Bayle Shanks's website: RecentChanges

opinions-political

Fri, 24 May 2013 10:01:20 GMT

notes-computer-bitcoin

Fri, 24 May 2013 09:57:13 GMT

Bitcoin is an electronic currency.

I don't know much about bitcoin, and am writing this as much for my own reference as for others. There are probably some errors.

Why Bitcoin?

Pros:

A lot of trippy stuff can be built on top of Bitcoin, see the links in the section "Other things like Bitcoin", below
Bitcoin can be used as a simple system for transferring money. Although tranfers are not free, they are cheaper and easier to setup (on the merchant end) than credit cards or ACH or international wire transactions. This should massively facilitate international commerce.
Unlike most other currencies, there will never be more than about 21 million bitcoins created. So with bitcoin, you never have to worry about inflation (not exactly, because there are currently only about 11 million bitcoins, and the other 10 million are going to be minted in the future; but at least the end is in sight).
In the event of an apocalyptic partial breakdown of society, bitcoin has a slightly better chance of remaining available than conventional credit cards as a long-distance electronic transfer method, due to its decentralized nature (however, electricity, computing equipment, and at least intermittant internet connectivity would still be required).
Transaction costs for electronically transferring Bitcoin are smaller than for conventional currencies
Unlike credit card transactions, which can be 'charged back' if a third party decides the transaction was fraudulent, Bitcoin transactions are irreversible (unless the counterparty chooses to reverse them). This means that if you a merchant, you aren't exposed to fraudulent chargebacks.
Strong https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Anonymity is theoretically possible within the Bitcoin system, although practically speaking it's currently difficult
It's harder for governments to track, so helps dissidents against authoritarian dictatorships
If Bitcoin survives and continues to be used more and more, it will probably increase in value
It's so technical and awesome!

Cons:

https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Myths#Quantum_computers_would_break_Bitcoin.27s_security -- i'm not as sanguine as these guys are about this; it's likely that intelligence agencies will secretly acquire large-scale quantum computers without anyone noticing.
There may be no inflation but there is still deflation.
Using credit cards and banks, at least in the U.S., if someone cracks the credit card company or bank's electronic security, or in some other way steals money out of your account (e.g. by planting a virus on your computer), the company usually takes the loss, not the accountholder. But with Bitcoin, the accountholder will probably end up actually eating the loss. Similarly, if you lose your bitcoin wallet, you lose all of the money in it, and no institution can get it back for you. So, you, the end-user, has to worry about all the technical security details that your bank usually worries about for you.
Unlike credit card transactions, which can be 'charged back' if a third party decides the transaction was fraudulent, Bitcoin transactions are irreversible (unless the counterparty chooses to reverse them). This means that if someone defrauds you, your chance of recovering the money is much lower.
It's harder for governments to track, so helps criminals
The value of bitcoin fluctuates MUCH more than more established currencies (like, sometimes 50% in a month!)
It's so technical and hard to understand :(

It Bitcoin good or bad?

Personally i'm undecided whether bitcoin is a good thing for humanity or not.

The 'trippy stuff' that can be built on top of it, alluded to above and described below, may turn out to be extremely valuable eventually, but it's too soon to say.

In the nearer term, it's certainly a great boon to moving money internationally, which should help the economy grow.

As for the freedom fighter stuff, on the one hand, i'm all for helping dissidents, but on the other hand, i don't like helping criminals (the reason that the same system does both is that one government's freedom fighter is another government's criminal, and it's hard to program a computer to decide which is right).

Another big problem with bitcoin is that it's a big pain for individuals to have to worry about security on their own with no institutional safety net (in Bitcoin, you can't reverse fraudulent transactions).

However, after looking into the system and thinking about it, i've determined that bitcoin is a self-reinforcing, self-perpetuating growing socio-economic system, and therefore it's not going to go away whether we want it to or not (at least, not unless/until it is replaced with something that is similar but better). So we may as well learn how to use it.

Basics

Bitcoin is denominated in units of bitcoins, abbreviated BTC. So you might say, 'hey, send me 3 bitcoins' (as of this writing, a value of about 81 dollars).

Bitcoin is a fiat currency in that it is not 'backed' by anything; there is no guarantee that a bitcoin can always be exchanged for at least a certain amount of gold, for example.

All bitcoin transactions are public. However, the identity of the parties behind the transaction could be hidden; all that is public is the time and amount of the transaction, and the account numbers of the parties.

An account number is called a 'bitcoin address'. Anyone can easily create as many new bitcoin addresses as they want; in fact, the bitcoin software automatically creates new bitcoin addresses on your behalf and shuffles money between them as part of the normal course of doing business. You can create an address on your own computer, and you do not have to tell anyone who you are in order to get an address.

Your bitcoin addresses are stored in a 'wallet', which is a computer file. The wallet can reside on your own hard drive, on your phone, or on a service provider's website.

The most important things to remember about bitcoin are these:

IF YOU LOSE ALL COPIES OF YOUR WALLET THEN YOU CAN NEVER GET THE MONEY IN IT BACK! NO ONE, NOT THE POLICE, NOT THE BANK, CAN HELP YOU!
IF A CRIMINAL CAN ACCESS YOUR WALLET THEN THEY CAN TAKE ALL OF THE MONEY IN IT AND YOU CANNOT GET IT BACK! NO ONE, NOT THE POLICE, NOT THE BANK, CAN HELP YOU! (unless the police can find the criminal and the criminal has non-bitcoin possessions that the police can sell and give you the money for -- unlikely)

So, you have to worry about (1) backing up your wallet, and (2) making sure that criminals can't access your wallet.

You can backup your wallet, however, as noted above, the bitcoin software creates new addresses for you as part of the normal course of business. If you have done 100 or more transactions (except for receiving money transactions, i think) in between when you backup the wallet and when you try to restore it, you'll lose some or all of the money in that wallet when you restore from backup (see https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Backup#Securing_the_Bitcoin-QT_or_bitcoind_wallet for details; this behavior varies depending on what kind of software you use for your wallet)! For this reason, it's recommended that you keep most of your money one or more 'savings accounts', and keep a little money that you plan to spend in a 'checking account', and every now and then transfer money between them. Just make sure that you backup your savings account more than once every 100 transactions and you should be okay (okay meaning that you only stand to lose the money in your checking account). I don't know why they made this so complicated!

Technically, each bitcoin address has an associated 'private key'. The private key is like a password for that address. Anyone can check the balance of bitcoins for any address, and can send btc to any address, but you can only make withdrawals from the address if you have the private key for that address. These private keys are automatically kept within the wallet files. This is an important point: with cash, whoever holds the dollar bill de facto owns it; with a bank account, whoever the bank computers say owns the account de facto owns the money in it; with bitcoin, whoever knows the private key owns the money in that account. In other words, in bitcoin, the private keys are, in some sense, the money.

The main source for technical information on Bitcoin is the Bitcoin wiki at https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki .

Technical notes

What bitcoin really is is a Freenet-like system for permanently publishing information (and for allowing a network to come to a global consensus about what has been published in a secure manner). On top of this infrastructure, the information that is published is the transaction record.

Legal notes

Recently (May 2013) the U.S. federal government has shut down a bank account related to a large Japanese bitcoin exchange, "mtgox", because they hadn't "registered as a money services business". So if you are a U.S. resident, you may want to only deal with bitcoin exchanges that are so registered, to prevent the risk of losing money if the exchange's account is frozen. You can apparently check here: http://www.fincen.gov/financial_institutions/msb/msbstateselector.html . Here is a forum thread https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=206300.0 where some people list businesses on that list. I dunno what other lists are out there. Some business that i heard were registered (NOT confirmed by me separately) are:

Coinbase
Coinlab
CampBX?
Tangible Cryptography (runs https://fastcash4bitcoins.com/ , http://launch.bitcoinsdirect.net/ , and apparently something called CellCoin? and Tangible Escrows)
bitinstant
bitbox

I've heard that there is also per-state MSB registration. I don't know if there are OTHER compliance issues besides MSB registration that other bitcoin exchanges might be facing. SO JUST BECAUSE YOUR EXCHANGE IS ON THE ABOVE LIST DOESN'T MEAN IT'S NECESSARILY 100% IN THE CLEAR. If your money gets taken, don't say i didn't warn you. In addition, a registered business could still be a fraud that disappears one day with your money.

I don't understand taxes but since the exchange rate of bitcoin vs. USD fluctuates, if you choose to speculate by investing a lot of money in bitcoin, be sure and get a tax accountant and ask them how to report this.

Other things like Bitcoin

i get a bit technical here.

a list with descriptions: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=134179.0
a wiki list without descriptions: https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/List_of_alternative_cryptocurrencies

Ones of some interest to me:

devcoin: 10% of mining fees are 'taxed' and donated to open source (but i guess this introduces some centralized organization to decide how to spend the tax? hmm.. or the protocol itself could allow for voting.. i think approval voting would be good for that.. do they do that?)
http://ppcoin.org/ : uses a proof-of-stake rather than proof-of-work to allow a cryptocurrency system without ever-increasing mining costs. Not sure if this is equally secure, i haven't read the paper.
- See also https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=127954.0
namecoin http://dot-bit.org : uses bitcoin with an alternate block chain. In addition to a transaction record, a DNS mapping of names to IP addresses is maintained.
- I like this idea because DNS is fundamentally a system for a network to come to a global consensus about which names map to which IPs in a secure manner, so it can be well-served by a system like bitcoin. In addition, the DNS functionality provides a sort of quasi-backing to namecoins; just as US dollars are quasi-backed by the US government's insistance in receiving taxes in US dollars, similarly namecoins are quasi-backed by the fact that DNS rentals must be paid in namecoins. However, I think Namecoin is too centralized, like DNS. I think something like http://www.communitywiki.org/LocalNames is the way to go. I feel like perhaps there is some scope for mixing bitcoin and localnames somehow.
litecoin.tumblr.com : like bitcoin but with different numerical parameters for how the blockchain works
http://terracoin.org/about/ : again, like bitcoin but with different numerical parameters for how the blockchain works
https://github.com/jgarzik/smartcoin

Let's think of other things that society would like a global memory of, that is decentralized, anonymous, and 'censorship-resistant'. Some ideas:

voting
decentralized DNS; more generally, assigning human-readable names to hard-to-remember numbers. See also [1].
public, anonymous expression of unpopular opinions (Freenet)
broadcast communication from dissident groups to the public
encrypted communication between anyone
globally-readable 'profile' information about a pseudonym (see also gevulot)
reversible, transitive delegations of authority (note: to make the delegations reversible, they must be encoded within the bitcoin transactions, e.g. it's not just that the authority is attached to a certain bitcoin, and when you give the bitcoin to someone, they gain the authority; that would be irreversible. See https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=40264.msg1159289#msg1159289 for an example of encoding other information within a bitcoin transaction.
prediction markets
securities markets (see https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=117800.0 )
a market economy where traders are rewarded for uploading programs that predict future prices, rather than only rewarded for uploading predictions of prices (in the current economy, there is a strong incentive not to publish trading strategies, holding back the development of financial theory)

Stop thinking of the bitcoin protocol as merely a vehicle for keeping a global record of transmissions of a conserved quantity between nodes, and start thinking of it as a vehicle for keeping a global record of statements that entities make, with priority resolution, with the added feature that a conserved quantity can be transmitted between nodes. When aren't PGP-signed statements good enough? When an entity might want to say one thing to one person and another thing to another person (a generalization of double-spending) but the community wants global agreement on what each entity has said at any particular time.

In fact, for some application one might want to use the Bitcoin system, but with a separate, local block chain.

Also, i think it's a shame that all that mining computing power is being wasted. I propose https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/CompuCoin ; the idea is that some fraction of the mining computing power should be auctioned off to solve NP problems (easy to check if a solution is correct, but hard to solve). This requires a little bit of thinking because people could get off easy if they were able to get credit for solving problems that they submit (that they already know the answer to; e.g. such an auction is not 'trapdoor-free' or 'non-interactive' to use the hashcash paper's terminology). This would give bitcoin a (somewhat variable) backing; you can use bitcoins to buy computing power from the miners via the auction. Bitcoin uses hashcash as the proof-of-work. Hashcash seems to be in the NP complexity class. This means that if bitcoin and compucoin both existed, bitcoin miners could buy computing power in the compucoin auction to do their mining with. Incidentally, i wonder if hashcash is NP-complete?

Wallets

To repeat, the key things to remember about wallets are:

don't lose all copies of a wallet with lots of cash in it
don't let a criminal access the wallet

Wallet security

great list of wallet security gotchas in http://bitcoinmagazine.com/bitcoin-self-defense-part-i-wallet-protection/
for the ultimate in wallet security, brain wallets: http://bitcoinmagazine.com/brain-wallet/ (but note the "Costly Brainwallet Mistake" example in http://bitcoinmagazine.com/bitcoin-self-defense-part-i-wallet-protection/ )

Misc

"We would like to take this time to warn you not to use Bitcoin addresses that you do not own, including but not limited to the following: InstaWallet?, exchanges such as MtGox? and others.

When will this madness end?

Bitcoin transactions do not have the concept of a "from" address.

A few services like SatoshiDICE?, BitLotto?, etc. send winnings to an address that was used as an input in the wager and there are regularly occurring new reports of people losing their wagers by sending from Mt. Gox or other hosted (shared) EWallet service.

This practice should not be adopted by merchants and payment processors. Bitcoin has no concept of a from address. Please don't proceed with any approach that assumes that there is." -- https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=143593.msg1523159#msg1523159

Links

Sources of information

wiki: https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/
Q&A: http://bitcoin.stackexchange.com/
Forum: https://bitcointalk.org/
- warning: the forum has a bunch of rules and i can't tell where the list of rules were. apparently one user was permabanned just for replying "+1" to someone else's post (a nice feature of the software is it says in red USER WAS BANNED FOR THIS POST below that post).
- https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=124441.0

News

bitcoinmagazine.com
bitcoinmoney.com
Bitcoin News

Tools

explore the public transaction records: http://blockchain.info/
how much are bitcoins worth: bitcoincharts.com
give bitcoin tips to people in forums or over twitter: btctip.com
http://www.cryptocoincharts.info/
http://btccharts.com/

exchanges

mtgox.com
https://www.bitstamp.net/
a BTC stock exchange: http://mpex.co/
there used to be another BTC stock exchange called GBSE but the founder decided that it wouldn't pass regulatory muster and shut it down: http://bitcoinmagazine.com/interview-with-glbses-nefario/ .
https://www.litecoinglobal.com/security?s=LTC-CHARTS (LTC, not BTC)
https://btct.co/ (another LTC stock exchange?)

Marketplaces

localbitcoins.com
a prediction market: http://bitbet.us/
http://www.bitcoinstore.com/

Cross-cryptocurrency exchanges:

vircurex.com : an exchange for btc vs other cryptocurrencies
https://btc-e.com

Talk page profile of BTC legends

A good way to learn new things about bitcoin:

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?action=profile;u=2228;sa=showPosts

todo

i dont have time right now to sign up with BitcoinPayment? so as to edit the btc wiki (i think this is somewhat ironic because i think HashCash?, which preceded bitcoin, would be a better anti-spam solution -- you could simply use JavaScript? to do the HashCash?, requiring no extra action from the user, and it prevents the attack where a spammer simply manually makes the small BitcoinPayment? once and then spams alot), but here are some links i'd like to add to the page CompuCoin? https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/CompuCoin , which i created:

Links:

also i had some further thoughts on the idea.

a) if, because of trapdoors, you still need people to do a useless proof of work too, then perhaps you could do these in disconnected stages, e.g. produce a normal bitcoin block as proof of work, then do some computation in addition to get a compucoin. Perhaps if the exchange rate were setup in a certain way, it would be equivalent to just say that compucoins are colored coins and that in order to mint one you need to already have a bitcoin to mint. b) on the other hand perhaps the trapdoor problem could be better solved by somehow entangling the useless proof of work with the useful one. Like, you must encode your solution in a bitcoin block and then do the partial hash breaking ON THE SOLUTION. This particular way would create a lot more wasted CPU cycles due to its combinatorial multiplication of useless work but perhaps there is a better way... c) is partial hash inversion of SHA256(SHA256()) (the bitcoin proof-of-work) NP-complete? if so, there may be a way to create CompuCoin? as an overlay using the existing mining network e.g. without making miners upgrade their software. If not, this might shed light either on a way to optimize bitcoin mining, or to prove P != NP, either of which would be valuable d) if compucoins are implemented as colored coins, then the value of normal bitcoins would be a lower bound to compucoins. We could also have the computing power auction automatically be used to mine bitcoins when no one is bidding higher than that. e) a related project: the relentless progression of bitcoin hash difficulty will create a continual supply of miners who have lots of CPUs than are too inefficient in terms of computation per watt to spend on Bitcoin. Let's make it easy for these guys to instead rent out their CPUs to do something else. f) an approach to solve the trapdoor issue: take all the bidders for computing power at the auction. Each of them has submitted a 3-SAT problem that they want solved. Remove the bidders who are bidding below some 'market minimum rate'. Now, 'the network' somehow randomly selects one of these bids to solve, and only that one can be worked on. So now even if you submitted a problem that you know how to solve, you can't necessarily get credit for it. The hard part is that the probability of one of your submissions being selected must not be proportional to how many you submitted g) a related approach: require useless, trapdoor-free computation in order to win the power to determine which submission everyone has to work on. Now in the worst case, all the submissions are fakes submitted by miners who already know the answer, and each miner will try to get their fake selected -- but the system is still safe because the miners who do the most useless work are the only ones who get to do so. open question is still what incentivizes miners to bother to work on real problems submitted by others rather than making up their own fake problems and solving them. if the answer is just, 'they keep the bid money', then why not just implement this as a contract? h) if you want to use ordinary contracts for this without changing bitcoin mining, all you need is a 3-SAT escrow service that uses a multi-signature transaction. The first person to solve the problem uses the bitcoin network to claim priority by signing their solution (thereby attaching their name to it), and inserting this signature in the blockchain, then sending the signed solution to the escrow agent. The escrow agent verifies the solution and then releases the prize funds. In this situation you have to trust the escrow agent to release the prize funds; although it can be publically verified whether they do so. Could you just use https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Script ?

todo 2

CompuCoin?

The following is a proposal to

links

http://www.thebitcoinchannel.com/

notes-books-corticalCircuitsWhite

Fri, 24 May 2013 09:54:28 GMT

Cortical Circuits by Edward White and Asaf Keller

area reviews

Kemper and Galaburda, 1984. Principals of cytoarchitectonics.
pandya and yeterian, 1985. Architecture and connections of cortical association areas.
van essen, 1985. Functional organization of primate visual cortex.

Part I by Edward White

"The theoretical framework upon this and subsequent chapters are based derives from the proposition that the processing of information by the nervous system is effected through sunapses, and that the anatomical organization of synaptic connnections, that is, the type of synapse and the identities of the neurons involved, is largely stable within the individual adult animal and relatively constant from one species to the next. In contrast, the physioligy of synapses is plastic, allowing for variations on a scale of milliseconds in the level f electrical activity within synaptic pathways. ... The notion that the cerebral cortex of different species is built according to some common, basic plan is woven throughout the following treatise. ... The principal focus of this work is the cerebral cortex because, perhaps more than any other area of the nervous system, it is the cerebral cortex that sets apart mammals from other animals and man from other mammals."

Chapter 1. General organization of the cerebral cortex

striate cortex = where the stripe (stria) of Gennari is = primary visual cortex

"Topographically organized pathways project from sensory organs, through thalamic nuclei and on to cytoarchitecturally distinct areas of the crerbral cortex"

p. 6 "The use of the word 'secondary' =is somewhat unfortunate because of the implication that the secondary areas are in some way subordinate to the primary ones. The fact is that the secondary areas were so called simply because their discovery followed that of the primary aears (e.g. White, 1979, 1987)."

p 7 "The manner in which multiple representations cooperate in the processing of cortical information is unclear. One possibility is ... hierarchical... whereby input... is passed in stepwise fashion through a series of cortical areas... Alternatively, the multiple representations may act in parallel to process separate aspects of input from the periphery (e.g. Ballard et al, 1983), a contention supported by results showing that different cortical areas receive input from different regions of the thalamus (e.g. for visual areas, Dreher et al, 1980; for somatosensory areas, Dykes, 1983)."

p 7 "There is no general consensus as to what constitutes a cortical area or what criteria should be applied to identify and to distinguish between different cortical areas (see Van Essen, 1985)."

p 8 "Correlations of structure and function in cortical areas are now being reassessed, however, principally because of the realization that single cytoarchitectonic areas may contain multiple representations of the periphery."

Table "Patterns of lamination of the striate area of man and various subhuman primates according to various authors"

p 8 "Today, in line with the system employed by Brodmann (1906, 1909), the cerebral cortex in all mammalian species is divided into six basic layers" "The basic arrangement of six layers is clearest in areas of the neocortex referred to by Brodmann (1909) as homotypic; the six-layered arrangement is somewhat modified in areas he labeled as heterotypic."

the Van Essen hierarchy between visual cortex areas is founded on noting that 'lower' areas project to layer 4 of 'higher' areas (from superficial layers). 'Higher' areas project back to layers other than 4 of lower areas (from deep as well as superficial layers).

Vertical Arrangements

There are cortical columns. The barrels within part of mouse primary somatosensory cortex are cortical columns. However in some other places p 13 "clear structural correlates for functional columns have yet to be identified" and "One possibility for the genereal lack of correspondence between anatomical structure and functional columns probably has to do with the likelihood that certain functional columns are rather ephemeral, owing their existence to the continued presence of a specific set of stimulus conditions (cf. Crawford, 1985; see also Part III, Chapter 7)."

Neurotransmitters and receptors in the Cerebral Cortex

GABA is inhibitory. Glutmate and apartate are thought to be excitatory.

There's also acetylcholine and the monoamines including norepinephrine, dopamine, and serotonin. There's also glycine, thought to be inhibitory, histimine, and peptides including (CCK, NPY, VIP, SP, somatostatin, opiods) which are thought to be modulatory.

p 16 "However, the identification of a receptor site does not necessarily imply the the juxtaposition of an axon terminal containing the neurotransmitter related to that receptor. This raises the possibility that certain neuroactive substances may be involved in extrasynaptic activation, reaching their receptor sites by diffusion through the cortical neuropil."

Many neurotransmitters have multiple receptor subtypes.

Chapter 2. Cell types

asymmetrical synapses are thought to be excitatory, and symmetrical ones inhibitory

p. 19 "Cortical neurons are classified into two broad morphological categories: pyramidal, and stellate or nonpyramidal (e.g. Peters and Jones, 1984". bayle: judging by the way the chapter is laid out, i think he meant (pyramidal or (stellate or nonpyramidal)), but i would say ((pyramidal and stellate) or nonpyramidal)

Pyramidal cells

p. 19 "Pyramidal cells include a variety of morphological types that have the following features in common: A single, dominant apical dendrite, larger in diameter than the other dendrites, which usually extends vertically from the cell body toward the pial surface, and several basal dendrites, which radiate more or less horizontally from the base of the cell body (Firgure 2.1). All the dendrites of the pyramidal cells bear spines that tend to occur with greatest frequency in the middle regions of the dendrite (Globus and Scheibel, 1967).... The axon of a pyramidal cell originates typically from the base of the cell body, or less frequently from the proximal portion of a basal dendrite, and projects into the white matter, giving off collateral branches on the way."

p 19 "...the somata of pyramidal neurons exhibit a broad spectrum of shapes..." (e.g. not just 'pyramidal' shaped "...This is especially true of pyramidal neurons in layer IV where the variety of pyramidal cell shapes no doubt contributed to the naming of this layer as polymorphic or multiform. In fact, either perikaryal size nor shape is reliable as the sole criterion for differentiating pyramidal from nonpyramidal cells (Feldman and Peters, 1978). Nevertheless..." ppl call them 'pyramidal cells' and the name stuck... "For an account of pyramidal neurons that have been distinguished by morphological features including size (e.g. Betz cells), orientation (e.g. inverted pyramids), and laminar location (e.g. Meynert cells), the reader is referred to Feldman's review (1984, pp. 176-182).

A distinguishing aspect of pyramidal cell bodies is that they receive only symmetrical synapses; of the nonpyramidal cell types, only the spiny stellate neurons share this feature (e.g. Peters and Kaiserman-Abramof, 1970; White and Rock, 1980). The cell bodies of all other neuronal types receive both asymmetrical and symmetrical synapses (e.g. Peters and St. Marie, 1984, p. 435). The distribution of synaptic types onto dendrites is also similar for pyramidal and spiny stellate cells: Most synapses onto the dendritic shafts (axodendritic) of these neurons are symmetrical, whereas synapses onto their spines (axospinous) are usually of the asymmetrical type (e.g. Hersch and White, 1981b; White and Rock, 1980). In general, asymmetrical synapses form a comparatively large proportion of the axodendritic synapses onto other neuronal types (e.g. White et al, 1984). "

there is a sense that the laminar location of the parent pyramidal cell correlates to a lot of other differences, such as where its dendrites and axon branches go. There is a sense that for an individual cell, the axons and dendrites are set to ramify in specific layers. Afferents to the cortex also ramify mostly in specific layers.

axons may travel horizontally for quite aways, e.g. an example from Gilbert and Wiesel (1979) gives one that travelled horizontally 7 mm.

we say "axon collateral" but in many cases you may as well consider the cell to have a branched axon with no branch being dominant. more useful terminology is 'local axon aollateral' (near cell body) vs 'projection axon' (far).

p 23 "For instance, pyramidal neurons typically have local axon collaterals that ramify extensively within close proximity to the parent cell body..."

bayle: these pages have a bunch of potentially interesting cited examples of specific axon connections that i am omitting here, e.g. "..most of the pyramids in cat visual cortex that project to the LGN lack horizontal collateral branches; their axons ascend and arborize within layers V and IV."

p 24 "Finally, the discovery by DeFelipe? et al (1986a) that terminal branches of widely separated parts of the same collateral and even of separate collaterals from the same cell can converge on a single focus of terminations is consistent with the view that the distribution of axon collaterals is orderly and with the notion that the cerebral cortex is a highly ordered structure."

p 25 "Pyramidal neurons in layers II and III have axons that project to other regions of the crerbral cortex; pyramidal neurons in hte deeper layers project, in addition, to subcortical regions." ".. the old idea that the superficial layers are receptive or associative but that the deeper layers are specialized for output (e.g. Bolton 1910) would seem to possess some degree of validity."

neurotransmitters: probably glutamate and aspartate.

p 28 "Apical dendrites typically cross several layers of cortex..."

Nonpyramidal cells

White likes the classification scheme from Feldman and Peters (1978): p 29 "According to this scheme, nonpyramidal cells multipolar, bipolar, or bitufted according to the shape of their dendritic tree and as spiny, sparsely spiny, or smooth (nonspiny)... This classification scheme is sufficient for differentiating nonpyramidal cell types according to the shapes of their dendritic trees. However, a more comprehensive scheme can be achieved by taking into accoount the form and distribution of the axonal ramifications..."

recommends Fairen et al (1984) for a good comprehensive review of nonpyramidal neurons; this is in Vol 1 of The Cerebral Cortex, and he likes the other chapters too.

with some exceptions, p 30 "...the axonal ramifications of nonpyramidal cells are local and do not leave the area of cortex in which their parent cell body is situated."

Chandelier cells

Named because their p 30 "vertically oriented arrays of axon terminals" look like "te branches and candles of a chandelier".

p 31 "...The occurrence of chandelier cells in additional areas of the neocortex and in nearly every cortical layer...suggests that chandelier cells are an integral component of the cerebral cortex in all mammalian species....Their dendrites, which may span one or several layers of the cortex, have few branches and bear only occasional spines. Typically, the axons.. form a profuse plexus in the vicinity of the cell body, coextensive with or somewhat above or below the distirbution of the cell's dendritic tree. Some chandelier cells in the upper layers of the cortex may also posses a second, less extensive axonal ramification in the deeper layers of the cortex (e.g. Fairen and Valverde, 1980). Vertical rows of boutons belonging to chandelier cell axons form only symmetrical synapses, and these are presynaptic only to the axons initial segments of pyramidal cells (citeations). However, as Lund (1987) observed, the presence of chandelier cell axonal boutons in layer IVC of the macaque visual cortex, where pyramidal neurons are scarce, suggests that spiny stellate cells may also receive synapses from chandelier cells."

GABAergic. b/c of axonal position on postsynaptic initial axon segment, probably exerts a powerful inhibition.

Basket cells

p 32 "As with chandelier cells, basket cells are recognized primarily by the distribution of their axonal branches, which form nests or baskets around cell bodies and proximal dendrites belonging to pyramidal cells (Fairen et al 1984).... Cajal (1909-1911) noted that each is composed of branches from more than one axon collateral and that each axon collateral contributes to several pericellular nests." "smooth or sparsely spiny dendrites that often extend well above and below the layer containing the parent cell body" "(Marin-Padilla (1969, 1970, 1972)...occur mainly in layers III and V" "dendrites...radiate in all directions, but the vertical ones prodiminate such that some cells have a bitufted appearance." "...axons...initially ascend or descend upon leaving the cell body and then run horizontally for as much as a millimeter while contributing to pericellular nests; the presence of a long, horizontal axon is contsidered typical for basket cells of higher animals (Jones and Hendry, 1984, pp. 316-420)"

GABAergic

you often can't see the baskets if you only stain one cells, as multiple basket cells' axons form baskets together

p 33 "...we propose that it may be useful to include as basket cells other nonpyramidal cell types whose axons contact pyramidal cell somata whether or not true axonal baskets are formed"

p 33 "The initial descriptions... emphasized the association of the 'basket' with pyramidal neurons, and from this the impressino might be gotten that basket cells synapse exclusively with the cell bodies and proximal dendrites of pyramidal neurons. However, recent evidence suggests" otherwise, "For example, counts of 241 elements postsynaptic to three basket cells in the cat visual cortex show less than half to synapse onto the cell bodies and proximal dendrites of pyramidal cells. THe permainder synapse with the cell bodies and dendrites of non-pyramidal neurons and with spines, axons, and distal dendrites belonging to pyramidal neurons or to cells of undetermined origin (Freund et al, 1986; Somogyi et al, 1983a)."

p 34 "Because the axons terminals belonging to basket cells form a large proportion of their synapses with neuronal cell bodies and proximal dendrites, it can be assumed that basket cells exert a powerful inibition on the postsynaptic neuron by virtue of the proximitiy of the inhibitory synapses to the trigger zone, that is, the axon initial segmment. That axons belonging to basket cells project horizontally for relatively long distances... suggests that these cells exert a powerful inbition on cells in neighboring functional columns"

Vertically oriented neurons

Spiny Stellate cells

"The lack of a dominant, apical dendrite is the chief characteristic by which spiny stellate cells may be distinguished from pyramidal neurons; however, inmany other ways, the two cell types are identical. For instance, spiny stellate cells, like pyramidal neurons, have dendrites that bear large numbers of spines, and theiir axons, at least initially, descend toward the white matter and may even enter it (Firgure 2.6). Both types of neuron appear similar at the fine structural level and differ from all other neuronal types in that their somata receive only symmetrical synapses. For these reasons, Lund (1984) proposed that spiny cortical neurons form a continuum with the "typical" pyramidal and spiny stellate neurons ars extreme types."

Cross-species correlations of nonpyramidal neuronal types

p. 39-40: scaling argument for basket cells in mice (note: bayle: a quick skim of recent literature (e.g. doi 10.1093/cercor/12.4.395 Anatomical, Physiological, Molecular and Circuit Properties of Nest Basket Cells in the Developing Somatosensory Cortex) seems to show that the existence of basket cells is now accepted in rodents; this item is provided just because it makes a scaling argument) some say that basket cells are seen in primate sensory and motor regions, but not in other mammals. However, basket cells might look different in smaller brains: "The cerebral cortices of higher animals are thicker than those of lower animals. In accord with the argument that identical numbers of neurons underlie comparable areas of the pial surface in different species (Rockel et al, 1980) (bayle: carlo and stevens have recently confirmed Rockel's with updated methods), it sands to reason that neurons in higher animals display a lower packing density, that is, are farther apart form one another than neurons within the thinner cortices of lower animals. The number of pyramidal neurns contacted by individual basket cells is uncertain; however, it is clear that, to contact the same number of pyramids, the axon of a basket cell in man must necessarily travel much further than the axon must of the basket cell hypothesized for the mouse. Thus, by simply considering the distances involved in traversing the cortices of different species, it should come as no surprise that cells having long, horizontal axons (long, both in an absolute and even in a relative sense) are uncommon in lower animals. As stated previously, the presence of long horizontal axons has been and remains an important criterion for the identification of basket cells in higher animals (e.g. the review by Jones and Hendry, 1984)."

also, basket cells were so named because you see 'baskets' of their axons "around the somata of pyramidal cells". However, these baskets are formed by multiple basket cells and you may not see baskets if you just look at the axons of one basket cell. (DeFelipe? et al 1986 "A correlative electron microscopic study of basket cells and ...").

random scaling data:

"Cortices of smaller brains tend to be composed of neurons having smaller sizer. For instance, the somata of pyramidal cells in the visual cortex of the rat range in size froom 10 to 18 microns (Peters and Kara, 1985), whereas those in the visual cortex of the cat range in size from 20 to 60 microns (Sholl, 1953). Within a single species, the larger the pyramidal cell body, the greater the number of synapses it receives (e.g. Peters and Kara, 1985), and there is every reason to believe that a similar relationship obtains across species. Thus, the smaller pyramidal cell bodies in the brains of loewr animals can be expected to be postsynaptic to fewer axons terminals, and possibly to fewer axonal branches, than would the larger pyramidal cell bodies in higher species."

and relevance to not seeing baskets in basket cells in rodents: "The number of axonal branches that impinge on a pyramidal cell body in a lower animal may be sufficiently small that when viewed collectively the axonal branches do not exhibit a basket shape".

p.45 "The problem is that observations made with the light microscope only imply the existence of a synaptic contact between specific neuronal elements -- the synapse may not actually be formed. Indeed, Peters and Proskauer (1980) cite severeal instances in which predictions of synapses made on the basis of light microscopic observations were discounted subsequently on the basis of evidence obtained with the electron microscope" (bayle: i think he means 'suggest' instead of 'imply')

Chapter 3. Synaptic connections between identified elements

Synapses of extrinsic afferents with cortical neurons

p. 63: "Results to date indicate that, in every system examined, axon terminals belonging to extrinsic afferents to the cerebral cortex invariably form only asymmetrical, presumed excitatory synapses (e.g. Colonnier, 1981 The electron-microscopic analysis of the nuronal organization of the crerbral cortex; for a possible exception, see Einstein et al, 1987 Ultrastructure of synapses from the A-lamina of the lateral geniculate nucleus in layer IV of the cat striate cortex).

p. 65: "These findings, which include investigations of thalamocortical connectivity in different cortical areas in several species, indicate that every neuron having a dendrite in layer IV of the primary sensory areas of the neocortex forms some proportion ofits synapses with thalamocortical afferents (cf. White, 1987)....Thus, ample findings exist to refute the suggestion that spiny stellate cells are the sole or even the main recipients of thalamic input (cf. Eccles, 1984). This relatively new view of thalamocortical synaptic relations provides a direct and important challenge to the concpet that thalamic input to the cortex is processed by hierarchically organized chains of neurons (see Part III)."

p. 67: "Comparatively little information is available regarding synaptic connections involving other afferent systems that project to the primary sensory areas or to other reigons of the cerebral cortex, but in general, what is known is consistent with the notion that afferents to the cortex form asymmetrical, excitatory synapses with both pyramidal and non-pyramidal cells."

p. 68: "The identification of unlabeled postsynaptic dendrites as of nonpyramidal origin is somewhat more prblematical, because it is based mainly on the assumption that only dendrites belonging to certain types of nonpyramidal cells do not have spines, but that dendrites of all other neuronal types do. However, it has been clear for some time that the proximal dendrites of pyramidal cells may have very few spines (e.g. Cajal 1909-1911), and it has been shown also that middle and distal portions of pyramidal cell dendrites may in some instances lack spines (Hersch and White, 1981b)."

p. 68: Also, ppl tend to assume that if an asymmetrical synapse is onto a dendrite, not a spine, then the postsynaptic cell is not pyramidal, because "dendrites of pyramidal neurons usually receive asymmetrical synapses only on their spines". However, "some parts of pyramidal cell dendritic shafts are postsynaptic at relatively high frequency to asymmetrical synapses (e.g. Hersch and White, 1981b)."

p. 68: summarizing the previous two, "it is likely that in osme instances, unlabeled, nonspiny segments of pyramidal cell dendrites have been mistakenly identified as of nonpyramidal origin".

Part II by Asaf Keller

Chapter 4. Functional properties of cortical neurons

p 126 "Nearly all pyramidal cells send their axons to other areas of the brain..."

corticotectal, corticocollicular, and corticopontile cells have complex receptive fields, but corticostriatal, corticothalamic, and transcallossal neurons may have simple or complex receptive fields.

Chapter 5. Synaptic circuitry revealed by electrophysiology

p. 142: "Intrinsic excitatory interactions may involve pyramidal neurons or nonpyramidal neurons, such as spiny stellate cells, some bipolar neurons, and certain double bouquet cells, which form asymmetric, presumably excitatory synapes"

p. 143 "One approach to determining the contribution of intracotrical interactions for shaping the receptive field properties of cortical neurons is to investigate the effets on cortical neurons of the selective inactiviation of specific intracortical inputs. This approach was followed by Malpeli (1983; Malpeli et al. 1986), who showed that in the absence of thalamic input simple cells in layers IV and VI of the visual cortex are silenced, but that complex cells in the superficial layers retain their receptive field properties. These findings imply that the activity of cells with complex receptive fields are not dependent on input from cells having simple receptive fields. Moreover, simple cells respond preferentially to slow stimulus velocities, whereas complex cells respond preferentially to significantly faster stimulus velocities (e.g. Pettigrew et al., 1968, Movshon, 1974). This indicates that simple cells are unlikely to provide direct input to cells with complex receptive field properties. In addition, activation of local axon collaterals belonging to layer VI corticogeniculate neurons, some of which have complex receptive field properties (e.g. Gilbert, 1977; Harvey, 1980), produces monotynaptic EPSPs in simple cells in layer IV (Ferster and Lindstrom, 1985), suggesting that complex cells may provide input to simple cells. This assumption is supported by studies showing that the activity profile of simple cells may be modulated by input from cells having complex receptive field properties (e.g. Burr et al., 1981; Maffei, 1985).

The hierarchical model suggests that inputs from supragranular layers to the infragranular layers are responsible for the formation of the receptive field properties of neurons in the infragranular layers. However, inactivation of cells in the supragranular layers, either by cooling or lesioning these layers, results in the disarrangement of the receptive field properties of only the "special complex" cells in layer V; the receptive field properties of other cells in layers V and VI remain intact (Schwark et al., 1987).

A direct approach to studying intracortical interactions involves using cross-correlation analyses to determine the types and strengths of interactions between cells whose receptive field properties have been defined. Using this approach, several studies have shown that intracortical monosynaptic excitatory interactions occur almost exclusively between cells with complex receptive properties, and then only when the pair of cells display similar orientation selectivities (e.g. Michalski et al., 1983; Toyama et al., 1981b). Excitatory interactions from cells with simple receptive fields to cells with complex receptive fields have not been observed in these studies.

In conclusion, the results of these studies do not support the assumption included in the hierarchical model that the receptive field properties of complex cells are the result of excitatory inputs from simple cells. Simple cells may provide input to complex cells, but the available data suggest that the influence of this input is less important for shaping the receptive field properties of complex cells that the hierarchical model would have us believe. "

p. 145 "Electrical stimulation of cortical afferents does not induce monosynaptic inhibitory postsynaptic potentials (IPSPs) in the cerebral cortex (e.g. Ferster and Linsdtrom, 1983; Toyama et al., 1974), and so inhibitory interactions are presumed to be mediated only by intracortical mechanisms. In addition, afferents to the cerebral cortex form only asymmetrical synapses, which are presumed to be excitatory;..."

ideas-science-neuro-cortex-whatIsTheReciprocalSignal

Fri, 24 May 2013 09:46:53 GMT

According to the model currently in fashion, the cortex gets input into layer IV from sources including, among others, the corresponding 'core' part of the thalamus (cite White or Sherman) and other cortical areas (cite Van Essen 1985), and provides 'ascending' output to other cortical areas in layer III, or to 'other' parts of the thalamus and to motor efferents via layer V. There is also some thalamic input to layer I, supposedly from 'matrix' parts of the thalamus (cite Jones), but also as branches of the same neurons providing the layer IV input (cite Sherman).

In addition to the 'ascending' output mentioned above, however, there is a 'reciprocal' output signal to the same place (same general area of thalamus or cortex) that provided the input. This comes from layer 6 (cite Sherman) and possibly other places (cite Van Essen).

Let's assume that the traditional model is right about the semantic content of the input signal, e.g. the semantic content of a signal from a columns in V1 to antoher area (an output signal from V1's point of view, an input signal from the other area's point of view) is the presence or absence of a visual edge with a certain position and orientation, that the semantic content of higher visual areas is stuff like whether something is at a certain position and moving in a certain direction, or whether a certain object is recognized.

What is the content and function of the reciprocal signal?

First, an important question: does the reciprocal signal project to exactly the same 'functional unit' as the one that generated the input signal? For instance, in cortico-cortico connections between different cortical columns, if column A layer III projects to column B layer IV, then does column B layer VI always project to column A (possibly projecting to other places in addition to column A)?

Some possible functions:

protocol metadata relating to flow control or error control. Examples: "Could you increase your amplitude?" or "I heard you say, 'I see grandma', is that what you said?" or "The checksum doesn't match the message, please resend" or "Slow down, I'm can't keep up with what you're saying"
protocol metadata relating to multiplexing/contention or uncontrollable external events which have a bearing on the protocol. Example: "This frequency is experiencing heavy contention, please switch to 22.5 mHz" or "Aaaagh, i'm getting too much input from other sources, cease all transmission for 1 second to prevent excitotoxicity from killing me"
attention. Example: "OK, wake up and start transmitting now" or "Everyone's paying attention to you now, please boost your amplitude so that your signal drowns out other less important signals"
protocol metadata relating to protocol phase. Example: "OK, i received the header for the current data packet, please proceed to transfer the actual data now"
a subsemantic synchronization signal. Example: a clock signal or sine wave
routing information. Examples: (route advertisement) "By the way, i've got a connection right to columns 29684 of temporal cortex, in case you want to tell them anything" (routing command) "That's interesting, please pass that along to column 39231 of prefrontal cortex"
a semantic query/selection for which the input on the connection being reciprocated is a response. Example: "do you see Grandma?" or "forget about Grandma for now, do you see a turkey?" or "Please fire if and only if you receive input from your afferent 4 in pattern 'Q'"
information with the same semantics as the input on the connection being reciprocated, except with a different modality. E.g. "OK, imagine you DO see grandma" (cite)
information with the same semantics as the input on the connection being reciprocated, with the same modality. E.g. in an iterative estimation algorithm, the prior estimate is fed back to serve as the starting point for the next iteration. Some evidence for this possibility may be found in the quote on Self:notes-books-corticalCircuitsWhite from p. 143, and in "Towards a Theory of the Laminar Architecture of Cerebral Cortex: Computational Clues from the Visual System" by Raizada and Grossberg.
information with different semantics as the input on the connection being reciprocated, but as a response to the information that was sent over the connection being reciprocated. Example: (reward signal) "That's good stuff, keep it coming, reward points +10"
completely unrelated data traffic (seems unlikely). Example: "Oh hey, the Yankees won last night"

ideas-groupDecisionMaking-fluidDemocracy-theShortVersion

Fri, 24 May 2013 09:46:08 GMT

Note: this is a abridged version of The Long Version. There are important details left out of this document which may be found in that one.

Note: this document is only a summary of the bylaws -- for clarification or in case of dispute, the actual bylaws, not this document, take precedence.

Temporary note: actually the previous is not yet true: in case i get hit by a bus, this version was written later than the bylaws and other overviews and is meant to replace them, but i havent gotten around to modifying them yet. Also, this "short version" turned into a long version because i added a bunch of details about the upcoming changes. After those are integrated into the bylaws, i'll make this version short again.

The Amendable Code Rules are a set of procedures to allow a group of people to make collective decisions, elect officers, and resolve disputes.

Benefits of the system:

Use of "score voting", a simple vote counting system which, compared to plurality voting, has (a) no spoiler effect, (b) no bias towards extremist candidates, (c) no bias towards negative campaigning, (d) no bias towards two-party rule, and (e) yields results proportional to the factional composition of the electorate.
A direct democracy component to allow voters to directly get involved with issues, with a proxy system to allow voters to delegate their vote on issues they have no experience with to others they trust. The direct democracy component is asynchronous, meaning that it does not require everything to attend a meeting; rather, each person can read about and discuss the issues and cast their vote online at their leisure.
All committees and assemblies are of a small size, allowing the decisionmakers to have time to actually have deep discussions
A strong watchdog role to ensure transparency and that the other officials follow the rules
Participatory committees to allow interested voters to get more involved. These committees also promote cross-factional dialog by ensuring that many factions are represented on each committee, and by making decisions by consensus minus 1.
A mechanism for voters to separately express their views on internal affairs and external relations
60% vote threshold for ordinary measures, preventing a narrow 51% majority from imposing its will on the rest of the community without compromise.
63% vote threshold for measures to increase member dues or to restrict the rights of the members (to impose a bias against organizational bloat)
Board members are selected by the membership at large, not by other board members, ensuring responsiveness to voter concerns. At the same time, the delegation system for selecting the board members prevents them from having to mount a mass campaign, even in large organizations; so candidates for the Board can actually focus on the issues, rather than on mass media and soundbites.
No 'districting', so no gerrymandering through control of district shape; but the delegation system ensures that each member has a single delegate responsive to their concerns.
The system is designed to scale to groups of any size, providing effective mechanisms for members to influence policy, promoting thoughtful deliberating without bogging down routine decision-making in lengthly debate.

These rules can be used for groups of any size. For very small groups, note that if we say, for example, that there are five members on the Board and three Chairpeople, this doesn't mean that eight people are required; a single person could hold two Board seats and also all three Chair positions.

Positions created by the system include:

a Forum in which the entire membership votes on proposals
a Board in which seven elected delegates who elect officers and vote on proposals
three Chairpeople elected by the voter who make sure that the rights of the members are protected
two officers (CEOs or Co-presidents or Co-prime Ministers), one for internal affairs and one for external affairs, elected by the Board
(optional) three High Judges who interpret these rules
(optional) other Judges who arbitrate disputes

A proposal that passes in the Forum or the Board is called a "Resolution". A Resolution that is not vetoed, or which overcomes the veto, is called an "Act". An Act is considered to be a valid collective decision of the group.

The Forum

The Forum is a public bulletin board. Any voter can create a proposal for the Forum. Voters are encouraged to air their proposals informally before posting. Before being posted, each proposal is vetted by Juror Committee and, if relevant, a Standing Committee (see below).

Voters can 'proxy' their vote to another voter. This allows their proxy to vote for them. Proxies can themselves be re-proxied, e.g. Alice can proxy her vote to Bob who can proxy both his vote and Alice's proxy to Caroline.

Committees

The function of the Committees is to filter and to improve proposals before they reach the Forum Floor.

A Committee examines the proposal and may make suggestions to the proposer to improve it.

Voting Thresholds

There are different voting thresholds depending on the type of measure.

A veto (see below) requires greater than 50%.

A measure to deficit spend (or borrow money), increase member dues, or to restrict the rights of the members requires at least 63%. A measure to decrease spending or to decrease the power of the organization with respect to the members requires greater than 50%. An ordinary measure requires at least 60%.

The Board

The Board is composed of up to seven Delegates. Each Delegate represents a Constituency, which is a group of voters who have chosen to come together and select their own Delegate. Each Constituency selects their Delegate by Score Voting.

If the group is large, then to prevent the Constituencies from becoming unmanagably large, there is a fractal/pyramidal system in which the voters gather into groups, who elect Delegates, who gather into groups, who elect Delegates, etc, until you get to the top and elect the Board's Delegates.

The External Relations subcommittee of the Board

3 of the Board members are chosen by Score Voting by all voters to be on the External Relations subcommittee. Only Board Members are eligible to be on the External Relations subcommittee. The External Relations subcommittee represent the entire Board when it comes to external affairs.

Executive Officers

The Board selects, via Score Voting, two Executive Officers, termed either CEOs or Co-prime Ministers or Co-presidents depending on the organization's preference.

One of the Executive Officers is selected by the External Relations subcommittee and deals with External Relations. The other Executive Officer is selected by the entire Board and deals with everything else.

The election of Executive Officers is continuous and each Executive Officer is replaced when another candidate wins the position.

Vetos

Any proposal passed by the Forum may be vetoed by the Board, and any proposal passed by the Board (except for the selection of Executive Officers or Judges or other individual candidates for office) may be vetoed by the Forum.

A Resolution which is vetoed but which has >=2/3s support in the body that passed it is then voted on by the highest appeals courts in the relevant Topical Area.

Amending the Bylaws

To Amend the Bylaws, an Act to amend the bylaws must be passed twice, the first time with a 2/3s majority in the Forum or a 3/4s majority on the Board.

If a change in procedure is desired more quickly, then in the interim a Temporary Exception to the Bylaws may be passed.

Budget

Proposal

At any time, the CEOi may proposed a new budget. The proposal is then sent to the Forum. Voters in the Forum who wish to (making use of transitive proxy voting and weighted voting as usual) then each create a budget that allocates the total amount in the proposed budget between the items in the budget. The weighted average of individual budget proposals these is taken. The Forum's Budget is then said to be a budget whose allocation to each item is the lesser of the amount allocated to this item (i) in CEOi's budget, and (ii) in the weighted average.

The Forum's Budget then goes to the Board. The Board debates it and amends it. The Board then votes on the resulting budget, this voting having a simple majority threshold if the resulting budget spends less than or equal to the current budget, and a 63% threshold if the resulting budget spends more than the current budget.

No need to renew

A budget does not need to be renewed -- the non-deficit spending portion of a budget auto-renews itself for each budgetary period until amended.

Deficit

A deficit is the portion of a budget financed by borrowing rather than by member dues, donations, and revenue. Deficit authorization require a higher voting threshold than ordinary resolutions. Deficits must be re-authorized each budgetary period.

Chairs

The Chair is the highest office of the organization; Chairs are protectors of the rights of the members and the keepers of the spirit of the organization. There are up to three Chairs.

The primary responsibility of the Chairs is auditing and investigating the organization, its officials (including the Board, the other Chairs, Committee members, and all Judges) and its appointees and employees. Their role is to protect individuals from violations of their rights by the organization, to protect minorities of voters by procedural violations by majorities, and to uncover and prosecute corruption.

Chairpeople are elected for a set term. Each electoral term, all three Chairs are elected by the voters via Score Voting. The end of the Chair electoral term does not mean that other officials, such as Executive Officers or High Judges, need to be reselected as well.

No information possessed by the organization may be kept secret from a Chair, and all parts of the organization must comprehensively respond to any requests for information from a Chair. Furthermore, any Chair may unilaterally "declassify" any secret organization and share it with the voters (although they are not permitted to selectively declassify information and share it only with a few selected individuals).

The Chairs rotate the duty of chairing the Board and its External Relations subcommittee. A parliamentary decision by any one Chair can be appealed to the other Chairs, who may overturn it by majority vote among the Chairs.

A majority of Chairs, acting together, may pardon or commute the sentence of any individual (excepting high officials) for a crime or crimes.

A majority of Chairs, acting together, may nominate an entity for admission to the franchise as a voting member, or may nominate an entity for expulsion from membership, even if a censorship court had previously considered this entity and decided not to act; but this nomination must be confirmed by the High Court to satisfy the rules for admission or expulsion before it can be acted on by the Board or the Forum.

Any single Chair may veto any nomination(s) for admission to or expulsion from membership, whether the nomination arose in censorship or from Chairs.

High Court

The High Court decides cases brought by the Forum, any member of the Board, any Chair, or either Executive Officer against other entites or officials of the organization concerning the interpretation of the Bylaws or violations of organizational procedure, as well as cases brought by any of the previous entities demanding the removal of a Judge or Chair due to incompetence or corruption. It also confirms cases decided against the default by majority rule in appeals courts (see below).

In addition, the High Court can take the following actions on its own:

strike down Acts which are in conflict with the Bylaws, strike down Acts which are in conflict with Found Rights (see below), strike down Acts which are in conflict with ratified contracts, and strike down pronouncements of organizational officers, appointees, or employees that are in conflict with Acts
Clarification: by unanimous vote, the High Court may determine that the consequences of some Acts are ambiguous, inconsistent, or absurd, and must be clarified, or that the voters hold other rights not explicitly enumerated in the Bylaws, if they consider such rights to have been implicitly assumed. They may suggest one or more alternative fixes. The issue is then forcibly placed on the agenda of both the Forum and the Board.

The High Court is composed of 3 Judges selected from the set of existing Judges by the Board via Score Voting.

Other Courts

Other Courts are each specialized to a Topical Area.

Before a case is put before a Court, a Judge conducts a preliminary hearing. If s/he can decide the case quickly and cleanly, s/he does, but this decision can be appealed regardless of verdict. If there is an appeal, two more Judges are added to form a panel to conduct a preliminary trial. If they can decide the case quickly, clearly, and unanimously, they do so. Otherwise it is sent to a full trial.

Each Court is composed of up to seven jurors, and one Judge (a new one, if there are enough Judges). The jurors are selected according to the "board-coloring constraint", which states that for each Board member, there must be exactly one juror sitting on each court whose constituency supports that Board member.

Both the judge and the jurors vote. Courts act via consensus minus one.

Juror deliberations are purely written and are public, however the identity of jurors is anonymous (even from each other). The identity of judges is public. The identity of the parties are anonymous if feasible.

Should either party wish to hire lawyers or similar, they must notify the Court at the beginning how much they intend to spend, and pay to the Court an amout equal to that which they pay their own lawyers for any expense arising from the case (including consultation before the case, and an amortized share of consultation relevant to many potential cases of which this is one). The Court will reimburse the other party for legal fees up to this amount.

Jurors are volunteers.

Judges

Judges serve on courts.

Candidate Judges self-nominate for one or more designated Topical Areas. They are only eligible to be nominated after they have served as a juror on the highest appeals court in that Topical Area. They are vetted by two Courts, and then appointed by a Resolution of the Board with a >=2/3s threshold.

Censorship

Any voter can anonymously Flag a comment in the Forum if they think it violates decorum. A Flagged comment is reviewed by a Court on the topic of censorship.

Candidate Chairs and Delegates can also be Flagged at which point they are reviewed by a censorship court. If the court finds that they are not members in good standing, they are still eligible candidates, however, their candidacy is flagged on the ballot.

Members themselves can be flagged for suggested expulsion.

A voter can also positively Flag someone for admission to voting membership, causing them to be reviewed by a Censorship court.

Admission of new members, and expulsion of members

Censorship courts are also responsible for reviewing applications for voting membership, and expulsion of members, working according to the organization's policy on such matters; most organizations will have criteria for admission and expulsion beyond just 'enough people flagged them'.

A majority of Chairs acting together may also nominate for admission or expulsion.

Any single Chair may veto any nomination for admission to or expulsion from membership.

Candidates once nominated must be confirmed by an Act with a threshold of >= 2/3s. Typically a large number of noncontroversial individual nominees for admission will be periodically combined into a single Act for routine admission.

ideas-groupDecisionMaking-fluidDemocracy-theLongVersion

Fri, 24 May 2013 09:46:05 GMT

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ideas-hypotheticalConstitution-hypotheticalConstitutionNotes2

Fri, 24 May 2013 09:44:26 GMT

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opinions-political-oliveOil

Fri, 24 May 2013 09:42:19 GMT

Here's some evidence for the libertarians:

http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/05/23/eu-olive-oil-idUSL6N0E41VO20130523

" BRUSSELS, May 23 (Reuters) - The European Commission has decided to tear up new rules on how restaurants should serve olive oil less than a week after unveiling them, following widespread ridicule and accusations of unwanted interference.

Last week, the Commission said restaurants would be banned from serving oil to diners in refillable glass jugs or dipping bowls from next year. Instead, to protect consumers from fraud, restaurants would have to use sealed, non-refillable bottles that must be disposed of when empty. "

quotes

Wed, 22 May 2013 21:20:06 GMT

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ideas-physics

Tue, 21 May 2013 08:42:51 GMT

cheapQuantumComputing

ideas

Tue, 21 May 2013 08:42:46 GMT

ideas-ai

Tue, 21 May 2013 08:42:32 GMT

books

Tue, 21 May 2013 08:42:29 GMT

ideas-math

Tue, 21 May 2013 08:42:22 GMT

ideas-science-neuro-cortex

Tue, 21 May 2013 08:41:32 GMT

whatIsTheReciprocalSignal