Can We Get Better at Forgetting?

The Times past coverage of artificial intelligence (AI) seems to indicate similarities between designing AI programs and the human process of remembering. "... Remembering is a dynamic process. At a biochemical level, memories are not pulled from the shelf like stored videos but pieced together-- reconstructed-- by the brain." And, this seems to fit the general pattern of how AI programs are developed. An essential set, or test deck, of data is inclusively developed to germinate patterns of recognition in AI. Successive rows of increasing numbers of semiconductors then fan out from a starting point. These additional rows of chips require an inherent prioritization scheme for coherence. For example, similarities between AI and remembering also seem to exist with the process of substitution: "Deliberately linking an unwanted memory to other thoughts, which help alter the unwanted content when it is later retrieved." The New York Times Magazine in the Dec. 18, 2016 issue, contains an article entitled: "The Great A.I. Awakening" by Gideon Lewis-Kraus suggesting many linkages between these two evolving fields of research. [JJL 03/26/2019 1:15pm Tues. Greenvillle NC]

"his lab is looking at using real-time neurofeedback to nudge people who are trying to dim a memory into the mental state suggested by the new study: moderate engagement with the memory, not too much nor too little." Too much or too little. This reminds me of the state called equanimity, which some forms of mindfulness help you work to achieve. You allow painful memories to drift into your mind as they will, then let them drift out again, but calming yourself as they do through your lowered arousal in meditation. They begin to lose their charge, and I suppose if they lose their charge, they don't tend to pop up as often--a form of forgetting. I recently found the sites below, after a comment made in another NYT article, (thank you whoever suggested these!). I've found them helpful and pleasant, particularly the very structured way of learning mindfulness presented at Unifiedmindfulness. (Note that the training is free; and no, I have no financial connection or gain with or from these sites.) Shinzen.org Unifiedmindfulness.com

Re: my previous comment. Finished reading the article--seems the point is that you must try to remember a little in order to forget.

While I have a good memory, Curiously, I never remember mine or my family’s and friend’s bad events, diseases, surgeries, etc. I always believed it was a coping mechanism and looked at it as a good thing. Does this explain it?

This experiment was only testing one aspect of memory - the visual content. Every day I get reminded that my visual cortex is far more accurate at remembering than whatever other parts of my brain have memories. Example: on sight, I can remember faces of people whom I've only met once, but I cannot remember their name or background. More and more, I forget names of people I no longer see regularly, but given a slight (verbal) clue I can immediately visualize them and within 5-10 minutes my visual cortex will sort out the details and "voila!" - the identity riddle is solved with the now complete back story. Not wanting to go one forever on this, just remarking on how narrowly based the research model is in execution and results.

Simply being mindful of what is happening in the present moment of time important. Mindfulness! Staring into the past creates regret hence depression, contemplating the future creates anxiety, but living in the moment will create emotional, physical, and psychological health. When this is happens memory follows along.

Isaac Asimov wrote about the advantages of forgetting, one of them reduction of interference from bad experiences or information in making sense of what's happening now.

From a brief stint as a psychiatric aide in the sixties, I recall that insulin coma therapy, electroshock therapy, and frontal lobotomies all eliminated many memories from those who endured them.

It is not so much about the memories but the reaction to them

Interesting article on memory that touches my current research on using memory for educational purposes in a global setting. In traditional populations in low and middle income countries, maternal, newborn, and child mortality is high, frequently due to cultural beliefs that determine practices. A new method to train female community health workers (CHW), called “Sharing Histories,” helps them retrieve memories of events surrounding their own pregnancies, child-birthings, and early child rearing, onto which are built new understandings that influence future behavior. The act of remembering and of women hearing each others’ sometimes painful maternity histories serves also to strengthen social bonding among women to sustain group changes in culturally-engrained practices once memories are retrieved, analyzed, and relearned. Thus empowered, CHWs then go out to share memories with other mothers their neighborhood to help them change beliefs and behaviors. This learning method is supported by neuroscience research showing integration and consolidation of memory-related neurons when new information is provided related to the memory. See DOI: 10.1186/s12960-017-0231-2 , www.future.edu. Author has a doctorate from the Johns Hopkins School of Public Health and does research in Peru.

A quick question, and maybe I misunderstood; if the participants remembered 60% of the images they tried to remember, and forgot 40% of those they tried to forget, doesn’t that mean that they remembered 60% of the images they tried to forget as well?

A thought provoking article.EMDR has a proven track record in helping to reduce or eliminate traumatic memories and emotions and, importantly, the the distorted, maladaptive beliefs connected to them. See: http://www.emdr.com/what-is-emdr/

The art of forgetting is not possible. You will always remember but you learn how to control the triggers and the impact those triggers have on you as a person. The person develops methods of controlling their environment instead of the situation/environment controlling the person. The problem comes in the form of people since the person is not a robot. A person can witness a violent act and they will fear the same thing can happen to them or you might witness an accident. These situation could in most cases develop PTSD, anxiety, and/or depression in the individual and they learn through therapy in most cases how to move through life handling the triggers.

The work described in the Journal of Neuroscience is far removed from the act of forgetting traumatic events. Sure, in a scanner, if one is instructed not to pay attention to an image because it is supposedly unimportant, then yes, subjects can choose to ignore the stimulus- just as students who are told that certain topics will not be tested in exam may choose to daydream and stare out of the window. But the suggestion that this is in somehow applicable to the scenarios proposed at the beginning of this NYT article, e.g. spousal abuse or a botched job interview, is misleading. The process with which the brain encodes (and forgets) events occurs soon after each experience, and is likely to be highly conserved throughout evolution, largely automatic, and difficult to alter. For significant events, it is presumably accompanied by enhanced labeling and storage of the memory. While I understand the author's desire to make the original publication more 'relevant' and eye-catching to readers, such placing of a pop-science spin on research in a way that is unjustified and uninformative simply turns it into click bait. Particularly since some readers are likely to be struggling with painful, difficult-to-erase memories and may feel a surge of false hope on reading the beginning paragraphs. And while I am sure that the authors of the original article will be pleased with the additional coverage, they may not appreciate the overhyping of their work and results either.

Is it wickedness or just plain madness to remove a bad memory, or perhaps later the capacity for memory? After I turned down his offer for medication, a doctor asked me, “Don’t you want to be happy all of the time?” No, I do not. I suspect continuous happiness would be as much as a neurological burnout as would continuous sadness or fear. I prefer my baseline to be contentment. If something comes along for me to feel happy let me feel happiness to the fullest. If a tragedy occurs let me feel grief and in time return to a contented state, but I need to feel that grief. I claim the ability to feel and would not appreciate anyone limiting my liberties. Human agency for me is a capacity for joy as well as suffering. In 6th grade, my class was taken on a field trip to the police department. I guess the nuns had a vision of our future. I stepped into a 6’ x 8’ cell and pulled the barred door shut. I can tell you that small space had horizons and vistas compared to the size and limits of a brain that this article seems to encourage.

It’s a long running joke in my family that I don’t remember ‘the bad stuff.’ I’ve gone from laughing it off, to considering it a gift, to realizing at I get older that there is a somewhat conscious process not unlike the one described in the article taking place. I don’t lie to myself about what has happened as one commenter suggested, I consciously take what’s necessary and work to leave the rest behind. For example, my grandmothers death was excruciating. I remember how I dealt with that pain (by cleaning my refrigerator and writing terrible poems) and often I realize something new I learned from it - from her. But I deliberately refuse to remember things like the name of the hospital or the date or even month in which she died. I won’t be broadsided once a year for no reason. I don’t celebrate tragedy like an event, I weave it into my everyday experience and let it continue to unfold. One commenter suggested that we are our memories, I’d counter that we are whatever we can find redemptive about our experiences. We are not just a series of things that have happened to us, we are the meaning we have made of those things. Where there is no meaning, or we cannot find redemption, we may as well forget.

I've observed something in myself that I think quite fascinating. At the age of 56, it stands to reason that I've accumulated a good amount of information and details over the years, some of which I purposefully want to commit to memory for future reference. It would also stand to reason that with each passing year, there is more new information I come across that I want to add to my already-comprehensive database. But how to manage all that information while at the same time ensuring that I can later access the info I need with ease?? I've noticed that particularly with regards to people I've met over the years, had relationships with (which subsequently ended), colleagues who moved on to other employers, conversations I've had with random strangers at parties, fellow residents of my hometown (where I no longer live) ....I've noticed that my brain now seems to quickly determine when it's time to 'delete' a person from my database. So in the case of work colleagues whom I may have liked, but not enough to maintain a relationship outside the office, once the day arrives that they are leaving the firm for other employment, my brain says 'Delete!' If I have a conversation with a stranger at a party...even if it's a great conversation...but we end the night not exchanging contact info...my brain determines that I'll likely never see that person again, or if I do it won't be until another party a year or two from now, so I don't bother committing their name to memory.

The experiment described here is meaningless because it’s just remembering or forgetting a list of things, with no emotional connection. Memories of pain, humiliation, fear and trauma are etched onto the mind by emotion. I can see how redirecting or reshaping a harmful memory might disempower it to some degreee, but I cannot believe the memory can ever be expunged. I’m not sure it would be good to do that even if you could. Our experiences are what make us who we are.

This very topic was the subject of one of my favorite movies which is old enough that some readers here may not have seen it: Endless Sunshine of a Spotless Mind with Kate Winslet and Jim Carey. The comedy is hilarious; too, the implications of erasing painful experiences is looked at from so many angles. In the movie, it was a private company that, for a fee, will erase all memories of your ex romantic partner and then send letters to friends for you asking them never to speak to you about your ex. It also raised serious ethical implications when an employee of the company steals a person's sentimental items and mines her memory to re-enact what she liked about her erased ex and try to woo her. Wonderful watch, and I highly recommend!

I am 61. To me, the single biggest change in my lifetime has been the increased acceptability of lying. The advice that we should now "edit" our true memories to create less painful memories highlights this acceptability of lying. It's as though society now views lying as a type of "creative intelligence" that should be used to improve reality. But by devaluing truth, we are devaluing the most important part of being human. Unlike animals, humans try to understand "why" we live, not just "how" to live in the easiest way possible. How are we to do this if we can't trust each other, or our own memories?