₦airaland Forum

Jub101:
Napier grass

jeromestarks:
Forget long story.

Assuming you met two ladies (Sera and Christy) who both have good characters that suit you but Sera is a virgin while Christy has been fvcked, fingered, licked and mounted by many men.
Who would you use your hard-earned money to pay her bride price?

Crucialgem:
Well it could be the mixture of both when i was in varsity i stayed in the school hostel throughout so i wasn't expose to the outside world because everything i want is between the four walls of my school that time. I didn't even used to think of girls or sex much, maybe sometimes when i leave my room to read in the midnight and i see love birds hanging around the dark corners of some buildings i begin to wonder what they were doing

I thought i would still have that self control when i finished school and started living alone. Hmm there is this carefree girl in the same compound that will come to the window of my room to dress up purposely, because i was sure she has mirrow in her room. Hmmm when temptation was becoming too high she started entering my room to watch movie she has big boobs and it was a point of attraction for me i couldn't resist one particular night she slept on my bed under the pretence of not feeling fine i knew something was fishy about the whole thing but as a virgin that has been expose to things online i couldn't resist the urge it was too overwhelming i moved closer to her and touched her and started kissing her and she didnt protest hmmmmm na so comrade fall for temptation and end up loosing my virginity

Dammy wherever you her i have not forgiven you ooo😞😞😞😞.

That time i was working from home and i was always at home then she kept on coming and coming. It was only when she left the house i realize what i have been doing

jeromestarks:
Men are able to reason outside their emotions. Women can't.
Once you are the first to enter the pvssy of a woman, she's bound to you.
Her body will be at default to yours.
Her body controls her emotions.
Her emotions controls her actions.

Get her emotionally and she will use her witchcraft to help you not to destroy you.
You think the hymen is there for decoration?

It is the gate to her life. Open the gate and all her blessings and glory will be yours.

Marry a non virgin and she will pack your blessings and glory to the first man who opened her gate of glory.

Be wise.
Once she's not a virgin, fvck her and let her go when you're tired of her overused pvssy.

Farmerakinloye6:
.

Shine Bridge Global is a US-based food science and agribusiness company established in 2018 by Dr Tony Bello, a native of Nigeria. The company specialises in producing products made from cassava sourced in Nigeria. Bello recently spoke with Jeanette Clark about his plans to produce and sell food items made from Nigerian cassava in the US and other countries.


According to the latest report from research group IMARC, the global cassava starch market is projected to reach US$6.5 billion by 2028. Bello believes this number should be much higher and can be achieved by developing the right products to capture market share from potato-derived items.

Cassava, a root crop that looks like a large sweet potato, is one of the most widely grown agricultural commodities in Africa. The roots can be processed into a variety of products, including cassava flour, starch, ethanol and glucose syrup.

Bello, who was raised in Nigeria and now resides in the US, holds a doctorate in food science. He has previously worked as a food scientist for Frito-Lay and Kellogg before transitioning to the consulting side of the industry. In 2010, he assumed the position of CEO at Heritage Agro-Allied Foods Incorporated (H2A Foods), a food science technology company that focuses on creating opportunities for cassava smallholder farmers in Edo State, Nigeria.

In 2017, H2A Foods facilitated a loan from the Nigerian Incentive-Based Risk Sharing System for Agricultural Lending (NIRSAL Plc.) for a group of smallholder farmers to develop their available land for cassava production. H2A Foods guaranteed to buy all the cassava they produced. It was during this time that Bello recognised the need for further development in the cassava value chain, as the existing market was still too limited. Consequently, Shine Bridge Global was established in 2018.


In recent years, Shine Bridge Global has focused on converting high-quality cassava flour (HQCF) into instant tapioca flakes. Tapioca is derived from the cassava root and the resulting flakes, according to Bello, have similar applications to potato flakes. Potato flakes are utilised as a food ingredient in the production of various commercially available items, such as pasta and snacks, as well as a thickener in gravies and desserts.

From idea to production
In 2018, the initial phase of developing and testing the tapioca flakes was conducted in the Netherlands, utilising cassava flour imported from Nigeria. Now that the product development has been completed, production will shift to a factory in New York. While the flakes will be processed in New York, the cassava flour used to create the flakes will continue to be sourced from Nigeria. The flakes will be branded as a Shine Bridge Global product and sold to companies that specialise in the production of consumer packaged foods.


Cassava flour preparation in Nigeria for processing into instant tapioca flakes.
The company is also busy developing a few other cassava-derived food products such as crackers, pizza crusts, ready-mix fufu, fried snacks and flatbreads – all using its tapioca flakes.

Shine Bridge Global has partnered with several cassava producers in Nigeria – specifically in Oyo, Ekiti, Edo and Enugu states – to ensure a sufficient supply of fresh cassava roots once full-scale production begins. These partners include H2A Foods, 365 Farms and Ocriv. In addition, Shine Bridge Global is in discussions with Nigerian companies that process the raw material into high-quality cassava flour including Aspuna, Niji Group and the Elephant Group.


The company aims to introduce both the tapioca flakes and final consumer packaged products to test markets in the US, UK and Nigeria within the next six months. Following this, it plans to gradually scale up production, selling to consumer packaged goods companies and marketers.

Regional expansion opportunities
Shine Bridge Global’s value chain development work is currently focused on Nigeria, but Bello has a wider vision for a continent-wide initiative. “Our primary targets will be the countries that produce cassava. In West Africa, this includes Ghana, Côte d’Ivoire and Togo,” he explains.

Rwanda, which sources some of its raw materials from Tanzania, is also emerging as a major player in the cassava market in East Africa. Shine Bridge Global is open to partnering with existing businesses in these countries.

“Commodities like potatoes are worth billions of US dollars when used in consumer packaged foods. We want to capture a share of that market and also improve the livelihoods of smallholder farmers in Nigeria and throughout Africa,” says Bello.

BigBrother9ja:
When this OLOSHO public commodity born?
Who be the father, abi na random sperm donor?


As a real Top- G and high value man, NOTHING in this life will make me feel comfortable birthing my children through someone that has been passed around like football by multiple men. No matter her status and beauty, GOD FORBID!
I could "mark" my own register with DOUBLE protection, but I'll make sure I don't plant any seed in her...



IF YOU WON'T LIKE TO HAVE A DAUGHTER LIKE HER, DON'T MARRY HER OR MAKE HER THE MOTHER OF YOUR CHILDREN.

Jub101:
25cm by 25cm double row

Jub101:
My ongoing dry season OKRO project. Planted on November 6. I planted it intentionally in the furrow for it retains water more than ontop of the ridges.

40Bullets:
It's Pa Elton sir..correct the title

Pa Elton’s prophecy Concerning Nigeria in 1986 Means there’s still hope for Nigeria
The nation of Nigeria is the most populous in Africa, with an estimated number of 201 million with a 2.6% annual growth rate since 2019.

The numbers do give a hint that Nigeria should be one of the top nations in the world because of its numerical advantage, especially when you compare her with nations like the United States of America (USA) and China, whose population is approximately 300 million and 1.3 billions people respectively.

Taking a walk down history lane, Nigeria gained independence in 1960 but had been a colony under the rule of the Britons from 1914.

However, long before Nigeria gained independence, in 1937, a young missionary – Sydney Granville Elton – who felt the burning passion of the Lord, left his home country, England, to come into Nigeria to fulfill his assignment.

History does have it Elton was an instrument used by God to spearhead various kinds of revival in Nigeria and was a father of faith to the ministers of God that were ever raised in Nigeria, the likes of Ayo Babalola, Benson Idahosa, E.A. Adeboye, W.F. Kumuyi e.t.c.

During the latter stages of Elton’s life, in 1986, he gave a prophecy concerning Nigeria, in which he said: “Nigeria and Nigerians will be known all over the world for corruption. Your name – Nigeria will stink for corruption but after a while, a new phase will come – a phase of righteousness. People from the nations of the earth will hold a Nigerian and say, ” We want to follow you to your nation to go and learn righteousness.’

One year after Elton gave this prophecy, he died. It has been over 30 years since Elton’s prophecy concerning Nigeria was spoken, but the situations in the nation have played out just as the prophetic words said they would.

Nigeria as a nation has been plagued with some negative happenstances, for example, corruption, money laundering, internet fraud, and scam, etc, and as a result, many nations do not want to be involved with Nigeria in business.

A careful look at Elton’s prophecy suggests that these all deal with the first phase of the statement, where Nigeria is deemed very corrupt. However, the second phase of the prophecy reveals that Nigeria will experience a drastic change, so convincing it will be that the nation will now be called ‘righteous”.

That is the phase we all still waiting for, and it is already beginning to happen, it is only a matter of time before it comes into full manifestation.

Napata77:
You are an absolute frigging ignoramus suffering from acute/chronic historical illiteracy.

That is why when a white maggot insults your race, you are helpless and drowned in self-hate.

Because you don't know who you are.

You don't know that it was your ancestors who taught the whites how to read, write, count, and even speak, instead of grunting like pigs.

And that they actually owe their existence and 'development' to you, black man, not the other way round.


12 Amazing African Inventions and Innovations That Led To World Civilization



1 Speech

The first words by humans were spoken by Africans.

''Using statistical methods to estimate the time required to achieve the current spread and diversity in modern languages today, Johanna Nichols — a linguist at the University of California, Berkeley — argues that vocal language must have arisen in our species at least 100,000 years ago. Using phonemic diversity, a more recent analysis offers directly linguistic support for a similar date. Estimates of this kind are independently supported by genetic, archaeological, palaeontological and much other evidence suggesting that language probably emerged somewhere in sub-Saharan Africa during the Middle Stone Age, roughly contemporaneous with the speciation of Homo sapiens.''


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Origin_of_language




2 Writing


In 1999, Archaeology Magazine reported that the earliest Egyptian hieroglyphs date back to 3400 BCE which "...challenge the commonly held belief that early logographs, pictographic symbols representing a specific place, object, or quantity, first evolved into more complex phonetic symbols in Mesopotamia."

Who were these original Egyptians?

The Greek historian Herodotus.. described the Colchians of the Black Sea shores as "Egyptians by race" and pointed out they had "black skins and kinky hair."

Apollodorus, the Greek philosopher, described Egypt as "the country of the black-footed ones" and the Latin historian Ammianus Marcellinus said "the men of Egypt are mostly brown or black with a skinny desiccated look."

http://www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/specials/1624_story_of_africa/page88.shtml

In his book 'Egypt', British scholar Sir E.A. Wallis Budge says: "The prehistoric native of Egypt, both in the old and in the new Stone Ages, was African and there is every reason for saying that the earliest settlers came from the South." He further states: "There are many things in the manners and customs and religions of the historic Egyptians that suggests that the original home of their prehistoric ancestors was in a country in the neighborhood of Uganda and Punt [present day Somalia]."

https://i.pinimg.com/564x/4a/70/3b/4a703be4f22ca99f45c67e4ba05b3426.jpg

''Greek historian Diodorus Siculus devoted an entire chapter of his world history, the Bibliotheke Historica, or Library of History (Book 3), to the Kushites ["Aithiopians"] of Meroe. Here he repeats the story of their great piety, their high favor with the gods, and adds the fascinating legend that they were.. the founders of Egyptian civilization, invented writing, and had given the Egyptians their religion and culture.''

(1st century B.C., Diodorus Siculus of Sicily, Greek historian and contemporary of Caesar Augustus, Universal History Book III. 2. 4-3. 3)

http://wysinger.homestead.com/blackegypt101.html

To summarise:

"Ancient Egypt was a Negro civilisation. The history of Black Africa will remain suspended in the air and cannot be written correctly until African historians connect it with the history of Egypt. The African historian who evades the problem of Egypt is neither modest nor objective nor unruffled. He is ignorant, cowardly and neurotic. The ancient Egyptians were Negroes. The moral fruit of their civilisation is to be counted among the assets of the Black world."

- Cheikh Anta Diop, The African Origin of Civilisation.


https://i.pinimg.com/564x/8e/df/df/8edfdfeff02c69723959a961a6b524ea.jpg



3 Medicine

''The earliest known surgery was performed in Egypt around 2750 BC.... The Ebers papyrus (1550 BC) is full of incantations and foul applications meant to turn away disease-causing demons, and also includes 877 prescriptions. It may also contain the earliest documented awareness of tumors..

Homer (800 BC) remarked in the Odyssey: "In Egypt, the men are more skilled in medicine than any of human kind" and "the Egyptians were skilled in medicine more than any other art". The Greek historian Herodotus visited Egypt around 440 BC and wrote extensively of his observations of their medicinal practices. Pliny the Elder also wrote favourably of them in historical review. Hippocrates (the 'father of medicine'), Herophilos, Erasistratus and later Galen studied at the temple of Amenhotep, and acknowledged the contribution of ancient Egyptian medicine to Greek medicine.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ancient_Egyptian_medicine



4 Architecture

The African empire of Egypt developed a vast array of diverse structures and great architectural monuments along the Nile, among the largest and most famous of which are the Great Pyramid of Giza and the Great Sphinx of Giza

The pyramids, which were built in the Fourth Dynasty, testify to the power of the pharaonic religion and state. They were built for reasons that remain mysterious to modern knowledge. The size and simple design show the high skill level of African design and engineering on a large scale. The Great Pyramid of Giza, which was probably completed c. 2580 BC, is the oldest and largest of the pyramids, and is the only surviving monument of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World. The pyramid of Khafre is believed to have been completed around 2532 BC, at the end of Khafre's reign.

https://i.pinimg.com/564x/21/32/59/2132596353cacee7484fdef5947cb8df.jpg

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ancient_Egyptian_architecture



5 Mathematics

The invention of mathematics is placed firmly in African PRE-HISTORY.

''The oldest known possibly mathematical object is the Lebombo bone, discovered in the Lebombo mountains of Swaziland and dated to approximately 35,000 BC. It consists of 29 distinct notches cut into a baboon's fibula. Also prehistoric artifacts discovered in Africa and France, dated between 35,000 and 20,000 years old [respectively], suggest early attempts to quantify time.

The Ishango bone, found near the headwaters of the Nile river (northeastern Congo), may be as much as 20,000 years old and consists of a series of tally marks carved in three columns running the length of the bone. Common interpretations are that the Ishango bone shows either the earliest known demonstration of sequences of prime numbers or a six month lunar calendar.

Also, Predynastic Egyptians of the 5th millennium BC pictorially represented geometric designs.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_mathematics#Prehistoric_mathematics

''Numeral systems have been many and diverse, with the first known written numerals created by Egyptians in Middle Kingdom texts such as the Rhind Mathematical Papyrus.

The earliest uses of mathematics were in trading, land measurement, painting and weaving patterns and the recording of time. More complex mathematics did not appear until around 3000 BC, when the Egyptians and Babylonians began using arithmetic, algebra and geometry for taxation and other financial calculations, for building and construction, and for astronomy''

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mathematics



6 Mining of minerals

The oldest known mine on archaeological record is the "Lion Cave" in Swaziland, which radiocarbon dating shows to be about 43,000 years old. Much later on, the Africans of Egypt mined malachite....Quarries for turquoise and copper were also found at "Wadi Hamamat, Tura, Aswan and various other Nubian sites"..The gold mines of Nubia were among the largest and most extensive in the world, and are described by the Greek author Diodorus Siculus. He mentions that fire-setting was one method used to break down the hard rock holding the gold. One of the complexes is shown in one of earliest known maps. They crushed the ore and ground it to a fine powder before washing the powder for the gold dust.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mining#Prehistoric_mining



7 Iron Smelting

Iron smelting is a form of extractive metallurgy; its main use is to produce a metal from its ore. This includes production of silver, iron, copper and other base metals from their ores. Smelting uses heat and a chemical reducing agent to decompose the ore, driving off other elements as gasses or slag and leaving just the metal behind.

Early iron smelting:

''Where and how iron smelting was discovered is widely debated, and remains uncertain due to the significant lack of production finds.. [but] there is a further possibility of iron smelting and working in West Africa by 1200 BC. In addition, very early instances of carbon steel were found to be in production around 2000 years before the present in northwest Tanzania, based on complex preheating principles. These discoveries are significant for the history of metallurgy.''

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smelting


8 Religion

Greek historian Diodorus Siculus. From his own statements we learn that he traveled in Egypt around 60 BC. His travels in Egypt probably took him as far south as the first Cataract. He wrote about the ''Ethiopians'' south of Egypt.

"They further write that it was among them that people were first taught to honour the gods and offer sacrifices and arrange processions and festivals and perform other things by which people honor the divine. For this reason their piety is famous among all men, and the sacrifices among the Aithiopians are believed to be particularly pleasing to the divinity,"


9 Laws

Stephanus of Byzantium, who is said to represent the opinions of the most ancient Greeks, says:

"Ethiopia was the first established country on the earth, and the Ethiopians were the first who introduced the worship of the Gods and who established laws."
Quoted by John D. Baldwin, Prehistoric Nations, p. 62.



10 International Trade


In 1825, Arnold Hermann Heeren (1760-1842), Professor of History and Politics in the University of Gottengen and one of the ablest of the early exponents of the economic interpretation of history, published, in the fourth and revised edition of his great work Ideen Uber Die Politik, Den Verkehr Und Den Handel Der Vornehmsten Volker Der Alten Weld, a lengthy essay on the history, culture, and commerce of the ancient Ethiopians, which had profound influence on contemporary writers in the conclusion that it was among these ancient Black people of Africa and Asia that international trade was first developed. He thinks that as a by-product of these international contacts there was an exchange of ideas and cultural practices that laid the foundations of the earliest civilizations of the ancient world. Heeren in his researches says: "From the remotest times to the present, the Ethiopians [ancient name for blacks south of the Sahara] have been one of the most celebrated, and yet the most mysterious of nations. In the earliest traditions of nearly all the..civilized nations of antiquity, the name of this distant people is found. The annals of the Egyptian priests are full of them, and the nations of inner Asia, on the Euphrates and Tigris, have interwoven the fictions of the Ethiopians with their traditions of the wars and conquests of their heroes; and, at a period equally remote, they glimmer in Greek mythology. When the Greeks scarcely knew Italy and Sicily by name, the Ethiopians were celebrated in the verses of their poets, and when the faint gleam of tradition and fable gives way to the clear light of history, the lustre of the Ethiopians is not diminished."

http://wysinger.homestead.com/blackegypt101.html


11 Philosophy

Philosophy is the study of general and fundamental problems, such as those connected with reality, existence, knowledge, values, reason, mind, and language. Philosophy is distinguished from other ways of addressing such problems by its critical, generally systematic approach and its reliance on rational argument.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philosophy#Ancient_philosophy

Philosophy in Africa has a rich and varied history, dating from pre-dynastic Egypt, continuing through the birth of Christianity and Islam. Arguably central to the ancients was the conception of "ma'at", which roughly translated refers to "justice", "truth", or simply "that which is right". One of the earliest works of political philosophy was the Maxims of Ptah-Hotep, which were taught to Egyptian schoolboys for centuries...Ancient Egyptian philosophers made extremely important contributions to Hellenistic philosophy, Christian philosophy, and Islamic philosophy.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/African_philosophy

''Ancient Egyptian philosophy has been credited by the ancient Greeks as being the beginning of philosophy''.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ancient_Egyptian_philosophy


12 Art

The oldest art objects in the world—a series of tiny, drilled snail shells about 75,000 years old—were discovered in a South African cave.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Art

brain54:
I had to stifle a laugh…

You corrected OP on the right spelling of your name and then went ahead to spell vegetables as vehetables. It just proves that no one is above mistakes. But that’s on the lighter side…

Nice thread. Kept me engaged till 12. 52 a.m had to read till the last page 7 even though feeling sleepy.

But it was a good read and worth it. I sure learnt a thing or two here.

Kudos to OP for sharing your knowledge and every other person that contributed to make the thread interestingly educative!

Jub101:
As a sheep farmer you will need to invest in some grasses and legumes to feed your animals. You can do your research on them. The ones I use are ; Napier grass, Bracharia ruzisiensis , panicum maximum these are all grasses and their yield per acre differs. The one I enjoy using the most is Napier grass as it is easy to cultivate and multiplying of the plant is through its stem cutting. The legumes I use are lablab, centrosema ,prureira and the normal black eye bean we eat. Lablab is far productive among the legumes as it’s yield is enormous and it’s also drought resistant.

JASONjnr:
Never been in such a situation before ....


I had one of my boss a certain time give me greenlight and anytime I go to her office to submit documents, she will not open up till when work is closed and while I'm about to leave, she will call me to bring it and will tell me she was naked because of the heat and so she didn't want me to see her naked ..


I will just hand her the files and leave....

Because, wetin bring the naked talk come now?

Rebuke:
What is really wrong? We need to look at their inputs before now, as in, since tomato importation has been put on hold, how much of it did we have and the cost of it.

Keep planting and keep producing, if we have it in abundance here, it will force the price of the imported one to crash and discourage the importers along the line.

Moealso, not everyone likes processed tomatoes, I prefer fresh ones. So, there will always be market for everyone.

Unfortunately, they are crying because they are about to lose their exploitation power on consumers.

Before the ban, we used to buy the sachet tomatoes around N25 -N30, suddenly the price flew to N100box.

For the years the farmers were allowed to produce, prices of things went up so much, rice, garri, yam etc and they were telling us rise in dollar caused it, I mean our very own produced farm things o.

We are very wicked to ourselves in this country, everyone only cry for what benefits them and not the the general warfare of others.

Let them continue crying, wicked and selfish farmers!

Millz404:
No they are not. Blacks are the most vile, corrupt, inhumane set of human beings. Slavary was successful because it was a trade, blacks were selling off blacks. Whites obey rules more, are more better behaved, white neighborhoods are more safer than black neighborhoods. Whites contribute more to the greater good, are more eager to respond to distress of other humans. This is not white worshipping, just observation.

Blacks are just good at one thing, HYPOCRISY

Axis313:
You can't have it all,how about we that are not "morally mad",but most of us are hypocrites,we condemn bad people but we ourselves are the baddest.

Millz404:
Are blacks morally better?

Following the Federal Government’s approval for tomato importation into the country, tomato farmers under the auspices of the Tomato Growers Association of Nigeria (TOGAN) have raised concerns over the possible shortage of the commodity in 2023.

However, the Kano State Chairman of TOGAN, Alhaji Sani Yadakwari, said the association has firsthand information that the federal government has given approval for tomato importation to nine companies with a 10% duty and 20% levy only; poor policies may cause the shortage of tomatoes.

[b]He said this had reduced farmers’ interest in planting the crops, adding that it would demoralize them from farming this year, [/b]saying, “It is unfortunate that the federal government, at this point in time, has decided to approve the importation of tomato paste into the country. To be candid, our members received this information with shock, and it has drained all our efforts in tomato production.”

Yadakwari further disclosed that election time was a hindrance for many tomato merchants who would not dare to travel out of their domains.

“Most of our members have decided not to grow tomatoes this year, and coupled with the election period, Nigeria may experience a tomato shortage this year,” he added.

The chairman also said the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) had declared a change in the recovery processes, which would compound issues for farmers.

jaephoenix:
Western countries spend on 'immorality' and still spend on research.
And no, Yahweh doesn't exist thus couldn't have created anyone

Eviana:
My "no-nonsense/trouble" attitude...lol.
Not trying to be rude, or nasty.
You know it sometimes becomes necessary to use wisdom when deciding to engage in certain things and other things not so much.

He absolutely knows that the God of Abraham gives mankind nothing but "free-will" based out of nothing but pure love. Mr. Phoenix just wants to be an agitator.
So it then becomes my decision on how I want to respond.
He's on my prayer list though....as well as for individual hearts of Nigerians to surrender & return to the Lord.
You will make a difference, the Lord willing, if you honor and keep Him first.

Chips are fast approaching physical limits. Replacing them with minibrains might be the next step forward.

Brain organoids could be the next major step in computing, but ethical quandaries abound.

Artificial intelligence is the tech catchphrase of the moment, but it may soon share headline space alongside another wild new computing field: organoid intelligence (OI), aka biocomputers.

Computers, simply put, are running out of space—at least, computers as most people know them. Silicon-based chips have long been the standard for everyday usage, but most experts agree that electronics makers are quickly approaching the physical limit in both the size of transistors, as well as how many can fit on a surface. Merging organic matter with electronics is a promising new avenue for advancing beyond these constraints, including organoid intelligence.

Scientists across a variety of disciplines and institutions recently published an early roadmap towards realizing this technology utilizing “brain organoids” in the research journal, Frontiers in Science. The phrase “brain organoids” may conjure images of noggins floating inside glass jars, but the reality is (for now) a lot less eerie. Organoids aren’t whole brains, but instead small, lab-grown stem cell cultures possessing several similarities to brain structures, including neurons and other cells enabling rudimentary cognitive functions such as memory and learning. Brain organoids’ three-dimensional design boosts their cell density over 1,000-times larger than their flat cell culture counterpoints, thus allowing for exponentially more neuron connections and learning capabilities—an important distinction given the trajectory for existing computers.

“[b]While silicon-based computers are certainly better with numbers, brains are better at learning,” [/b]said Thomas Hartung, one of the paper’s co-authors and a professor of microbiology at John Hopkins University, in a statement. Hartung offers AlphaGo, the AI that bested the world’s top Go player in 2017, as an example of a computationally superior program. “[It] was trained on data from 160,000 games. A person would have to play five hours a day for more than 175 years to experience these many games.”

But AlphaGo’s impressive statistical capabilities come with a hefty cost—the amount of energy required to train it equaled about as much as it takes to keep an active adult human alive for about 10 years. A human brain, by comparison, is far more efficient, with around 100 billion neurons across 1015 connection points—“an enormous power difference compared to our current technology,” argues Hartung. Factor in the brain’s ability to store the equivalent of around 2,500TB of information, and it’s easy to see how biocomputers usher in a new era of technological innovation.

There are serious ethical hurdles ahead of researchers, however. Today’s earliest brain organoids are small and simple cell cultures of just 50,000 or so neurons. To scale them up to computer-strength levels, scientists need to grow them to house 10 million neurons, [/b]according to Hartung. More neurons means more complex brain functions, edging researchers further into the murky realm of what is and isn’t “consciousness.”

[b]As Live Science explains, brain organoids have been around since 2013, primarily as a way to help study diseases like Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s. Since then, these cell clumps have even been taught to play Pong, but they remain far from “self-aware.” The new paper’s authors, however, concede that as they develop more complex organoids, questions will arise as to what constitutes awareness, feeling, and thought—considerations that even the most advanced computers can’t answer. At least, not at the moment.