In 2009, neuroscientist Henry Markram stood in front of a crowd and made a bold claim. “Our mission is to build a realistic, detailed, computer model of the human brain,” Markram said at a TED talk. Markram told the audience that he believed he could recreate the human brain using supercomputers and that he’d do it in 10 years. Filmmaker Noah Hutton watched the TED talk online and decided to chronicle the decade long struggle to map the human brain.
After 10 years, Hutton has finished his documentary. It’s called In Silico and it’s hitting film festivals right now. Markram’s Human Brain Project has yet to produce a simulation of the human brain though it’s spent billions of euros in the attempt, and seen Markram ousted from a leadership role on the project.
In Silico began with a narrow focus on Markram and his work, but Hutton quickly realized he had to expand its scope. “It was only after a screening at a conference organized by Google where scientists in the audience peppered me with critical questions that I came to see the urgent need to expand this story beyond its singular focus,” Hutton said in a press release.
The story of the Human Brain Project is fraught with controversy and tension. Hundreds of neuroscientists believe the project is a boondoggle. Others believe Markram is asking all the wrong questions.
In Silico will take viewers on a journey into the project, its detractors, and the scientists at the center of it all.