What if you could remember everything?
 

I came across an article on Wired.com about a woman who wrote a book about how she remembers every minute detail about her life, from the age of 8 onwards. The article went on to dispel this apparent case of perfect memory and put it down to a form of OCD, whereby the woman in question, through a practice of keeping extensive and detailed journals of every day of her life and re-reading them over and over again, had come to memorize every detail of her life.

Link to Article

While the reality of this may seem like a nightmare, it made me wonder what it would be like, to truly be able to remember your entire life in exact detail, without that OCD aspect of it. Would it in fact be possible? What would it be like to be able replay in your mind the feelings and thoughts had at that moment over and over again? This includes the good and the bad. Would we be more insightful about our own motivations and personalities? Would it be painful and exhausting, or would it be highly useful and enjoyable?

In a hedonistic way, I think that being able to go over positive events in my life could become a bad habit - I'd want to replay those moments over and over again for the sheer pleasure. But would I be able to replay them with the same emotions I had then, knowing what I know now, in the after? Somehow that seems unlikely.

How useful would it really be to not be able to 'put the past behind me', and be able to re-experience all the negative moments over again on cue? Would I feel things differently because of what happened after? Could I learn something from this ability?

Or could I just have the memories but not the exact intense feelings of the time, but instead some kind of evolved emotion relating to the event, despite its immediacy and reality in the recollection?

I often have situations where I wish I could remember certain things more precisely. Like the first time I recognized that I am me. Or the first time I knew I wanted to be an artist. Or the first time I swam in the sea. Or any good memory of my father. Funny there are a lot of firsts in this list. I guess it would be nice to still have the awe and surprise of a child in certain situations...just the wonder of new things.

Do you think it would be good to remember everything? Why is our memory so patchy? Why can't we be more like computers in that sense? Would you like to be able to remember everything, including the feeling you had at the time? Would this be useful to you?

I wouldn't want to remember every minute detail and can't.
I do, however, have my first memory dating back to being a baby in a stroller. When I told my mother, she said "It must be a dream", but when I described the apartment I was in and who was there, she knew it was real.
Certain items trigger reactions that stem from memory and that's enough. I don't like glass block because it reminds me of something from kindergarten, but I don't remember what. Same with those little peanut butter cracker sandwiches-don't like those.

I think the theory that the woman was "remembering" because of journals is apt; otherwise, she would have precise memories from at least the age of 5, when our brains have reached adult size and the memory process really begins.

Funes, the Memorious - By Jorge Luis Borges - Athenaeum Library of Philosophy

it'd maybe be something like this.

memory is intertwined with experience in/of the present. not being able to limit it would mean not being able to function at all. what defines "normal" is as much the ability to reduce or eliminate information and as to retain it.

(sometimes this tic of keeping verb forms symmetrical in a sentence makes them look wrong, kinda like "that is the kind of thing up with which i shall not put.")

If our memories were 'perfect', we'd consume a lot more weed and drugs to block it out.

Imagine the invasiveness of total recall... urgh.

Thankfully, there's not much reason for evolution to favour such a system i'd think...

Yes, the ability to filter the entirety of our memory,
is paramount to some semblance of sanity.

Sometimes the 'normal' filters we are born with don't work that well
and I understand why people would self-medicate
in an attempt to restore some piece/peace of mind.

I tried that avenue.
It kinda works.

My mothers side of the family,
is well known for having what the rest of the family calls..'A memory that just won't quit.'

It makes for really good story telling.

I'm fine with the official Willravel CliffsNotes. Eidetic memory sounds good on paper, sure it would be nice to be able to examine the overall narratives of your life backed up by perfect recollection, but I wonder if that would make someone look back too often instead of looking to the present or the future.

Hey, I remember that you just used that word in another post!!!!


I understand the concern about "those who forget history are doomed to repeat it" but I'm in favor of "benefit of the doubt" and getting on with life

Some sort of savant?? I saw it on discovery. She's not the only person that can do that. Some dude in Atlanta was able to do the same thing after some sort of accident (If I'm to believe discovery channel).

I would hate to remember everything. Would come in handy in exams though I guess!!!

I think it would be a type of torture to remember *everything*. Some things are better left buried.

That being said, I wish my memory were better when it came to passwords and exam material.

insanity would run rife..... and mine would be the first to go

it would make for a good lawyer to be able to quote things verbatim.

or you could become a lecturer and ramble on about something when you're actually just reading from a book, or just take exams and ace them your whole life.

interesting thought though lil' tipp

Selfishly, I was thinking that this would come in useful in those hugely annoying situations when people presume to tell you that they remember what you said previously better than you do, and insist on it, when you are adamant that you didn't say any such thing. Heh

I would go insane! Selective memory makes everything seem not so bad, even though it was hell going though it.

NPR did a piece on this subject awhile back. I was in and out of the car, and don't (heh heh) remember all of it anyway, but the thrust of it was that if you could remember every detail you'd be unable to function.