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Turning Memories On/Off With the Flip of a Switch
cylonlover writes "Using electrical probes embedded into the brains of rats, scientists have managed to replicate the brain function associated with long-term behavior and found a way to literally turn memories on and off with the flip of a switch. The scientists hope their research will eventually lead to a neural prosthesis to help people suffering Alzheimer's disease, the effects of stroke or other brain injury to recover long-term memory capability."
Any research on the subject of deactivating and then, at a later time, reactivating memories embedded in the subject should have been done on Manchurian Hamsters, not rats...
We all know it will be used by governments when they revoke ultra-secret clearance, companies when they want to keep R&D for themselves, dictatorships when they want to neutralize dissidents.
What has been seen, can now finally be unseen!
My understanding is that there has been some work in that area as well(inhibiting the formation of, or reducing the affective salience of, memories of a traumatic experience, say, could be much easier and better for patient quality of life than trying to treat their PTSD after the fact); but that most of it was pharmacological. Given that people manage to black out with stuff you can buy over the counter at E-Z-Booze all the time, never mind the punchier anaesthetics and experimental compounds(and head injuries, and degenerative diseases), the demand for forgetting-through-invasive-neurosurgery just isn't all that high...(and, since it is invasive neurosurgery, it isn't all that useful for some kind of "We haf vays of making you forget... scenarios; because scarring and implanted electrodes tend to raise even more questions than do 'unfortunate accidents' which are far easier and more reliable).
Was anyone else's immediate thought ERASING memories rather than preserving them?
Yes, in fact it was used on samzenpus: http://science.slashdot.org/story/11/06/17/2058214/Researchers-Design-Memory-Strengthening-Implant
MIB standard issue.
I just wish I could remember what the hell happened after the 6th Guinness and 3rd round of shots last saturday night.
Scratch that, the bits and pieces I do remember ... I wish I could forget.
There's a switch for that.
You can't easily prove the existence of criminal intent when the criminal doesn't even remember committing the crime.
I'd be interested to know how this could be applied to turning off traumatic or unpleasant memories, and the socio-psycholigical effects such widespread use would have. Aren't there memories we all have that we have thought it would be better to forget? Disregarding the use by governments for a second, let's contemplate how it could be used by an individual to shape their own consciousness. You could remove the images of your battle buddies being killed in combat, or your parents being killed in that car accident you survived. As a hack to short circuit the processing and digestion of unpleasant memories, this is an interesting (although perhaps disturbing and dangerous) technology, but it could be found that the negative effects could be mitigated with a combination of memory forgetting treatment and therapy.
If you build it, nerds will come. Soylentnews.org
I already graduated from the institution listed on the login page and therefore have no access to an active JSTOR account with which to read the article that you cited.
How happy is the blameless Vestal's lot
The world forgetting by the world forgot
Eternal sunshine of the spotless mind
Each pray'r accepted and each wish resign'd?
Yes, I'd like to erase the memory of what I saw when I clicked on that goatse link.
In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is usually crucified.
Or....is it!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eternal_Moonshine_of_the_Simpson_Mind
Why is it that researchers are always saying that their research is for helping those with medical conditions. Even if this is true (and it probably is), that is NOT the only reason and to imply that it would not be used for other functions is a lie by omission.
If this ever gets developed to the point where it could be used on people with brain damage or to remove trauma, it could also be used for memory wipes, selective memory cleanup, and other less pleasent actions.
I am not saying that we should not develop it, Im saying that how can we have discussions around the proper use of technology if we wont admit to what it can actually be used to accomplish.
Reminds me of the three wishes story from "Planescape Torment".
An elderly man was sitting alone on a dark path. He wasn't certain of which direction to go, and he'd forgotten both where he was traveling to and who he was. He'd sat down for a moment to rest his weary legs, and suddenly looked up to see an elderly woman before him. She grinned toothlessly and with a cackle, spoke: "Now your *third* wish. What will it be?"
"Third wish?" The man was baffled. "How can it be a third wish if I haven't had a first and second wish?"
"You've had two wishes already," the hag said, "but your second wish was for me to return everything to the way it was before you had made your first wish. That's why you remember nothing; because everything is the way it was before you made any wishes." She cackled at the poor man. "So it is that you have one wish left."
"All right," he said, "I don't believe this, but there's no harm in wishing. I wish to know who I am."
"Funny," said the old woman as she granted his wish and disappeared forever. "That was your first wish."
Maybe the /. editors had the same problem, which is why they forgot that this story already ran a few days ago.
XML is like violence. If it doesn't solve your problem, you're not using enough of it. --AC
Yes, I'd like to erase the memory of what I saw when I clicked on that goatse link.
That would be trolls’ paradise.
They could hit you again and again. Sure, you’d erase it afterwards, so it would be like trolling a goldfish.
Ignore this signature. By order.
Even without such switch, you can goad the same people again and again.
The scientists hope their research will eventually lead to a neural prosthesis to help people suffering Alzheimer's disease, the effects of stroke or other brain injury to recover long-term memory capability.
Yeah yeah, thats all well and good. How long before there is an app that one can use to un-see certain things that, well, should not have been seen...
Yes. Ever since I saw Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind I've been dreaming of a way to erase my memory of that *CRAPTACULAR MOVIE*
If you mod me down the terrorists will have won
This kind of reminded me of the episode of Red Dwarf where Holly had gone computer senile and the toaster reconfigured her to increase her intelligence at the expense of her operational lifetime. Intelligence != memory, obviously, but I wonder if there is any of the same effect here... not that it really matters - I bet there wouldn't be a person in the world diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease who still had some presence of mind who wouldn't trade quantity for quality
Traumatic experiences in the degree of "Affleck as Daredevil" would probably be impossible to erase without causing brain damage. Worst... movie... EVAR!
This is equivalent to hoping that you could fix with software the failure of a CPU.... Not likely to work.
That would depend on the nature of the failure. Have you heard of the Pentium F00F bug?
Oh, say does that Star-Spangled Banner entwine / The myrtle of Venus with Bacchus's vine?
Huh, David Cross was in that? Did he play an analrapist?
And make the mistakes all over again?
Just use a rat-protect tab.
Not to mention things like Google, where their whole operation runs on HW that isn't anywhere near "enterprise grade", but commodity off the shelf desktops (basically). How do they handle the inevitable failures? They design the software to deal with it.
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