Received: by alpheratz.cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk id DAA22965 (8.6.9/5.3[ref pg@gmsl.co.uk] for cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk from fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk); Fri, 30 Nov 2001 03:30:13 GMT Message-ID: <009301c1794e$c5dd28e0$9324f4d8@teddace> From: "Dace" <edace@earthlink.net> To: <memetics@mmu.ac.uk> Subject: Re: Memories etch sense of self Date: Thu, 29 Nov 2001 19:26:15 -0800 Content-Type: multipart/alternative; boundary="----=_NextPart_000_0090_01C1790B.B6596E80" X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook Express 5.50.4133.2400 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V5.50.4133.2400 Sender: fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk Precedence: bulk Reply-To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
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Nice, little sci-fi piece here.
http://www.boston.com/dailyglobe2/331/science/Memories_etch_sense_of_selfP..
shtml
>>>
Without a brain - those few pounds of red meat atop our spinal
columns - thinking is impossible. The mind, and therefore the
self, is inextricably embedded in our physical bodies.
>>>
Without a TV, watching I Love Lucy is impossible. Is I Love Lucy inside the
TV? This is the level of sophistication we're dealing with here.
>>>
When a sea slug remembers, changes happen at the places where
nerve cells touch each other, the synapses.
>>>
This is to be expected, regardless of whether or not the brain stores
memories. It has no explanatory power.
>>>
Memories are stored as electrical and chemical changes at the
synapses where cell communicates with cell.
>>>
Evidence? I guess you don't need that when you already know.
>>>
The biochemical approach to understanding memory has been
wonderfully successful, but
>>>
By successful, does the author mean the theory has never been formulated
as a testable hypothesis and lacks any supporting evidence whatsoever?
It's not simply that no one has documented a sort of pseudo-artificial
information storage system in the brain but that no one has even worked out
how to recognize it if we did find it.
>>>
it is a long way from a sea slug to
an 88-year-old human who can remember the words of a song
learned more than eight decades ago.
>>>
This is particularly disingenuous. It implies that we do understand sea slug
memory, when in fact we have no idea how sea slug brains store memories
and no reason to believe they do. If we did possess such understanding, it
actually wouldn't be that far at all from understanding human memory. This is
manipulative, and it operates unconsciously. Most likely, even the author only
dimly realizes he's manipulating his readers. Rather than following from
reason and consciousness, the belief is self-replicating.
>>>
And not just a song.
People, faces, voices, places, literature, music, telephone
numbers, travels, likes, dislikes, loves, hurts, grandparents,
grandchildren, birthdays, funerals, current affairs, and the
grand pageant of human history - a vast and unique accumulation
of memories, profound and trivial, which are a human self.
>>>
The author is correct to equate self-nature with memory. The self spans
time as much as space.
>>>
The 21st century promises to be the century when we explore
every corner of the mansions of self, and understand, at least
in principle, how the brain gives rise to mind.
>>>
Scientistic faith.
Ted
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