For a start Benny, I would recommend this book very highly:
Computational Explorations in Cognitive Neuroscience: Understanding the Mind by Simulating the Brain by Randall O'reilly
This is the most influential book I've ever read and it changed my life and whole understanding and way of thinking about the brain and psychology. If you read it you'll learn all about the biology of the neural networks of the brain but also what they actually do in computational terms... the latter you don't really get from a book that is purely about the biology... or at least I never did. Most of the language I use and which is now second nature to me - transformations, abstractions etc - I learned from this book, along with that way of looking at the brain. So I cannot recommend it highly enough if you want to understand where I'm coming from.
The book is about simulating the known biology of the brain using neural network modelling software that is as biologically accurate as possible. So for instance it will teach you all about how a neuron works biologically and then show you, step by step, how it is mathematically implemented in the model such that the neurons in the software are modelled right down to the level of specific ion channels etc. Then how learning works biologically, followed by an algorithm to model it. Then about the connectivity in the brain, and again, show you step by step how it's modelled in the software, leaving no stone unturned and nothing to chance, because they want the models to be as biologically plausible as possible. Then it will guide you through modelling specific networks in the brain - for instance the visual system - again... according to the connectivity that they actually exhibit biologically. So not only do you learn from reading the text - which is very heavy on the biology and the computation - but also by observing these networks in action and also by tweaking things and observing their effects and experimenting with your own models.
If you read the book I would hope that you'd be filled with the same sense of wonder and excitement at the possibilities that I experienced, and which has never left me. And by seeing the neural network dynamics I've talked about in action, I'd hope that you'd also see how closely they parallel our experiences in consciousness.
Computational Explorations in Cognitive Neuroscience: Understanding the Mind by Simulating the Brain by Randall O'reilly
This is the most influential book I've ever read and it changed my life and whole understanding and way of thinking about the brain and psychology. If you read it you'll learn all about the biology of the neural networks of the brain but also what they actually do in computational terms... the latter you don't really get from a book that is purely about the biology... or at least I never did. Most of the language I use and which is now second nature to me - transformations, abstractions etc - I learned from this book, along with that way of looking at the brain. So I cannot recommend it highly enough if you want to understand where I'm coming from.
The book is about simulating the known biology of the brain using neural network modelling software that is as biologically accurate as possible. So for instance it will teach you all about how a neuron works biologically and then show you, step by step, how it is mathematically implemented in the model such that the neurons in the software are modelled right down to the level of specific ion channels etc. Then how learning works biologically, followed by an algorithm to model it. Then about the connectivity in the brain, and again, show you step by step how it's modelled in the software, leaving no stone unturned and nothing to chance, because they want the models to be as biologically plausible as possible. Then it will guide you through modelling specific networks in the brain - for instance the visual system - again... according to the connectivity that they actually exhibit biologically. So not only do you learn from reading the text - which is very heavy on the biology and the computation - but also by observing these networks in action and also by tweaking things and observing their effects and experimenting with your own models.
If you read the book I would hope that you'd be filled with the same sense of wonder and excitement at the possibilities that I experienced, and which has never left me. And by seeing the neural network dynamics I've talked about in action, I'd hope that you'd also see how closely they parallel our experiences in consciousness.
