![METAMORPHOSIS](https://cdn.magzter.com/1422886351/1699864904/articles/DfbzEGU1i1699958373198/METAMORPHOSIS.jpg)
In your brain, neurons are arranged in networks big and small. With every action, with every thought, the
networks change: neurons are included or excluded, and the connections between them strengthen or fade. This process goes on all the time—it’s happening now, as you read these words—and its scale is beyond imagining. You have some eighty billion neurons sharing a hundred trillion connections or more. Your skull contains a galaxy’s worth of constellations, always shifting.
Geoffrey Hinton, the computer scientist who is often called “the godfather of A.I.,” handed me a walking stick. “You’ll need one of these,” he said. Then he headed off along a path through the woods to the shore. It wound across a shaded clearing, past a pair of sheds, and then descended by stone steps to a small dock. “It’s slippery here,” Hinton warned, as we started down.
New knowledge incorporates itself into your existing networks in the form of subtle adjustments. Sometimes they’re temporary: if you meet a stranger at a party, his name might impress itself only briefly upon the networks in your memory. But they can also last a lifetime, if, say, that stranger becomes your spouse. Because new knowledge merges with old, what you know shapes what you learn. If someone at the party tells you about his trip to Amsterdam, the next day, at a museum, your networks may nudge you a little closer to the Vermeer. In this way, small changes create the possibility for profound transformations.
Esta historia es de la edición November 20, 2023 de The New Yorker.
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Esta historia es de la edición November 20, 2023 de The New Yorker.
Comience su prueba gratuita de Magzter GOLD de 7 días para acceder a miles de historias premium seleccionadas y a más de 9,000 revistas y periódicos.
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THE SPACE BETWEEN
\"Janet Planet.\" The first time we meet Janet in \"Janet Planet,\" a wondrous début feature from the celebrated playwright Annie Baker, she is standing on a rural road a little way from the camera.
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LABOR PAINS
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HEAT RISING
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UNSHATTERED
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THE PLAGUE DOCTOR
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the buggy RODDY DOYLE
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GHOSTS ON THE WATER
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THE CRACKDOWN
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SMALL WONDER
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