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On Memories

As we progress in science, the time is going to come when we can transfer memories from one person to another. They exist in some material form (as proteins I believe), and thus should be measurable, copyable, etc.

One interesting thing however that was captured both in an excellent Radiolab show, and in Cormac McCarthy's The Road, is the destructive power of recalling a memory.

It's interesting. As McCarthy states, "...each memory recalled must do some violence to its origins." According to Radiolab, McCarthy is right on the money. In their show, they explain that as we think about a memory, really we are constructing it from fragments of that memory, recreating how we imagine it was. Unfortunately though, the next time that we recall that memory, we lose some accuracy because we can't quite keep track of which parts we constructed the last time, and which parts were there from the beginning.

This is why people who dwell on a memory, or are repeatedly asked to recall the same thing, will quickly forget what was fact, and what they constructed. It's not that they are making things up, per se, it's just that what they believe, and what they constructed have merged.

So, what's the best way to remember your first kiss, or your the face of a loved one lost? Don't think about it - unless, of course, you're sure you want to.

The Singularity Is Near

I know what you're thinking: "The Singularity - What is Mike talking about? This must be stupid." I'm here to say that it might be stupid, but bear with me because I can't decide if it is, and I need to know the public consensus.

The Singularity is this theory I have been reading far too much about that there will come a time when "computers transcend biology." Think about that for a moment: computers...transcend...biology. In other words, there will come a time when computers are so advanced that they have moved beyond the limitations of biology; beyond what we now think of as computers, and into some biocomputing nano-thing.

The book I'm reading right now is The Singularity is Near by Ray Kurzweil. It sounds like a joke, and you'd think he was some two-bit writer that didn't cite his references, or that didn't know his shit, but sadly, the book has over 100 pages of references, and the man teaches at Stanford. So he's qualified to write about crazy future ideas.