How the Brain Works

Alan Rosen - Editor, MCon Technical Journal

Preface:

MCon has succeeded in reverse engineering the functions of the human brain. A neural net-based brain-model, known as a Relational Robotic Controller (RRC), is functionally similar to the biological brain. It controls the somatic muscular system, the organic autonomic system, and it exhibits functional characteristics of consciousness and emotions that are similar to human consciousness and emotions. The RRC-brain contains modules that are the analogue to the sensory cortex, the motor cortex, the association cortex, the limbic-hypothalamus-amygdala region (a motivational system), and various regions of the brain stem and mid-brain. The functions of the RRC-brain model are consistent with the known functional-operational data of the normal (undamaged) human brain, as well as the damaged brain (genetic defects, accidental damage, or stroke). Thus, although the following discussion is a quantitative description of the operation of the RRC-brain, it applies functionally, if not structurally, to the operation of the biological brain.

Medical practitioners are very busy people, and many will be dissuaded from reading on, convinced that the RRC-brain has nothing to offer the medical profession. This is not true!

We will try to be very succinct.

The brain is the control system for both the autonomic and the somatic musculature system.

Guyton, in the textbook of medical physiology, states that the operation of the human body may be described by, literally, thousands of homeostatic subsystems. The brain is the “controller” of these subsystems.

MCon has reverse engineered the major homeostatic subsystems by means of servo mechanisms. A servomechanism for the cardiovascular system, the pulmonary system, the digestive system, temperature control system, and the somatic motor system. The RRC-brain is the controller of these servo-mechanisms.

Each of these subsystems operates in an equilibrium state during the sleep phase of the life-cycle. In order to respond to environmental stimuli, the equilibrium of one or more of the homeostatic subsystems must be “upset”.
It is a the major thesis of MCon Inc. that the brain CANNOT respond, recognize, or comprehend an environmental stimulus, if the stimulus does not “upset” the equilibrium of one or more homeostatic subsystems of the human body.

The implications of this statement are far-reaching.
1. Following William James, the father of modern psychology, and author of “what is an emotion”: The modality of the upset subsystem is defined to be the “emotional experience” that accompanies the “upset”. Defining a modality that is associated with “upset” subsystems is analogous to the definition (in all medical text books) of modalities of mechanoreceptors, nociceptors, proprioceptors, rod/cone visual receptors, etc. The emotional-modalities definition is the basis for the design of the Neuronal Correlate of Emotion (NCE)-circuit.

2. This is important enough to require re-iteration: In order to respond, recognize, or comprehend what we see, hear, feel, smell, or taste, some homeostatic subsystem MUST be upset. The modality of every upset (no matter how small) manifests itself as an emotion. No “upset” means no response, no recognition, no comprehension, no emotion.

3. It is also a major thesis of MCon Inc. that the “emotion” (and the upset associated with it) is a precursor to action. This precursor is called a Task-initiating Trigger(TT).
An emotion is an “identification, recognition, or comprehension” of the incident energy that caused the upset. It is a motivator with an ill-defined objective. Therefore, that part of the sensory stimulus (see, hear, feel, smell, or taste) that upsets a homeostatic system is called a Task–initiating Trigger (TT)-pattern. The TT-pattern is part of the incident energy that is identified, recognized or comprehended. The “upset” is generally an involuntary action in a small part of the somatic or autonomic systems. The modality of the upset (the emotion) is generally localized by the upset, but it does not define the task that is to be initiated.

4. The involuntarily upset subsystem is often the somatic muscle system (furling of the brow, facial expressions of fear, anger or pleasure, or increase/ decrease of muscular tension in the shoulders, neck, back, arms or legs). However the upsets of the autonomic system are of great interest to the medical profession. Autonomic system upsets, such as vasomotor constriction/dilation, increases/decreases of heart rate and breathing rate, have a direct involuntary effect on blood pressure and stroke volume. In general, involuntary autonomic upsets have an effect on the general operational integrity of the cardiovascular system, pulmonary systems, reproductive system, the digestive system, on diet and elimination and on the brain itself. Generally, emotional upsets of autonomic subsystems, do not impair the operation of the subsystem. However, sometimes they lead to medical problems that are in the realm of the medical practitioner. We call those impairments (upsets of the autonomic subsystem), emotionally induced malfunctions.

5. The medical profession must determine the degree that emotionally induced malfunctions affect the operational homeostasis of the involuntary autonomic system. It is important to ask the questions, what incident energy (TT-pattern) causes the most damaging upsets? What is the modality of the “upsets”? Where is the equilibrium “set point” of each “upset” subsystem? Exactly which subsystems are “upset”? To what degree is the “upset” damaging? What about chronic or acute “upsets”? The state of the art answers to these questions are inadequate, and it is hoped that MCon inc will stimulate research aimed at obtaining answers. The table presented below lists some characteristics of emotional modalities and the TT-drives generated by them.


	Table 1. some characteristics of emotional modalities and the TT-drives generated by them. (click figure to enlarge)

6. Based on these theses, MCon Inc has recommended a paradigm shift in the practice of medicine, psychiatry, and psychology. The shift is nothing more than a greater reliance on the Emotional Mechanism (upsets in homeostasis) for the control and healing of the involuntary autonomic systems in the human body. Emotionally induced malfunctions are involuntary malfunctions of the autonomic system. Why not take a modicum of control over the autonomic system, by using the Emotional Mechanism to stabilize and heal the autonomic subsystems? Some examples of autonomic control are biofeedback, meditation, greater control of the incident energy, and possibly more invasive methods of affecting the equilibrium “set-point” of homeostatic subsystems.

7. The Emotional Mechanism, as practiced by some Hindu gurus, may be a powerful methodology for gaining control over many of the involuntary control functions of autonomic subsystems of the human body. For example, the prescription of a laxative seems to be a brute force controls methodology to a Hindu Guru that has learned reverse peristalsis (learned to take an anal enema by sitting in a bucket of fluid and drawing the fluid into the lower digestive track by reversing the direction of peristalsis). Apparently, some Hindu gurus have learned how to reduce heart rate and blood pressure to extremely low levels (suspended animation?), and to become oblivious to nociceptic and thermal receptor “upsets” (pain). The question to the medical profession is, are these methodologies (technologies) to be shunned by the medical profession? Shouldn't the medical profession conduct more vigorous research into how the emotional mechanism may be used to gain greater control over the operation and operational well-being of the involuntary autonomic systems? Especially, at this time, when MCon Inc. has finally established the role of emotion in the operation of the motivational system in the brain.

NOW back to the question of how the brain works:
The contribution of MCon Inc to the medical profession is the discovery of the design of the motivational system in the brain. Given a design of a voluntary somatic motor system and an involuntary autonomic system, the design of a motivational system in the brain finally closes the functional loop between these three systems. And with a closed functional loop, it is now possible to answer the question of, how does the brain work?

We begin by comparing the structure of the biological brain with the RRC-brain.


Figure 1. The biological brain (click figure to enlarge)		Figure 2. The RRC-brain (click figure to enlarge)

Both figures show sensory input signals and the motor control output signals. The brain/controller controls the somatic and autonomic systems in the human body. The following is a description of the functional flow of signals through these figures that answer the question of “how the brain works”. The data is taken from the Rosen et al (2003a,b,c,d,e) publications describing the design of the NCC-multitasking robot, the NCC-circuit and NCE-circuit.

How the brain works

1. The inputs to the brain/controller are shown in figures 1 and 2. They consist of an external and internal input-signals. The external input consists of the things you “see”, “hear”, feel”, “smell”, and “taste”. They are labeled as “retinal rod-cone receptors, and somatosensory cortex; mechanoreceptors, thermal sensors, proprioceptors, and nociceptors”, in figure 2, and “sensory-input (retinotopic, auditory, olfactory, gustatory)”, in figure 1. The internal inputs arise in the autonomic systems and are identified by the sympathetic and parasympathetic pathways (to/from basil ganglia) labels shown in figures 1 and 2. The external sensors mediate the operation of the somatic motor system, whereas the operation of the autonomic organs is mediated by internal status-sensors that generally detect the operational status of the autonomic subsystems. The communication pathways of the autonomic subsystems are shown in figure 3.


Figure 3. The communication pathways of the autonomic subsystems (click figure to enlarge)		Figure 4. The Darwinian Hierarchical Task Diagram (DHTD): The Top Level Specification of biological systems

2. One of the most important functions of the brain is to search the external and internal environment for either environmental contingencies or internal organic status-upset signals. Every organism operates in this search mode throughout its lifetime. We call this mode of operation the “search engine mode” because in addition to the sensors, the whole body may be involved in this operation. Our external sensors detect environmental contingencies. They consist of those things we see, feel, hear, smell, and taste that impact our well-being (for example, obstacles in our path, food, shelter, dangerous things, and mating opportunities). These contingencies impact the survival of the organism and must be identified, classified, and prioritized by the brain. Some of the internal status-upset signals may also impact the well being of the organism. They consist of signals that tell us that we are hungry, horny, tired, and sleepy, need to urinate, defecate or sneeze. Those signals indicate that the autonomic system requires maintenance and care, or that it is malfunctioning. Such signals must also be identified, classified, and prioritized by the brain.

3. The environmental contingencies and the internal organic status-upset signal-patterns have an impact on the survival of every organism. They are classified as the TT-patterns that must upset homeostasis, and that have the modality of an emotion associated with them. All such TT-patterns (internal of external) must be identified, classified, and prioritized by the brain. In order to develop a specification for the brain, it is convenient to classify all the TT-patterns that the brain is capable of identifying in terms of a Darwinian Hierarchical Task Diagram (DHTD). Only the top and bottom TT-tasks of the diagram are specified by the designer. All intermediate TT-tasks are performed autonomously and volitionally. Figure 4 is a representation of a DHTD that shows Darwinian survival at the top of the hierarchy, and five Task Objectives at the next level. Those five task objectives are meant to encompass all the TT-tasks that the organism is capable of performing. For humans, almost all TT-tasks below the task objectives are performed autonomously and volitionally.

4. Whenever the search engine finds an emotional TT-pattern (one that upsets homeostasis) then the TT-pattern must be recognized and prioritized. Recognition takes place in a pattern recognition circuit, shown in figure 2 below the association cortex and labeled TSM TT-pattern recognition circuit. Prioritization takes place in the hypothalamic-amygdala-brain stem regions of the brain shown in both figures 1 and 2. The hypothalamic region operates like a motivational system in the brain, whereas the association cortex operates like the long-term memory module in the brain.

5. The TT-identification circuit is a multilayered neural net-based pattern recognition circuit. The top layer of the somatic, visual, and auditory pattern recognition circuits maintain a somatotopic, retinotopic, and tonotopic organization (called brain modules) in the somatosensory, visual, and auditory cortical regions, respectively. The sensory patterns recorded on these cortical organizations are applied to the multilayered pattern recognition circuit. The recognized patterns, the so-called TT-patterns, are applied to the hypothalamic equilibrium-set point neurons that represent the primary region of the motivational system in the brain. The activated set point neurons “upset” homeostasis of one or more homeostatic systems, and the modality of the upset is experienced by the organism as an emotion.

6. The magnitude of the upset determines the magnitude of the emotion and the priority level that the brain assigns to the incident energy-TT-pattern. High priority TT-patterns are associated with high magnitude modalities (fear, terror, pain, rage, ecstasy). The emotional TT-patterns operate as “urges” or “non-specific drives” in both the biological brain and the DHTD-brain. The human brain does not innately “know” which task to associate with any given modality. The modality generally gives the organism a “hint” of the set of acceptable tasks that represent a proper response to any experienced modality. That is, the modality is a Task-initiating Trigger (TT) that does not specify exactly what task is to be initiated. The actual task initiated must be learned by the DHTD-brain. For example the urge to urinate may initiate a learned task of going to the toilet, and the modality of fear may initiate a learned fight or flight pattern of tasks.

7. Conditioned procedural, implicit or reflexive learning in the connectionist brain occurs by means of classical conditioning or Pavlovian learning, a methodology introduced by Ivan Pavlov (1927) at the turn of the century. The essence of classical conditioning is the association or pairing of two stimuli, a “learned” or derivative-TT, which is called the conditioned stimulus (CS), and an innate-TT, which is referred to as the unconditioned stimulus (US) (Kupfermann, 1991). In the motivational system of the human brain a small number of innate-TT are “recognized” in the biological pattern recognition circuit. Many of the tasks of the DHTD are first recorded as benign (un-recognized) q-patterns on the “self” circuit (the top layer of the pattern recognition circuit) and then recognized by the pattern recognition circuit as conditionally “learned”-TTs

8. A large body of scientific literature from the time of Pavlov (1927) to the present time, validates that repeated pairing of the conditioned and unconditioned stimulus is the means by which animals learn to predict relationships between events in the environment (Kupfermann, 1991). Irving Kupfermann (1991, p.998) writes, “All animals that exhibit associative conditioning, from snails to humans, seem to learn by detecting environmental contingencies rather than detecting the simple contiguity of a CS and US” (Conditioned and unconditioned stimulus). “Classical conditioning develops best when in addition to contiguity of stimuli, there is a contingency between the conditioned and unconditioned stimulus-“ (The italic stress is by Irving Kupfermann). Eric Kandel et al (2000 p. 1241) re-enforces Kupfermann’s biological conditioning criteria with the following: “The capacity for a conditioned stimulus (CS) to produce a classically conditioned response is not a function of the number of times the CS is paired with the US but rather the degree to which the CS and US are correlated” (with environmental contingencies). The pattern recognition circuits of the DHTD-brain exhibit classical conditioning (learning) characteristics that is ideally suited to the world-map self-circuit that may be regarded as the top layer of a multilayered neural network (Kohonen1981, 2003; Carpenter and Grossberg, 1991; Cohen and Grossberg, 1987). The only thing missing is the additional learning re-enforcement, known as Long Term Potentiation (LTP) arising from the environmental contingency, added to the simple contiguity of the CS-US.

9. Conditioning, contiguity, and contingency (LTP) are the factors that operate throughout the lifetime of the organism to add innumerable TT-patterns that are recognized (learned) by the pattern recognition circuit. The variable contiguities and contingencies encountered by the organism lead to variable modalities, variable assignments of priority levels, and variable selected TT-tasks that may be triggered by a set of contiguous patterns. Thus, the pattern recognition circuit acts as the memory module in the brain that “remembers” how to tie your shoelaces, brush your teeth, drive a car, go visit aunt Millie, or give a lecture on “how the brain works”.

10. The DHTD-brain may also be taught (programmed) to speak and comprehend any language and to achieve a high level of human intelligence and rationality, by using the techniques described by Rosen et al in the MCon publications. The design of the intelligent-brain is presented in the Machine Consciousness Technical Journal, Volume 1, pp.112, in an article titled The Design of the NCC-circuit for audition and sound generation: Comprehension, verbalization, conceptualization and declarative memory (now published on the web site www.mcon.org, and available for viewing).