A brain from simple circuits

Aatish Bhatia and Arkarup Banerjee use a visual explainer for how a few neurons can orchestrate seemingly complex and surprising behaviors.

If you squint very hard at this, you might be able to see the rudiments of how our brains encode preferences, such as a love for spicy food or an aversion to smelly cheese.

Of course, biology is far more complex than these simplified sparks. We intentionally gave them very simple brains, so that we can understand how every part works.

Their brains are also frozen in time. In reality, brains can learn: They alter their wiring to gain new skills such as learning to walk, ride a bicycle, or play a piano.

This is the first part in a series they call Myriad.

I like the spark characters with different wirings. I got lost in joy for a second making them chase the light.