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$500M for Virtual Biology Initiative, Funded by Zuckerbergs

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Re: $500M for Virtual Biology Initiative, Funded by Zuckerbergs

#21

Post by marstall »

I've been reading "Elusive Cures" by Nicole Rust, about the failure of neuroscience to cure major ailments like schizophrenia and alzheimers, despite decades of work modeling neurons and other brain systems (costing far in excess of $500M).

Here are some thoughts that that book sparks ...

"the whole is other than the sum of its parts" - someone, based on Aristotle. The way Nicole Rust puts is that the whole->part relationship is one way. In other words, you can determine the parts from the whole, but not the whole from the parts. A cell is a complex dynamic system with many overlapping and interacting feedback effects and diverse homeostatic drives. Its state emerges into its own entity that, once formed, bears only a tenuous relationship to its parts.

Understanding of our bodies and minds may be more tractable at more common levels, levels where the life system is at (whole), not where it was (parts) is where I think she's going: language, art, kinship, etc. But I'm not done yet.

Re: $500M for Virtual Biology Initiative, Funded by Zuckerbergs

#22

Post by hackinthebochs »

xsor wrote: post #19
hackinthebochs wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Have they cured 1 disease? Let alone ~all~ disease? No. I mean, curing all disease isn't something where progress is linear. A large portion of the work is done upfront before you see any result. Then when your knowledge base and methodology is sufficiently robust, many disease can then be cured in quick succession. The fact that they have no visible success after 10 years says little about the viability of their go…

Not sure if that’s true. Looking at the history of modern medicine, the cure rate of diseases was not exponential, it was gradual over the course of hundreds of years. Sure there were a few big jumps- water sanitation and antibiotics come to mind- but if you look at cured cardiovascular diseases, cancers, GI diseases etc., they all started with bad treatments that indeed slowly improved over decades. If CZI is lookin…

You're talking about curing diseases where each disease is a largely independent effort, which is distinct from an enterprise aimed at curing all disease. The former will be much more linear in appearance than the latter.

Re: $500M for Virtual Biology Initiative, Funded by Zuckerbergs

#23

Post by adamandsteve2 »

vibrio wrote: post #17
adamandsteve2 wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is that an issue?

Just in that it’s not gonna work.

Why not? No law of physics prevents it and we already have examples of (albeit simpler) organisms that can live forever. Worst case scenario, we grow a clone of your body, transplant your brain into it, then somehow repair the spinal cord and slowly replace your brain tissue piece-by-piece. Might be a difficult engineering challenge but it’s 100% possible.

Re: $500M for Virtual Biology Initiative, Funded by Zuckerbergs

#24

Post by cindyllm »

adamandsteve2 wrote: post #23
vibrio wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just in that it’s not gonna work.

Why not? No law of physics prevents it and we already have examples of (albeit simpler) organisms that can live forever. Worst case scenario, we grow a clone of your body, transplant your brain into it, then somehow repair the spinal cord and slowly replace your brain tissue piece-by-piece. Might be a difficult engineering challenge but it’s 100% possible.

[dead]

Re: $500M for Virtual Biology Initiative, Funded by Zuckerbergs

#25

Post by chermi »

marstall wrote: post #21

I've been reading "Elusive Cures" by Nicole Rust, about the failure of neuroscience to cure major ailments like schizophrenia and alzheimers, despite decades of work modeling neurons and other brain systems (costing far in excess of $500M). Here are some thoughts that that book sparks ... "the whole is other than the sum of its parts" - someone, based on Aristotle. The way Nicole Rust puts is that the whole->part rel…

How is this different than "more" than the sum? Is the argument/claim that we can't figure out stuff via composition? If so, why not?

Re: $500M for Virtual Biology Initiative, Funded by Zuckerbergs

#26

Post by chermi »

randycupertino wrote: post #11
jghn wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They already donate a lot of useful money via the Chan Zuckerberg Institute so there’s a good track record at least

Chan Zuckerberg Institute doesn't produce much actual research it's mostly fancy dinners, global travel for congresses and conferences and big opulent parties. They actually got in trouble in the building with the landlord for too many parties, there was a problem drunken individuals peeing in the hallways when they had Justin Bieber and other celebs on site (seriously).

Lol cool anecdote. Guess karma for hating on billionaires is more important than saving lives.

Re: $500M for Virtual Biology Initiative, Funded by Zuckerbergs

#27

Post by yalogin »

d_silin wrote: post #10
yalogin wrote: post #7

Genuine question, there are a lot of overly ambitious efforts like, even though this seems the most ambitious of them all - but is this all optimistic investment or is there any iota of indication that this is a viable path? I am very skeptical of the ai initiatives in medicine and biology where they want to solve problems that humans cannot yet. I would love to be wrong of course

Sort of long answer. In, say, civil or aerospace engineering, science is understood well enough to allow your building or airplane to be modelled and tested using computer modelling, CAD software, FEM and CFD algorithms and so on. You can design a house or an aircraft without ever building a single physical model, and it will stand (or fly), 99 times out of 100. It is oversimplification to a degree, but sufficiently…

Thank you for the response, very helpful

Re: $500M for Virtual Biology Initiative, Funded by Zuckerbergs

#28

Post by marstall »

chermi wrote: post #25
marstall wrote: post #21

I've been reading "Elusive Cures" by Nicole Rust, about the failure of neuroscience to cure major ailments like schizophrenia and alzheimers, despite decades of work modeling neurons and other brain systems (costing far in excess of $500M). Here are some thoughts that that book sparks ... "the whole is other than the sum of its parts" - someone, based on Aristotle. The way Nicole Rust puts is that the whole->part rel…

How is this different than "more" than the sum? Is the argument/claim that we can't figure out stuff via composition? If so, why not?

Philip Ball helped me understand this in his book "How Life Works." He makes the point that you can't understand language by understanding letters. Walking up to someone and just saying "L" won't have any effect. And given just an understanding of the alphabet, you would never be able to use that on its own to understand a whole book, you have to move up. The whole has its own kind of existence. I think about how hard it is for one individual to influence a culture. You kind of have to speak and operate at the highest level to change things. I know that's super vague but those are just the terms I've been thinking about it in.
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