Abstract
To say that an animal responds to sensory stimuli may not be the most natural and efficient way to describe behaviour. Rather, it appears that animals most of the time react to situations, to opponents or things which they actively isolate from their environment, Situations, things, partners or opponents are, in a way, the terms of behaviour. It is legitimate, therefore, to ask what phenomena correspond to them in the internal activity of the brain, or, in other words: how are the meaningful chunks of experience “represented” in the brain?
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Preview
Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Blakemore, C., and Cooper, G.F.: Modofication of the visual cortex by experience. Brain Res. 31, 366 (1971)
Braitenberg, V.: Thoughts on the cerebral cortex. J. theor. Biol. 46, 421 – 447 (1974)
Braitenberg, V.: Cortical architectonics: General and areal. In: Architectonics of the cerebral cortex. M.A.B. Brazier, H. Petsche, eds., New York: Raven Press 1978, pp. 443 –465
Evans, E.F.: Upper and lower levels of the auditory system: A contrast of structure and function. In: Neural networks. Berlin-Heidelberg-New York: Springer 1968
Hebb, D.O.: The organization of behaviour. New York: John Wiley and son 1949
Hirsch, H.V.B. and Spinelli, D.N.: Modification of the distribution of receptive field orientation in cats by selective visual exposure during development. Exp. Brain Res. 13, 1–43
Hubel, D.H. and Wiesel, T.N.: Receptive fields of single neurones in the cat’s striate cortex. J. Physiol. (Lond.) 148, 574 – 591 (1959)
Hubel, D.H. and Wiesel T.N.: Binocular interaction in striate cortex of kittens reared with artificial squint. J. Neurophysiol. 28, 1041 – 1059 (1965)
Jasper, H.H.: Mechanisms of propagation: Extracellular studies. In: Brain mechanisms of the epilepsies. H.H. Jasper, A.A. Ward and A. Pope, eds., Boston: Little, Brown and Company 1969
Legendy, C.: A remark on Hebb’s cell assemblies. In: Atti del congresso di cibernetica, vol. II. M.A. Baldocchi and F. Lenzi, eds., Pisa: Lito Felici 1971, pp. 905 – 917
McCulloch, W.S. and Pitts, W.H.: A logical calculus of the ideas immanent in nervous activity. Bull. Math. Biophys. 9, 127 – 247 (1943)
Morrell, F.: Lasting changes in synaptic organization produced by continuous neuronal bombardment. In: CIOMS symposium on brain mechanisms and learning. A. Fessard, ed., London: Blackwell 1961, pp. 375 – 392
Palm, G.: private communication, 1976
Palm, G. and Braitenberg, V.: Tentative contributions of neuroanatomy to nerve net theories. In: Third European meeting on cybernetics and systems research 1976, Progress in cybernetics and systems research, vol. 3, London: Advance Publications Limited (in press)
Palm, G. and Heim, R.: this volume
Renaud, quoted by Gloor, P. in: Synchronization of EEG activity in epilepsies. H. Petsche and M.A.B. Brazier, eds., Wien-New York: Springer 1972
Rosenblueth, A., Wiener, N. and Bigelow, J.: Behaviour, purpose and teleology. Philosophy and Science 10, 1943
Schüz, A.: Some facts and hypotheses concerning dendritic spines and learning. In: Architectonics of the cerebral cortex. M.A. B. Brazier, H. Petsche, eds., New York: Raven Press 1978, pp. 129 – 135
Wiesel, T.N. and Hubel, D.H.: Comparison of the effects of unilateral and bilateral eye closure on cortical unit responses in kittens. J. Neurophysiol. 28, 1029 – 1040 (1965)
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 1978 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg
About this paper
Cite this paper
Braitenberg, V. (1978). Cell Assemblies in the Cerebral Cortex. In: Heim, R., Palm, G. (eds) Theoretical Approaches to Complex Systems. Lecture Notes in Biomathematics, vol 21. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-93083-6_9
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-93083-6_9
Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg
Print ISBN: 978-3-540-08757-1
Online ISBN: 978-3-642-93083-6
eBook Packages: Springer Book Archive