If a single celled micro-organism is more complex than our simulations of neurons, that makes me suspect that our simulations aren’t yet right. Or, finally, consider 3 more discoveries we’ve made in recent years about how the brain works, none of which are included in current brain simulations. First, there’re glial cells. Glial cells outnumber neurons in the human brain. And traditionally we’ve thought of them as ‘support’ cells that just help keep neurons running. But new research has shown that they’re also important for cognition. Yet the Blue Gene simulation contains none. Second, very recent work has shown that, sometimes, neurons that don’t have any synapses connecting them can actually communicate. The electrical activity of one neuron can cause a nearby neuron to fire (or not fire) just by affecting an electric field, and without any release of neurotransmitters between them. This too is not included in the Blue Brain model.

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