by Steve Joordens
One of "The Great Lecture" series and truly great, I must say. What I don't know about memory now, well...I can't remember. I did takeaway the note that when people say they want to improve their memory, they're generally talking about their episodic memory. But things like crossword puzzles and Suduko only exercise their semantic memory, which doesn't decline all that much with age. Likewise your procedural memory (how to do things) doesn't decline much either although your ability to carry it out might.
If nothing else, the lecture reminds us of what most educated people already know--eyewitness testimony is horribly unreliable. But what we didn't know is that people tend to believe eyewitness testimony at an ridiculously high degree. "I saw the man in the black cap holding the gun," is, more often than not, a pure elaboration of an unreliable mind. It might have been a woman in a green cap with a banana.
And don't get him started on implanted memories. The scariest thing to realize is that people absolutely can't tell the difference between real memories, implanted ones, and ones that they have simply fabricated in their mind during the brain's attempt to add filler to the facts. If the facts are even true.
As to the lecture series, my memory tells me (hope that's right) that I enjoyed it tremendously. The only thing I didn't enjoy is the title--from the words "Human Lifespan" I'd fabricated the idea that it might touch on more than a single human's lifespan and instead talk about collective memory and even delve into anthropological questions. But none of that. "Human lifespan" means simply what happens as one person gets old--how does memory change? And he has an excellent section on Altzheimer's. With very sensible, practicable tips on managing patients.
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