Current Events > Do memories ever really disappear?

(+) Yeah! (+)

If so, how are you able to remember random minor things from decades ago?
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No, they don't.

What can trigger an individual to retrieve these memories?
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Varies, depending on the individual and the memory.
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Do you ever think about how weird it is that you can remember a taste? It's like youre almost tasting it when you do
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Random stimuli. Familiar sights, sounds, smells, etc. They're in there but our brain has most stuff filed away as useless until it appears relevant again.

no, they just morph.
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Sounds like a question for the board neuroscientist
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NeuralLaxative posted...

Sounds like a question for the board neuroscientist

@COVxy
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specialkid8 posted...

Random stimuli. Familiar sights, sounds, smells, etc. They're in there but our brain has most stuff filed away as useless until it appears relevant again.

What makes them resurface even at irrelevant times?
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bump
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No one really knows, but it's not exactly the most biologically driven question. The brain doesn't store memory like a computer, all the resources are overlapping.
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Is it possible we store memories in our nervous system like in the fingertips and around anal glands
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Doesn't it depend on how strong the neural connection is? The information from all the stimuli is there but can't be accessed together correctly as the neural pathways degenerate/are severed?

The way I heard it, there's no garbage collection (or free() function) but you can lose the pointers.
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What literature or sites would be good resources to read on this?
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YoshitoKikuchi posted...

What can trigger an individual to retrieve these memories?

Smell is a big one for me.
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Yes they can change and disappear.

Consider if a doctor performed surgery, opened your skull and cut out a piece of your brain and destroyed it.

We are doing the same thing all the time... your entire body is harvesting, destroying, and replacing itself:

https://biology.stackexchange.com/questions/24020/are-brain-cells-replaced-over-time
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shironinja posted...

Yes they can change and disappear.

Consider if a doctor performed surgery, opened your skull and cut out a piece of your brain and destroyed it.

We are doing the same thing all the time... your entire body is harvesting, destroying, and replacing itself:

https://biology.stackexchange.com/questions/24020/are-brain-cells-replaced-over-time

Interesting
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ioebgcivX1o" data-time="
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I remember reading an old Maxim article where a Vietnam POW spent a lot of his time in solitary trying to unlock old memories, and he claimed to have brought back memories from when he was only a year old.
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Blue_Inigo posted...

Do you ever think about how weird it is that you can remember a taste? It's like youre almost tasting it when you do

Yeah I find it kind of weird. Being able to imagine/remember tastes, sound, feel. If I focus on it enough, it very nearly feels like it's happening in that moment, in a way.
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if science is real, why talk can we see black things
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masterpug53 posted...

I remember reading an old Maxim article where a Vietnam POW spent a lot of his time in solitary trying to unlock old memories, and he claimed to have brought back memories from when he was only a year old.

In reality he was making those memories up.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/False_memory
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specialkid8 posted...

No, they don't.

Memories are fascinating. The truly amazing part is that we can't really access them vividly, despite that they hold a lot of power over us. Consider imagination, picture an airplane, where exactly is that airplane? Not in your head per say but the realm you summon it into. It's like your own private virtual reality system. Is there a way to access that space/framework while unconscious? Can you have real life inceptionesque moments? It's a lot to ponder about.
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Yeah, I don't remember most of my childhood

lincoln002 posted...

It's like your own private virtual reality system. Is there a way to access that space/framework while unconscious? Can you have real life inceptionesque moments?

It's called Lucid Dreaming. I've read of various people basically being able to control it like the matrix. Spawning in people, doing whatever they want. I've had lucid dreams briefly, but wake up shortly after I start flying.
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I don't remember.
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Silver Shadow X posted...

lincoln002 posted...

It's like your own private virtual reality system. Is there a way to access that space/framework while unconscious? Can you have real life inceptionesque moments?

It's called Lucid Dreaming. I've read of various people basically being able to control it like the matrix. Spawning in people, doing whatever they want. I've had lucid dreams briefly, but wake up shortly after I start flying.

If that interests you check out former nasa physicist tom campbell who's a consciousness expert. He goes on to detail how he's never done any drugs in his life and how he and another scientist were hired by a billionaire to conduct consciousness experiments where in they were able to enter each others dreams and inhabit a world and basically play around in it. He says in one video there's many worlds to visit in this lucid state. It's fascinating, I just wish I had someone to train me to do it like in doctor strange. I've had one to two dreams where I was aware I was dreaming and did stuff. That's why I've made threads about when we can realistically expect gaming consoles like sword art. Futurist Peter Diamondis thinks people wont be so fascinated with space exploration when they can access virtual worlds and live virtual lives in those worlds pretty much like sword art online. I never gave it much of a thought until he mentioned it. Imagine being able to explore world of warcraft for instance, like in person vividly, why would you even want to go to mars and have to work your butt off over there building infrastructure. It's a lot to be explored, I've often wanted to explore lucid dreaming more in an attempt to create something like sword art online, but you would need access to a ton of resources. Black mirror is a good show, they've got some interesting examples of how we could upload consciousness and whatnot.
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lincoln002 posted...

Silver Shadow X posted...

lincoln002 posted...

It's like your own private virtual reality system. Is there a way to access that space/framework while unconscious? Can you have real life inceptionesque moments?

It's called Lucid Dreaming. I've read of various people basically being able to control it like the matrix. Spawning in people, doing whatever they want. I've had lucid dreams briefly, but wake up shortly after I start flying.

If that interests you check out former nasa physicist tom campbell who's a consciousness expert. He goes on to detail how he's never done any drugs in his life and how he and another scientist were hired by a billionaire to conduct consciousness experiments where in they were able to enter each others dreams and inhabit a world and basically play around in it. He says in one video there's many worlds to visit in this lucid state. It's fascinating, I just wish I had someone to train me to do it like in doctor strange. I've had one to two dreams where I was aware I was dreaming and did stuff. That's why I've made threads about when we can realistically expect gaming consoles like sword art. Futurist Peter Diamondis thinks people wont be so fascinated with space exploration when they can access virtual worlds and live virtual lives in those worlds pretty much like sword art online. I never gave it much of a thought until he mentioned it. Imagine being able to explore world of warcraft for instance, like in person vividly, why would you even want to go to mars and have to work your butt off over there building infrastructure. It's a lot to be explored, I've often wanted to explore lucid dreaming more in an attempt to create something like sword art online, but you would need access to a ton of resources. Black mirror is a good show, they've got some interesting examples of how we could upload consciousness and whatnot.

None of what you said is real lol.
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lincoln002 posted...

If that interests you check out former nasa physicist tom campbell who's a consciousness expert. He goes on to detail how he's never done any drugs in his life and how he and another scientist were hired by a billionaire to conduct consciousness experiments where in they were able to enter each others dreams and inhabit a world and basically play around in it. He says in one video there's many worlds to visit in this lucid state.

It's fascinating, I just wish I had someone to train me to do it like in doctor strange. I've had one to two dreams where I was aware I was dreaming and did stuff. That's why I've made threads about when we can realistically expect gaming consoles like sword art. Futurist Peter Diamondis thinks people wont be so fascinated with space exploration when they can access virtual worlds and live virtual lives in those worlds pretty much like sword art online. I never gave it much of a thought until he mentioned it. Imagine being able to explore world of warcraft for instance, like in person vividly, why would you even want to go to mars and have to work your butt off over there building infrastructure.

It's a lot to be explored, I've often wanted to explore lucid dreaming more in an attempt to create something like sword art online, but you would need access to a ton of resources. Black mirror is a good show, they've got some interesting examples of how we could upload consciousness and whatnot.

That bit about entering someone else's dreams is wild if true. I'll be looking him up, though I have to admit it's rare I can listen to lengthy lectures for long, no matter how fascinating I find the subject matter.

But I've been interested in virtual reality for probably almost 20 years myself. I'm both excited and wary about actual dream based VR though. As interesting as I find lucid dreaming, induced forms of that are pretty much The Matrix IRL. And the idea of what could be done to a person in that sort of scenario is kind of scary to think about. Dying in a dream, having your mind erased or rewritten? Being locked in a dreamstate and experiencing hundreds or thousands of years like in Inception?

Really not sure what I'll do if we ever do come up with the technology. For now though, I can look forward to developments on ordinary VR headsets lol. Also, what do you mean you would need access to a ton of resources to create SAO in a lucid dream?

COVxy posted...

None of what you said is real lol.

Why not? Because you don't believe the sources? Because google suggests he's not literally making the story up if nothing else.
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Because we don't live in a world where the supernatural/metaphysical exists.
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COVxy posted...

Because we don't live in a world where the supernatural/metaphysical exists.

That's quite a silly thing to say with such confidence. I will concede that maybe we don't. I personally lean more heavily towards "we probably do". I'm just not sure about the specifics yet. Most of my idle thoughts are on that very subject these days though.
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