A Thousand Brains: A New Theory of Intelligence

by Jeff Hawkins

Your brain is in a box, the skull. There are no sensors in the brain itself, so the neurons that make up your brain are sitting in the dark, isolated from the world outside. The only way your brain knows anything about reality is through the sensory nerve fibers that enter the skull. The nerve fibers coming from the eyes, ears, and skin look the same, and the spikes that travel along them are identical. There is no light or sound entering the skull, only electrical spikes. The brain also sends nerve fibers to the muscles, which move the body and its sensors and thereby change what part of the world the brain is sensing. By repeatedly sensing and moving, sensing and moving, your brain learns a model of the world outside the skull. Notice again that there is no light, touch, or sound entering the brain. None of the perceptions that make up our mental experiences—from the fuzziness of a pet, to the sigh of a friend, to the colors of fall leaves—come through the sensory nerves. The nerves only send spikes. And since we do not perceive spikes, everything we do perceive must be fabricated in the brain. Even the most basic feelings of light, sound, and touch are creations of the brain; they only exist in its model of the world.