Main distinctions of the proposed project from the other known in the world attempts of the same profile

The project is in the field of the Artificial General Intelligence (AGI), based on detailed understanding and artificial re-creation of the informational processes in brain. Another direction of the AGI presents the synthesis of the AGI systems, based on general principles of physics and electronics and the essence of intellectual problems. In our case, we intend to construct the neural-like AGI system. In other words, we mean to re-create the natural intelligence by its image and resemblance. We will also keep an eye on the going on progress of the synthetic direction of the AGI. The major know-how of our project is in the use of permanent brain storm method. We start with the generally acknowledged presumption that human brain is still the most intellectual device of the all known means of information analysis. That is why we are going to create an unprecedented by number of members “intelligent cluster” of human brains, i.e. the team of researchers. It is supposed that the team members will have equal rights (and equal responsibilities) in relation to the goals of the project.

The next important feature of our project is in the fact that among the research team members there will be many novices to the field, which had no experience of the prior work in neurosciences. This is a forced measure, as presently in Russia there are too few professionals in the needed field of research. However, we should point to the fact that the two up to date most successful neurotheoreticians – David C. Marr and John J. Hopfield, were in fact dilettantes, when they started their work in the field. It might be that their lack of professional knowledge made them unaware of the fact that some problems “had no solutions” and they found the latter. Another possible advantage of the team of non-professionals might be the absence of “ambitions struggle”, which, alas, is too common among the acknowledged authorities. So, to a certain degree the “dilettantism” might help real cooperation of the team members.

The third distinct point of the project is in its aggressive pursuit to search for solutions in the “bottom-up” directions of work. In other words, we will search the solutions for the brain enigmas on the most basic level of the informational processes. And, in principle, it might be that we can attain the mindful, cognitive level of the system functioning indirectly, due to quantitative, but not qualitative complexity of the problems, with which the system deals.

The fourth and the last original point of the project constitutes the targeted search of the basic principles of the work of the neuronal systems in the simplest form. “The template” for such type of principles is the revealed by J. Watson and F. Crick the complementarily of the nucleotides in the pairs A-T and G-C. Of course, there could be neural principles tangible only in highly advanced math terms, we will not avoid them as well.

Among the subjective factors, which can determine the success or failure of the project, might be properties of scientific and research activity of the project initiator. In short: he has a serious administrative and research experience (in particular, he was a Head of the A.B. Kogan Research for Neurocybernetics (the KRINC (www.krinc.ru) in 1990-1995, and he was PI in tens research grants, Russian national and international as well). He has a non-interrupted experience in theoretical and experimental brain studies since 1961. He knows personally many world leaders of Neuroscience. There are also his well-known results in different directions of theoretical and experimental neuroscience. The present attempt to organize the work on brain reverse engineering presents a logical extension of his preceding work experience and is based on his objective and subjective evaluation of the state of the art in the field.