| Author |
Message |
    
Hitman84
gatherer
Username: Hitman84
Post Number: 166
Registered: 9-2006
| | Posted on Monday, June 11, 2007 - 2:42 pm: |     |
Well, my memory is something I can't be proud of, I've always wished to have a hard drive wired into my nervous system. May be in the future with the human-machine convergence it will be accomplished. One thing is that the more I get to know about machines the more I detest them.
What actually causes forgetfulness ? Is forgetfulness hereditary ? Is it overlapping of memory that make us forget ? or is it just lack of concentration ? At times we get very excited and forget other important issues, has emotional precedence got some thing to do with it ?
Or are we just not good enough for remembering things permanently ? Or Is it that we don't know how to remember everything permanently ?
One instance,
In my younger days, I used to ride a bicycle to school. One day I had to ride a motorbike as my bicycle had a flat tyre. As I always do, I let the mobike move down the slope of the road and at the edge of the slope I rose from my seat and gave a mighty stamp only to realise that I wasn't riding a bicycle. That hurt so bad I can't tell you 
So does the brain carry out routines for certain predefined activities ? |
Scott
flint knapper
Username: Scott
Post Number: 2009
Registered: 5-2003
| | Posted on Wednesday, June 13, 2007 - 3:56 am: | |
Memory seems very fluid. While we remember generalities, we don't remember detail unless we work at it and even then, recall is notoriously suspect.
I suspect we carry out routine through memory. I go to work everyday, and though it is only a km away, I rarely remember how I got there and am oft surprised when I come out and there is no car, realising too late that I took my bike that day instead.
Scott
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
Ces gens, Jondalar, ils sourient. Ils me sourient. - Ayla |
Angakuk
flint knapper
Username: Angakuk
Post Number: 705
Registered: 6-2005
| | Posted on Wednesday, June 13, 2007 - 5:04 am: | |
I think it has long been known that emotions play an important part in the formation of memory. This article from Science News indicates that strong emotions may have the two-fold effect of enhancing the memory of events associated with strong emotions and muting the memory for those events just preceding the strong emotion.
This site has a more comprehensive discussion of the relationship between emotion and memory.
To dare is to lose one's footing momentarily; not to dare is to lose oneself.
- Soren Kierkegaard
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T1g3r_g1rl
bear cub
Username: T1g3r_g1rl
Post Number: 14
Registered: 11-2006
| | Posted on Wednesday, July 04, 2007 - 7:27 am: | |
Hey Angakuk - How are you?
I love my beautifull daughter - Taliah |
Angakuk
flint knapper
Username: Angakuk
Post Number: 706
Registered: 6-2005
| | Posted on Thursday, July 05, 2007 - 8:00 am: | |
Just fine Tig3r g1rl. How are you and your lovely daughter?
To dare is to lose one's footing momentarily; not to dare is to lose oneself.
- Soren Kierkegaard
|
Scott
flint knapper
Username: Scott
Post Number: 2043
Registered: 5-2003
| | Posted on Friday, July 06, 2007 - 4:45 am: | |
Thanks Angakuk. I knew the basics but I wasn't aware of the muting of memory for events preceding the strong emotion. All my childhood memories are associated with strong emotion - especially now with a child who is going through some of the same experiences I did, I have strong flashbacks.
Hi T1g3r g1rl!
Scott
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
Ces gens, Jondalar, ils sourient. Ils me sourient. - Ayla |
Hitman84
gatherer
Username: Hitman84
Post Number: 187
Registered: 9-2006
| | Posted on Monday, July 16, 2007 - 9:27 am: | |
Thanks for the article Angakuk!
Here is a comprehensive article on the memory code.
http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?articleID=2B01392B-E7F2-99DF-33EA093AFDA271B1
The one I'm interested in..
-----TOWARD DIGITIZING MEMORIES
Our work with mice also yielded a way for us to compare patterns from one brain to another--and even to pass information from a brain to a computer. Using a mathematical treatment called matrix inversion, we were able to translate the activities of neural clique assemblies into a string of binary code, where 1 represents an active state and 0 represents an inactive state for each coding unit within a given assembly we examined. For example, the memory of an earthquake might be recorded as "11001," where the first 1 represents activation of the general startle clique, the second 1 represents activation of the clique that responds to a motion disturbance, the first 0 indicates lack of activity in the air-puff clique, the second 0 indicates lack of activity in the elevator-drop clique and the final 1 shows activation of the earthquake clique. We have applied a similar binary code to the neural ensemble activity from four different mice and were able to predict, with up to 99 percent accuracy, which event they had experienced and where it had happened. In other words, by scanning the binary code we could read and compare the animals' minds mathematically.
Such a binary code of the brain could also provide a potentially unifying framework for studying cognition, even across animal species, and could greatly facilitate the design of more seamless, real-time brain-to-machine communication. For example, we have arranged a system that converts the neural activity of a mouse experiencing an earthquake into a binary code that instructs an escape hatch to open, allowing the animal to exit the shaking container. We believe our approach provides an alternative, more intuitive decoding method for powering the kinds of devices that have already allowed patients with neural implants to control a cursor on a computer screen or a monkey to move a robotic arm using signals recorded from its motor cortex. Moreover, real-time processing of memory codes in the brain might, one day, lead to downloading of memories directly to a computer for permanent digital storage.
In addition, we and other computer engineers are beginning to apply what we have learned about the organization of the brain's memory system to the design of an entirely new generation of intelligent computers and network-centric systems, because the current machines fail miserably in the type of cognitive decision making that humans find easy, such as recognizing a high school classmate even though he has grown a beard and aged 20 years. Someday intelligent computers and machines equipped with sophisticated sensors and with a logical architecture similar to the categorical, hierarchical organization of memory-coding units in the hippocampus might do more than imitate, and perhaps even exceed our human ability to handle complex cognitive tasks.
For me, our discoveries raise many interesting--and unnerving--philosophical possibilities. If all our memories, emotions, knowledge and imagination can be translated into 1s and 0s, who knows what that would mean for who we are and how we will operate in the future. Could it be that 5,000 years from now, we will be able to download our minds into computers, travel to distant worlds and live forever in the network?-----
One is never too old to learn or unlearn. |
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