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Drug Deletes Fearful Memories
Al writes "Technology Review has an article about a common drug that seems to 'delete' painful memories related to a fearful experience. Experiments carried out by neuro-scientists at Emory University show that propranolol, a drug commonly used to treat high blood pressure, can suppress the emotional part of a fearful memory. The results, published in Nature Neuroscience, suggest a new way to treat anxiety disorders. In recent years, scientists have discovered that the simple act of remembering a past experience requires that the memory be consolidated once again. And both animal research and some human studies have shown that during re consolidation, long-term memories — once thought to be fairly stable — can be more easily meddled with."
Now they can make money re-educating the same students they educated before! Think of the student loan debt!
Any relation to propofol, a.k.a. milk of amnesia?
Oh, say does that Star-Spangled Banner entwine / The myrtle of Venus with Bacchus's vine?
propranolol
So this will turn your fearful memories into hilarious ones?
So I can forget the past eight years?
Now I can finally forget the day that ruined my life. It took me away from schoolwork, friends, family...it was horrible.
Now I can finally forget the day I joined Slashdot.
"The difference between genius and stupidity is that genius has it's limits" - Albert Einstein
You know one does learn to avoid making many mistakes in life--I really cant fly, fire is pretty but it does hurt--by pain.
Besides just the idea of tampering with memory being a *bad* thing, the notion of fooling with one of the fundamental ways we learn strikes me as a really bad idea.
Soma anyone?
Steven
Interestingly, it turns out that the test subjects are actually ghosts who are dreaming the future.
I don't believe in time. It's a grand conspiracy designed to sell watches.
make me forget my ex?
Admittedly I didn't RTFA, but is this specific to just painful memories? I mean, I'd love to delete some memories I have, but I wouldn't want to run the risk of overwriting, say, my acceptance to law school, or memories of particularly good sex, for example. (Yes, strangely enough for a Slashdotter, I have had some.)
How can the drug possibly discriminate between good and bad memories, or for that matter, any memories at all?
I've seen this story before. I think.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
The article states that the experiments where carried out at the University of Amsterdam, not Emory University.
Microsoft Microsoft and Red Hat Team Up On Virtualization
Another thing to hear my tinfoilhat friends complaining about..
"The government is magically putting it IN THE AIR!"
How long will it be until law enforcement or the military drugs an interviewee, thus having the evidence thrown out?
...but not something you'd notice straight away? Would you ever even miss it? Would your life be a bit more crap because you lost a fond memory to look back on and didn't even know it?
"SIDE EFFECTS: Propranolol is generally well tolerated, and side effects are mild and transient. Rare side effects include abdominal cramps, diarrhea, constipation, fatigue, insomnia, nausea, depression, dreaming, memory loss, fever, impotence, lightheadedness, slow heart rate, low blood pressure, numbness, tingling, cold extremities, sore throat, and shortness of breath or wheezing. "
Lot of patients who I've dealt with who took this drug suffered from impotence and had to be changed to alternative medication - wonder if in fact all that happened is that they forgot what do with it :)
I vaguely remember being told by a gynae doc that Pethidine had some memory loss effects too
The article linked above also goes on to say:
"Kindt's team has already tested whether the propranolol effect lasts longer than three days--a key requirement for therapeutic use--but she declined to give the results because they have been submitted for publication."
So continuous treatment might be required? Side effects of prop. can be worse than the memories maybe?
Really, what's wrong with spending money on counselling instead?
(IANAD - but IWAP)
All they've proved is that the drug inhibits startle response.
I wish I could remember why my ass hurts.
If everything that you think you are (your memories) gets gradually shifted and rewritten from day to day, who are we? Never minding the fact that it appears our conscious existence ends when we die, it's almost as if we die a tiny bit every day. While I think I remember who I was 10, 20 years ago, if these memories are faulty and always being revised, perhaps I am that person no longer.
Some days, I look around and find it remarkable that I even exist. But, sadly, that appears to be a temporary state of being. Not only will I not exist in the future, it appears that I will not even be able to know I don't exist. And now, with these discoveries on memory, it appears that this gradual process of death happens even when we are still alive.
Dude, I think you smoked too much TROLL!
(>'.')>
I'll keep my alcohol. Years of private studies show loss of fear and suppression of bad memories.
Such a drug could be enormously helpful for soldiers suffering from PTSD.
This is my sig.
Scientology is gonna fucking ATE this!
"The only thing we have to fear is fear itself, and now we have a drug for it."
QamuIs Heg qaq law' lorvIs yInqaq puS
I guess using this technique you could torture someone, then make it "all better."
Lovely.
Soma -- Praise be to Ford.
If they delete all my fearful memories, I won't remember any of my visits to Slashdot. Fuck, I might not even remember this site exists.
And here's another dangerous feedback loop for you:
"Oh, what's this OS, haven't seen it before. 'Windows Vista', hmmm, looks good, like the shape of the box!" ...
*puts DVD in drive. Boots machine*
"Aaaaargh!"
*Takes tablet*
"Oh, what's this OS, haven't seen it before. 'Windows Vista'
Maybe this drug is the secret behind the success of Windows 7. No-one can remember how awful it is!
is a result of experience both good and bad. You would be deleting yourself.
Watch those corners
delete the awful memory of the scientology ad I just saw on this site?
I wonder if it works on bright pink colour schemes?
"I'm going to f***ing bury that guy, I have done it before, and I will do it again. I'm going to f***ing kill Google"
Phillip K. Dick has been done proud once again... sounds just like one of his novels.
Pipe it into the U.S. water supply, and maybe we can all forget the last eight painful years...
Actually, you can teach yourself to forget once you develop a certain level of introspection.
The key is in realizing that trying not to think about X will, in fact, cause you to think about X by reference. Combine that with the fact that one memory will trigger related memories (as if they were all connected by URLs or pointers or what have you... yes, I am a software geek) and you may start to see the solution.
First, you need a 'null thought' to overwrite the bad memory with. This should be a thought that references only itself. A software diagram that showed a memory scheme where address 0 was filled with 0x00 so that it acted as a null pointer that pointed to itself was what gave me that idea. It's not unlike the sink state of a state machine.
You might worry that it will develop links to the outside as you use it as a replacement. This is a reasonable worry, but solved via use. Most people can't remember how many times they've, say, breathed, because the memories are indistinct. There are simply too many of them. Forget enough and the null memory will be the same.
After that, you need the introspection to know when you're about to think about the thought you want to replace, at which time you divert to the null thought. It won't quite work at first. But over time, the memory will lose power by virtue of not having been thought of as much. The further ingrained into your mind the memory is, the harder it will be to forget. If you erase it right away, it may die on the spot. If this is the most painful moment of your life that you've lived with for decades... you might not be able to fully get rid of it, but you may be able to think about it a lot less.
Be smart about what you erase. Sometimes painful memories are a part of us. You don't have to erase everything. Just find a level you can live with and stay there. It's hard sometimes. And not every bad memory should be erased. Sometimes, you're better talking them out with someone you trust. Sharing your pain is another way to lessen it. That's a lot better than having some weird drug mess with your mind. And that goes double for illegal drugs.
This news came out in 2002.
http://www.neuropsychiatryreviews.com/march02/ptsd.html
In Russia this thing is known for centuries, they call it "vodka".
Can I get four years' supply?
The drug in the study is a beta blocker. They are used heavily to treat high blood pressure, heart rhythm issues, and specific aspects of heart failure. The study indicates that they MAY be useful in helping to dampen the negative feelings associated with traumatic memories when combined with specifically designed therapy. There's no claim that they can actually cause a memory to be forgotten. It's not a potential lifestyle drug poised for widespread abuse. Most links I've seen to this article and others covering the study seem to suggest that simply popping one of these pills will make you forget an entire event at will. It's nowhere near that simple. If it were, I'd be a lot more laid-back than I actually am.
Stan: Let's go watch the new Indiana Jones movie.
Kyle: Yeah, dude. Totally!
(in theater)
Stan: What are they doing?
Kyle: They're raping him! They're raping him!
Butters: Let's get out of here.
(two weeks later)
Stan: Let's go watch the new Indiana Jones movie
Kyle: Yeah dude. Totally!
After all, if you can't remember being tortured, and there's no permanent physical damage, where's the harm?
Also, with this or roofie-type drugs, I wouldn't be surprised if some people were willing to pay to be tortured, as long as they couldn't remember it.
Lastly, quit referencing Eternal Sunshine. Yeah, it was okay. The original PKD story, We Can Remember it For You Wholesale, was pretty good too. Of course, they never gave credit, just like Idiocracy never credited Kornbluth's Marching Morons, despite being a verbatim copy. Pretty sure Harlan Ellison had a similar story, but I... can't remember right now.
Oh look, the coffee just hit.
And they said some things couldn't be unseen.
Its just propoganda from the lol machine (crazy scientists with a sense of humor, propranolol)
... when 'Battlefield Earth' was released?
Wait a minute. I think I posted the same quip the last time this story came out.......Oh No!!!!! Old jokes live on!
Have gnu, will travel.
can suppress the emotional part of a fearful memory
What about supressing the emotional part of an intense, but not exactly fearful memory? There wasn't cure for love... till now?
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0116768/
'Delete' being misleading is correct. More often than not, we witness researchers 'mainstreaming' their research by promoting it to the general public - and using words to express it in a way that they mean, genuinely, but subtly is underrated.
These are the type of advances that ARE beneficial towards psychiatric treatment. As some above have already said, we are not all built the same, neither do we learn the same. Outliers exist as a result of experience or mental deficiencies that make the value of a learning process disappear beneath the weight of its trauma.
It is obvious that some who experience fear in excess on a daily basis will benefit from it, and it is obvious that some looking for the next cheap exit in terms of life's hurdles will abuse it. This is always the case. And at the end of the day, society's decision is based on this--the IMPORTANCE of this, that outweighs this debate that, I'm sure, has taken place time and time again--which is why these drugs go on to getting made: to give help to those who need it.
The disclaimer is there. Just because society develops a way to change what fundamentally makes us human, doesn't mean we are incapable of making the decision of what is fundamentally right for us.
For what it's worth, UFO abductions alleged use something like this.
Table-ized A.I.
I wish people would stop using words like "delete". Evidence suggests that the brain simple doesn't work like that.
I'm sick of these stupid "propranolol deletes memory" headlines. There was even an episode of boston legal or law & order perpetuating this nonsense a year or so ago. The drug does not "delete" a specific memory. The only people who can that are on star trek. The drug simply reduces the emotional significance of the memory, uncoupling it from the autonomic/fear response associated with it. A HUGE difference.
This article is misleading. It does not alter or delete memories at all, it simply changes the person's response to a memory.
Propranolol is also used by people who experience anxiety, because it inhibits the "fight or flight" response. Musicians routinely use it when performing to stop the shaking related to stage fright.
what the research showed is that propranolol worked exactly as expected; the subjects were trained to become fearful of a spider picture, and those who took the drug had a calmer response when seeing it. That's it.
As someone who takes propranolol daily, I found it alarming that the article would link selective memory loss to it, but then never really back up that point. Sloppy reporting.
I'll finally be able to wipe the image of Goatse from my mind.
I can win at the game!
I reject your reality and substitute my own.
TFA is more than most hyping of background and implications of a minor advancement, written so as to appear TFA is the origin. But this time there are even falsehoods in the summary.
The study tests a very physiologically based instinct and the effect if the drug to alter that response. Altering a physiological reaction is not the same as blocking part of a memory. Startle response is easily reduced in almost everyone by giving a startling or even sub-startling stimulus 1/2 second prior to the target. Nobody would dare argue that a stimulus prevents the effect of another simply because the body is unable to react to a second startle stimulus fast enough.
Recent research does not show that memories must be reconsolidated. Memories are constructed heuristically from components stored by association with prior stimuli similar to the present stimulus. The fastest good enough result to provide adequate response is accepted. Virtually never is anything recalled entirely accurately. It is during this construction phase that alterations from the original can and do occur. Such memories can be "meddled with" after this phase, as it is being held in consciousness. It is not because this memory exists in a malleable form, but rather because the brain continually refreshes the memory with a new construction, usually more accurate with time as new information (correct or not) becomes incorporated.
"I may be synthetic, but I'm not stupid." -- Bishop 341-B
now we only need a drug that makes us afraid of things we want to forget
http://www.google.com/url?sa=U&start=1&q=http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2006/11/22/60minutes/main2205629.shtml&ei=0iSaSemGDJCCNcW8tfML&usg=AFQjCNG6fzuWD3FE-G7us7pv5RxvXSmctA
http://xkcd.com/379/
Could this be coupled with a movie/book/song - so after you've paid the small 1 time leasing fee, you are required to take a pill to forget the movie/book/song. Don't want any unlicensed memories 'stealing' from artists!
This is a topic that has popped up on Slashdot several times in the last year alone... a beta-blocker somehow altering mind function to improve concentration, increase cognitive abilities, recreational "doping" of the brain, etc...
It seems far more likely, that this isn't actually "removing" anything from the brain in terms of bad thoughts, but instead is making the brain better able to cope with a bad experience by improving it's ability to reason it's way through it using common sense and logic.
Likewise, it could also be argued that people who can't normally focus on a simple task at will often end up going off on wild tangents at random instead, and will ultimately go insane trying to consciously resolve whatever scenario pops up in their mind at any given moment, only to shift the workload over to resolve a completely separate scenario brought on by attempting to resolve the previous one. Since this accomplish nothing but large amounts repetitive thinking on the same overall theme, while generating no useful information or solutions, it's not surprising that someone locked in such a state would be depressed and believe themselves to be "traumatized".
I suppose a beta-blocker might help a case like this, but it seems like this is simply restating the obvious to make whichever drug company did this study seem more "profitable" through sensationalism.
8==8 Bones 8==8
"The Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind"
Well, I did RTFA, and I understand it so that to get over the painful memories from my marriage, I have to take propranalol and marry the bastard again?
Being relationship-averse suddenly doesn't seem like such a bad thing!
Why doesn't this have the 'backupeverything' tag?
Fighting anxiety when it's for a specific reason sounds so easy. Man, I wish I had anxiety like that. Try fighting Generalized Anxiety. You can't tell what is causing it so there is nothing to fight. I know other anxiety disorders must be terrible but imagine the same thing except with no source. It feels like your body hates you. Torture for the mind. Horrible...
/.:
"Experiments carried out by neuro-scientists at Emory University..."
Technology Review: "...a neuroscientist at Emory University, in Atlanta, who was NOT involved in the research."
According to Nature Neuroscience, the researchers are all affiliated with the University of Amsterdam.
Reading the discussions here, some people seem to think that the drug actually erased the painful memories; which it doesn't.
My understanding is that with the drug, you don't have the same panic/anxiety response that you would normally get while recalling painful memories. That would mean that you can reflect on the event that created those painful memories more objectively and be better able to deal with your situation, if you're having problem coping with it.
The research in this article was _not_ performed at the Emory University, but at the University of Amsterdam.
I think you are all not seeing the big picture. man, marine taken up reported dead with all long term memory modified no name just a mindless killing machine.
This is from the University of Amsterdam, not Emory University. TFA: says Seth Norrholm, a neuroscientist at Emory University, in Atlanta, who was not involved in the research ...
In the new experiment, researchers from the University of Amsterdam...
Nanoprobes would totally whoop Propranolol's ass...
Radio Lab did a great bit about this a while ago. Check it out here: http://www.wnyc.org/shows/radiolab/episodes/2007/06/08/segments/71872
So this will turn your fearful memories into hilarious ones?
Just wait when it goes off-patent. You'll see knock-offs like propanorofl, propanolmao, propanolulz and propanocheezburgar.
Everone knows what this drugs name should really be.
Repressitol!
-Millhouse
It's easier to fight for one's principles than to live up to them.
the vista nightmares can end.
After watching 3 guys 1 hammer last night i really need this.
There's a simple mechanism in all of us, protecting our brain from being overwhelmed by something that we can't grasp at that moment. (Eg. because it is too horrible.)
It's called repression.
A bit of it is normal, and everyone does it.
But normally, you process it later, when you got the psychological hold and stability to fully face it.
If this does not happen, you will start to live in a delusional world.
Neurally, it is a simple over-association. You link things that are not linked in reality, because -- in simple terms -- the linking power was too strong and overflowed into other areas.
So, "simply" getting into a state of emotional hold (eg. by having a therapist or a really close person be with you) where you feel safe, then facing your fears (because now you can), and really mentally "diving" into the core of them, will result in a re-linking to the original cause. You can easily help facing your fears, by strengthening the congruence between the original horrible moment and now. But it has to be controlled by your own gut feeling of what you fear. Not by what you think. This is, because in this case, we address a very old and primitive mechanism.
When you re-linked the cause (= strengthened the original path of association) enough, you will notice all the situations where you repressed this thing, and where you lived in delusion. ;)
This can then be used as a tool to realign your associations with reality. (= weaken the wrong neural paths of association)
I found the best way of doing this, is to use the method of the self-fulfilling prophecies. This means that if you think that something will happen this way, it strangely usually does. (In reality, it only is much more likely that it does, because you act in that direction. Of course you still can't do magic.
So if you get in a situation where you notice that you usually did have wrong associations with it (eg. you fear going to work, because you got beaten up in school and therefore feared going to school), you "sidestep" your fears, use your tool to see what the actual reality is, and then tell yourself that you expect it to happen like you think reality really is. ;)
Afterwards, you can then say "See, I told you it would not end horribly", reward yourself for it, and take the not-so-good days on the light side. (After all, it is what it is. No good or bad about it. An asshole at work still is only a system that works in a specific way, and that you can control is a specific way. But if he *really* is an asshole, of course you can think of him that way too. But don't let him play you.
And that is the complete essence of neuropsychology on the subject of healing fearful memories, and every other repression/delusion/psychoblocade and even psychosomatic problems. In a nutshell.
Now if you do this, while balancing the difficulty of things to face with your own (then growing) abilities, you can really heal. Of course, it will not change from now to then. But I achieved to change things so massively in a matter of weeks, that I myself changed completely.
So you do not need any "repress this even more" pills. Because it will break out somewhere else anyway. Sooner or later. And then it will be even harder to detect and re-associate.
And you also do not have to have your memories deleted. You can face them and have no fear at all.
Needless to say, that this will give you a big advantage over forgetting them.
Any sufficiently advanced intelligence is indistinguishable from stupidity.
You may end up using Windows again...
"Damn it Bones, you're a doctor. You know that pain and guilt can't be taken away with the wave of a magic wand. They're the things we carry with us, the things that make us who we are. If we lose them, we lose ourselves. I don't want my pain taken away! I need my pain!"
Windows is like the faint smell of piss in a subway: it's there, and there's nothing you can do about it.
Elecroshock therapy combined with several cocktails of druds will do the job very very well. Of course it might delete slightly more then a specific memory nothings perfect
My doc used to give this to me for migraines..
it merely makes them bearable. If you were raped, normally you would be unable to even think about your memory of being raped without experiencing significant trauma. On the other hand, if you've been treated with propranolol as it is supposed to be used, you can then think about your rape experience and say, "Yes, I was raped. Ok, now what?"
The article has a quote attributed to, "a neuroscientist at Emory University, in Atlanta, who was not involved in the research." Further down, it says the research took place at the University of Amsterdam.
Eh, maybe it can remove the damage the goatse guy has done to some of us.
Gerry
I have a phobia of forgetting things? :|
Propanolol is a beta blocker used to treat everything from high blood pressure to tremors to fears about public speaking. While I'm interested in seeing where this research takes us, I'm a little concerned that deleting painful memories would be a bad thing because they teach us to avoid the behaviors that originally led to those mal events. For example, rape is terrible crime, but forgetting who your rapist is would be even worse.
Quite simply, the method you describe does not work for everyone. Believing it does not make it so. The causes can be many.
I think you're probably right about "it will break out somewhere else anyway". But the way it breaks out might still be preferable, for some people.