[lend000]

While that's true, you need to consider that neurons don't act alone in a real system. Not only must one simulate the dozens of types of ligands and receptors in a typical neuron, but also how those ligands are modulated not only by neighbors, but also at a macro-scale (for example, if an organism increases serotonin levels due to some external stimuli, that will have significant effects across the nervous system, even parts that ostensibly have nothing to do with responding to that stimuli.)

So given ~20 types of receptors, ~8 response types ranging from inverse agonist to full agonist, and conservatively, 20 relevant concentrations per ligand, we have over 3000 states dictated both by macro and local conditions.

[ud_0]

Forgive me if I misunderstood your intent, but this feels a little like moving the goal posts on me. In my comment, I was addressing the specific claim that we know little enough about neuronal complexity so the number of atoms in a cell could be seen as a reasonable upper bound on the complexity of the neuron. When you say I "need to consider" the complexities of response modulation and the combinatorics of the entire neuron population acting together, I disagree (purely in the context of the original claim, because that was specifically about the capabilities of a single neuron).