". Most readers would logically look for "Neural network", without the "biological". --Tryptofish (talk) 19:59, 10 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Perhaps there is need for a distinction between artificial neural networks (or neural network models) and biological neural networks? The way that these network pages are organized and titled is confusing and it needs to be threaded together. This book (Neural networks: an introduction, Volume 1 By Berndt Müller, Joachim Reinhardt, Michael Thomas Strickland) defines neural networks:


 * "Neural network models are algorithms for cognitive tasks, such as learning and optimization, which are in a loose sense based on concept derived from research into the nature of the brain."
 * Here is the catch - they didn't define neural network - but neural network models. Perhaps this should be the title to prevent confusion? There are real neural networks in biology - interconnected neurons or neural groupings:


 * "In his book Mind and body (1873), Bain set out an account in which he related the processes of associative memory to the distribution of activity in neural groupings—or neural networks as they are now termed."
 * This paper (A sense of history. TRENDS in Ecology & Evolution Vol.16 No.3  March 2001) defines a neural network as follows:


 * "A neural network is a mathematical model, run on a computer, which learns to distinguish patterns. It mimics a real neural system and consists of layers of highly interconnected cells (neurons). A simple network comprises an input layer where each neuron is or is not activated by the stimulus, a ‘hidden’ layer for processing and an output layer."
 * Hence, there are neural network models that mimic biological neural networks (or neural networks for short). Neural networks are biological, neural network models are algorithms. A solution needs to be made to prevent this confusion.Thompsma (talk) 20:55, 10 June 2011 (UTC)


 * I had read Talk:Neural network, which is what got me into action here. I posted some discussion there as well. Here are the list of terms: neural network, neural network model, artificial neural network, biological neural network. Neural network can mean any one of the latter three. A neural network model and artificial neural network are the same thing. Biological neural networks are also called neural networks - so I guess I agree with keeping the title of this page as it is. However, I think that the page currently listed as neural network should be merged, deleted, or turned into a simple paragraph that explains this distinction. Some of the papers I linked too above can be added in here - because this page lacks citations.Thompsma (talk) 21:18, 10 June 2011 (UTC)


 * Oppose: Artificial neural networks are a major research topic. –CWenger ( ^ •  @ ) 22:37, 10 June 2011 (UTC)
 * There is a page for Artificial neural network already. I'm not disputing that it isn't a major research topic - the naming convention used in wikipedia is confusing and redundant. People are free to oppose, but please offer an alternative fix - because there is a real problem here.Thompsma (talk) 22:45, 10 June 2011 (UTC)
 * I don't see the problem. Neural network is currently a page that describes both biological neural networks and artificial neural networks—kind of an expanded disambiguation page. That seems reasonable to me. –CWenger ( ^ •  @ ) 23:32, 10 June 2011 (UTC)


 * Oppose neural nets, the artificial ones, are the primary topic. 65.94.47.63 (talk) 05:35, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

External links modified
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Requested move 1 June 2018

 * The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review. No further edits should be made to this section. 

The result of the move request was: Move. No objections after over a week. Cúchullain t/ c 17:27, 11 June 2018 (UTC)

Biological neural network → Neural circuit – It is a simpler name. It is the name more usually used (Purves) for one; and Google search will only bring up those related to biology. This would leave a clear separate entry page for Artificial neural networks (as Neural network if wanted) and avoid all the disambiguation issues. Iztwoz (talk) 10:45, 1 June 2018 (UTC)
 * Support. I think that's an excellent idea! I was uncomfortable when, a few days ago, Neural network was changed back to a separate page from having been a redirect, because I am not really convinced that that was the consensus, and it strikes me as very redundant. My inclination would be to leave Artificial neural network as it is, with Neural network a redirect to it (and maybe some content merged there from the reestablished redirect). But having Neural circuit as the pagename makes excellent sense, and avoids the current problem of needing to specify "biological" for something that is obviously biological (and of course Biological neural network would redirect to Neural circuit). We would still have Neural network (disambiguation). --Tryptofish (talk) 18:45, 1 June 2018 (UTC)
 * I just noticed that we also have Large scale brain networks. I'm just noting that here for completeness, not sure yet what, if anything, we should do with it. --Tryptofish (talk) 17:53, 3 June 2018 (UTC)


 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page or in a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

Lead
I don't think that the lead sentence should have "neural network" in bold, and I do think it should be blue-linked later in the lead, because Neural network is currently a separate standalone page, in addition to Neural network (disambiguation). I'm not convinced that it should be a separate page, however. --Tryptofish (talk) 20:34, 12 June 2018 (UTC)
 * Have made changes. Re the stand alone page - think that was done to prevent the neural network page defaulting to artificial neural network - so its removal now would probably be OK. --Iztwoz (talk) 08:04, 13 June 2018 (UTC)
 * Thanks, good. As for Neural network, what do you think would be best? Would a merge and redirect be appropriate? --Tryptofish (talk) 19:15, 13 June 2018 (UTC)
 * Yes, I think that will resolve things.Thanks --Iztwoz (talk) 07:08, 14 June 2018 (UTC)

"Specific function when activated?"
So does that above phrase imply that general intelligence networks are not networks? Perhaps meta-networks? But that is doesn't seem accepted terminology. So it seems when staying in commonly accepted terminology one would conclude that general neuronal nets are also networks. 2A02:3036:2E0:26A5:C5E1:7EAB:1ADE:433D (talk) 09:34, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

Possible error in Early Study section
The Early Study section mentions "In 1959, the neuroscientists, Warren Sturgis McCulloch and Walter Pitts published the first works on the processing of neural networks." I believe this to be factually incorrect. Specifically, I think this should be written as, "In 1943, the neuroscientists, Warren Sturgis McCulloch and Walter Pitts published the first works on the processing of neural networks."

McCulloch and Pitts published their seminal neural networks paper "A Logical Calculus of Ideas Immanent in Nervous Activity" in 1943. In this paper, the authors characterized the function of simple networks of binary threshold neurons in terms of logical operations.

Currently, the text points to their 1959 paper "What the frog's eye tells the frog's brain". However, in this context it seems to be a mistake. The 1959 paper does not discuss the processing of neural networks. Therefore, I believe the appropriate fix would be to update the date within the text from 1959 to 1943 and replace the reference appropriately. The correct reference is given below:

McCulloch, Warren; Walter Pitts (1943). "A Logical Calculus of Ideas Immanent in Nervous Activity". Bulletin of Mathematical Biophysics. 5 (4): 115–133. doi:10.1007/BF02478259. FNel (talk) 19:40, 19 June 2024 (UTC)


 * My first entry only addresses the incorrect reference and date. However, I am currently working through the published work of Ken Aizawa, whose work seems to indicate that McCulloch and Pitts were not the first to publish works on the processing of neural networks. Once the previous issue has been confirmed, I will continue with this new topic. FNel (talk) 23:28, 19 June 2024 (UTC)