Memories

We remember in sequences; patterns rendered useless and unintelligible if not committed to implicit and explicit memory locations. Implicit memories are declarative; unconscious motions and behaviors that naturally arise due to constant exposure or repetitive practice. This is why you may experience “highway hypnosis,” for example. Because you have repeated the task of driving to one place many times (or perhaps driving a straight shot on a highway for an extended period of time) it becomes second nature to you and you may drive to a location and not remember the trip there. Thus, the memory had clearly become devoted to your cerebellum for later use. This is vital for your ability to operate on autopilot whilst thinking about other concepts, plans, etc.

 

Explicit memories can be semantic or episodic. Examples of such are facts, events, and concepts. If you have no qualms with memory, you need not tell yourself to remember what you ate for breakfast or your own name. This fact is automatically dedicated to your medial temporal lobe and more specifically in your hippocampus. Without this facility, you would be in a ceaseless state of confusion, making yourself powerless to the world around you. Unfortunately, memory loss is common. From a biopsychological perspective, and according to Ribot’s law, you may suffer from losing recent memories first due to the weaker neural pathways of newer memories. This is applicable to recollection of memories in general and supports the fact that memories dim over time if not accessed.

 

There are no images, videos, or sound recordings in the mind. That is the greatest illusion. It is instinctive to believe that what you can remember is akin to a byte of information on a hard drive, but alas, it is just the opposite. Your memories are composed of a hierarchy of patterns in the neocortex. You are able to recognize such patterns because of your inherent nature to do so. From an evolutionary standpoint, it is indubitably necessary to be able to quickly pick up on minute details and devise subjective opinions, plans, decisions, and so on. This all ties in with your obligatory drive to predict the future in order to ensure your safety and survival. We are relentlessly foretelling future outcomes in order to fashion an aegis surrounding ourselves from possible danger. This expectation harshly manipulates what we actually perceive.

 

The neocortex itself is technically one pattern recognizer high. Within the neocortex are a myriad of redundant factors. Redundant factors are words or images that occur often and are analogous. Take the word cat, for example. Hundreds of recognizers could be firing at once when this word is spoken or viewed. Albeit you do not notice this, because your brain transfigures which form of the word is being used rather than making you decipher it. If the word is spoken, those recognizers will fire, and so on. Not every input pattern has to be present for a recognizer to fire. As long as some parts are activated, you will recognize the pattern nonetheless. This can ensue issues because you can misinterpret words or patterns for something entirely disparate than what they are meant to be. Optical illusions are an example of such.