little_tippler

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?

__________________
Whether we write or speak or do but look
We are ever unapparent. What we are
Cannot be transfused into word or book.
Our soul from us is infinitely far.
However much we give our thoughts the will
To be our soul and gesture it abroad,
Our hearts are incommunicable still.
In what we show ourselves we are ignored.
The abyss from soul to soul cannot be bridged
By any skill of thought or trick of seeming.
Unto our very selves we are abridged
When we would utter to our thought our being.
We are our dreams of ourselves, souls by gleams,
And each to each other dreams of others' dreams.

Fernando Pessoa, 1918

ngdawg

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.

__________________
Don't blame me. I didn't vote for either of'em.

roachboy

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.")

__________________
a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle
spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear

it make you sick.

-kamau brathwaite

tisonlyi

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...

__________________
"I do not agree that the dog in a manger has the final right to the manger even though he may have lain there for a very long time. I do not admit that right. I do not admit for instance, that a great wrong has been done to the Red Indians of America or the black people of Australia. I do not admit that a wrong has been done to these people by the fact that a stronger race, a higher-grade race, a more worldly wise race to put it that way, has come in and taken their place." - Winston Churchill, 1937 --{ORLY?}--

ring

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.

Willravel

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.

BadNick

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

Xerxys

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!!!

SabrinaFair

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.

__________________
"With all its sham, drudgery, and broken dreams,
it is still a beautiful world.
Be cheerful. Strive to be happy."
-Desiderata

cdwonderful

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

__________________
Never try to teach a pig to whistle
it wastes your time,
and annoys the pig.....

dlish

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

__________________
An injustice anywhere, is an injustice everywhere

I always sign my facebook comments with ()()===========(}. Does that make me gay?
- Filthy

little_tippler

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

__________________
Whether we write or speak or do but look
We are ever unapparent. What we are
Cannot be transfused into word or book.
Our soul from us is infinitely far.
However much we give our thoughts the will
To be our soul and gesture it abroad,
Our hearts are incommunicable still.
In what we show ourselves we are ignored.
The abyss from soul to soul cannot be bridged
By any skill of thought or trick of seeming.
Unto our very selves we are abridged
When we would utter to our thought our being.
We are our dreams of ourselves, souls by gleams,
And each to each other dreams of others' dreams.

Fernando Pessoa, 1918

lostgirl

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

shakran

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.