many circuits operating together rather than as linked chains. Scientists at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Bell Laboratories, and
C.I.T. have fabricated collective-decision circuits, the largest being 54 amplifiers. However, it will take a network of hundreds or thousands of "neurons," with thousands or millions of connections, for a circuit "to be useful" as a research tool.
Collective-decision circuits could be used in many ways. A C.I.T. team led Carver Mead, for example,...