Eclecticism

"A Memory Lasts A Lifetime"

Hello, all. It's time for a trip down Mind-Screw Lane today, because I've been doing research into memory.

So one thing I found is that it's shockingly and disconcertingly easy to color or alter a human memory. You can see the former in many places; the one coming to mind currently is the court room. If a lawyer asks a witness to a car crash, "How fast did his car smash the other?" as compared to "How fast did his car hit the other?", then the answer for the former is more likely to be a higher speed. As a matter of fact, a similar study was conducted, and the average answer was 41 miles per hour as compared to 34 miles per hour. The first group also reported seeing broken glass when there was none in the image. So alteration, seeing the broken glass, is probably more common than you may think-- after all, if you're trying to recall something that happened years ago and someone suggests a detail to you, you might 'remember' it. But that's mild. Naturally, I'm not going to focus on that much. Suggestion is more powerful than people realize-- that example up there goes a way to explaining the number of false convictions legal systems have. Experiments have proven that people will choose out of a line-up a person who was never even at the scene.

And of course, it only gets weirder. It's possible to go a step further and create false memories, cure fears by inhibiting memories, completely edit memories in a way beyond just wordplay. Talking about false memories first, there was an experiment where 71% of participants were convinced that they committed a crime that had never actually occurred, and another branch of that experiment where over 76% of participants were convinced that they'd suffered through an emotional event (injury, dog attack, loss of money) that also never happened. Of the former group, 11% "recalled" elaborate details on their supposed crime and subsequent dealings with the police. Naturally, this is a little unsettling when you think of the implications-- the criminal justice system and prisoners of war are the first places my mind jumps to, but the uses would be as varied as human creativity allows. Abusive tactics like gaslighting already sow a wide field of doubt and discouragement, but if that uncertainty and confusion ("Well, is that really how it happened? Am I just making this up?") expanded into something like this, it'd cause a great deal more damage to a victim. I'm sure that there could be beneficial purposes as well-- I am, after all, reviewing a story where a general was allowed to gain closure by speaking to his dead son-- but call me cynical. I think there will be wide misuse.

Ultimately, the most convincing liar is the one who believes that the lie is true. These fake memories, spoken of with absolute certainty and vivid description, could contribute to the spread of misinformation to large groups of people, or create a higher number of faulty convictions. Already we've seen how suggestion affects court procedure; small bits of information like speed and the presence of broken glass can be affected by a simple choice of words. To some extent, we can see how false memories affect procedure, such as the line-up issue. But while details were affected by another person, these memories were generally a result of the witness's own mind. Now there's the possibility of entire memories-- not just the details-- being implanted by an outside source. I'm not sure how much this will come into play in common courts, since this process of creating memories took a bit under three hours (spaced out) and not many people have access to witnesses for that amount of time but the side that they're already helping. So unless it's to ensure that the witness speaks with certainty so that they aren't torn apart by the opposing lawyers, there's perhaps not a ton of applicable use. Clandestine operations, however... by nature of the name, we don't know exactly what they do unless they choose to release it or a whistleblower does. I'd imagine, though, that they would find this very helpful indeed.

Curing fears, while it may sound a bit more pleasant, also has some darker implications. One of the first experiments came from the study of memories-- it was once thought that memories functioned similarly to a library, where you shelved the book but could return back to it and find it unchanged, provided that you knew where you put it. The experiment began by teaching rats to fear a certain sound by pairing it with a shock; once the rats had formed the memory that sound equals shock, they began to fear the sound even when there was no accompanying pain. Brains make connections to form memories, but to discover what would happen to those connections during recall, anisomycin (a protein inhibiting the formation of those connections) was injected into the rat. Were memory really similar to a library, that injection would be useless; there would be no alteration since the memory of sound equals shock was already formed. Of course, this isn't the case-- the rat forgot its fear. So memories, in the process of being recalled, can be changed. This process with rats was adapted to treat long-time fears of humans. While in process of remembering that fear (for example, being confronted with a spider), a medication (propanolol hydrochloride) that interferes with norepinephrine in the amygdala is given, blocking the feeling of anxiety and fear during recall. Over a few tries, this removal of fear led to participants confronting what had made them afraid with little trepidation, and even over the course of a year, the effect remained. Research into alleviating the effects of PTSD have already commenced. Now, that's fantastic news for a lot of people, going from those with phobias to those who have PTSD. But the process can also likely be adapted in other ways. If fear can be removed from a memory through the blockage of norepinephrine, then what other emotions can be removed by blocking other chemicals? Love, maybe, or sadness.

Imagine that. Perhaps one day, the effects of a nasty break-up can be wiped away, or the grief following a loss can be relieved. Many people have said that emotions are how you know that you are really, truly alive, that by stripping yourself of them, you lose the full experience of life. To some extent, I'd agree with that. It's not healthy to be thoroughly miserable for months and months on end following a break-up, but completely taking away any reaction deprives you of an experience, good or bad. I'd certainly like to see treatment for PTSD and other disorders. But as with all new advancements in science, it's important to keep in mind the many ways in which this could be used, regardless of whether they help humanity or harm it.

In conclusion, memory. It's what makes you who you are, but it is not entirely stable. The basis of your identity isn't entirely stable. Whether it alters minute details or creates for you a scenario that never occurred or removes an element of a recollection that had great significance, the truth is that your memory is malleable. When you're telling a story of your childhood, maybe think about how that memory has been twisted, even if you don't realize it.

Supplemental Reading/Watching

Memory Hackers (video available through YouTube or PBS; also in header).

Implanting False Memories (video available through YouTube on the channel NOVA PBS Official).

"People Can Be Convinced They Committed a Crime That Never Happened" (article in Association for Psychological Science).