Author's foreword to the first edition (copy no. 0 to 10)

This monograph was written in response to the "Manifesto of the eleven leading neuroscientists", published years ago (6/2004) in the journal "Gehirn & Geist". It still "haunts" the Internet today. In this manifesto the authors complained that we have the status of "hunter-gatherers" in terms of explaining how the brain works.

The author felt compelled by this call to reassess the thoughts he had been working on for decades about the origin of intelligence, thought and language. No one seemed to be interested in his mathematical theories on this subject.
However, since it seemed possible to transform this mathematical theory of the "cybernetic elementary cell" in such a way that it seemed to be realizable with real nerve cells, a theory of the neuronal circuitry of the brain was developed over a long period of work.

This was actually not the intention of the author, who is rather a mathematician and has relatively little understanding of neurology. However, since this theory has now reached a certain maturity and there seems to be no reasonable international theory on the neuronal circuitry of the brain, the author takes the liberty of presenting this theory to the scientific community.

Es ist absehbar, dass diese Theorie kaum zur Kenntnis genommen werden wird. Entsprechende Anfragen bei führenden Neurologen Deutschlands verliefen meist ergebnislos. Dennoch sollte hier erwähnt werden, dass es sich die einige Wissenschaftler nicht nehmen ließen, den Autor in seinen Bemühungen durch geeignete Hinweise, durch das Zusenden von Literatur und eigenen Hinweisen zu unterstützen. Gedankt sei hier vor allem Herrn Prof. Valentin Braitenberg, Herrn Prof. Ulrich Ramacher, Herrn Prof. Karl Zilles, Herrn Prof. Günther Palm sowie Herrn Prof. Heinz Wässle.

This work is not a dissertation, and in view of the relatively low level of interest from the specialist world, the author has tried to achieve a certain general comprehensibility. Let others judge whether the theory presented here has a hand and foot.

Part 3 of this theory under the topic "The digital system of the brain" is still in progress and would have gone beyond the scope of this paper. The presentation of the binary functioning of the brain only makes sense when the first and second parts of this monograph are scientifically recognized. Only when the depicted magno- and parvo-cellular circuits of the brain have been correctly recognized can the binary functioning of the brain be derived from them.

Additions and corrections from 20/10/2023:

In retrospect, this monograph from 2011 contains several errors of interpretation! Driven by the desire to find a kind of digital mode of operation in the brain, I incorrectly categorised a whole class of structures as negation nuclei. These turned out to be inversion nuclei almost 10 years later. Although I pointed out that it was difficult to differentiate precisely between negation nuclei and inversion nuclei because negation nuclei are characterised by total inhibition, whereas inversion nuclei are characterised by only partial inhibition, I unfortunately did not correctly recognise the true function of inversion nuclei at the time. Inversion nuclei have the task of reversing the monotonicity of extreme value-coded signals. Neuronal signals are often present as minimum-coded signals, frequently in the motor area. They arise there through signal divergence, which is characterised by a strictly concave transfer function (cable equation for non-myelinated axons). Here, a signal inversion in an inversion nucleus can transform the signals into a maximum-coded form. Only then can they become motorically effective. Instead of a single or double negation, a single or double signal inversion is carried out in the brain. All readers should kindly take note of this correction.

Andreas Heinrich Malczan
Oranienburg, den 15. August 2011

Theory of the neuronal circuity of the brain and analytical thinking

Author's foreword to the first edition (copy no. 0 to 10)