Brain Inspired

BI 240 Cristopher Moore: Cognition and Computational Complexity

June 17, 2026·1h 42m
Episode Description from the Publisher

Support the show to get full episodes, full archive, and join the Discord community. The Transmitter is an online publication that aims to deliver useful information, insights and tools to build bridges across neuroscience and advance research. Visit thetransmitter.org to explore the latest neuroscience news and perspectives, written by journalists and scientists. Read more about our partnership. Sign up for Brain Inspired email alerts to be notified every time a new Brain Inspired episode is released. To explore more neuroscience news and perspectives, visit thetransmitter.org. Cristopher Moore is a professor at the Santa Fe Institute in New Mexico, and he is a computation and computational complexity expert. He recently joined a us in my complexity discussion group, and answered a bunch of our questions, but I wasn't done with him regarding what, if anything, computational complexity has to do understanding how brains and minds work. So that's why he's here today, and we discuss a wide variety of topics related to AI, computation, computational complexity, and cognition. Cris's Homepage Book: The Nature of Computation Related papers What Is a Macrostate? Subjective Observations and Objective Dynamics 0:00 - Intro 4:24 - The Nature of Computation 9:14 - Computational complexity 28:22 - Real mathematics 35:08 - Current state of AI 39:04 - Computational complexity in the AI world 47:53 - Cognition, creation, problems 56:16 - Rugged landscapes and generalization 1:13:52 - What is computation? 1:32:31 - How would you study the brain?

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