Why Is the Human Brain So Efficient? - Issue 59: Connections

The brain is complex; in humans it consists of about 100 billion neurons, making on the order of 100 trillion connections. It is often compared with another complex system that has enormous problem-solving power: the digital computer. Both the brain and the computer contain a large number of elementary units--neurons and transistors, respectively--that are wired into complex circuits to process information conveyed by electrical signals. At a global level, the architectures of the brain and the computer resemble each other, consisting of largely separate circuits for input, output, central processing, and memory.1 Which has more problem-solving power--the brain or the computer? Given the rapid advances in computer technology in the past decades, you might think that the computer has the edge.