
The growing science of memory manipulation - occamschainsaw
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/a-successful-artificial-memory-has-been-created/
======
slim
The mere _possibility_ of tampering with memory is indeed the most dangerous
thing that could happen to humanity. Imagine not being able to believe your
own memory.

In fact we don't have to imagine, I believe I've been subjected to "mass
gaslighting" on multiple occasions recently on the internet : some piece of
information I'm sure I saw on the internet suddenly completely disappears.
Google + Facebook + "right to be forgotten" type of policy, make for a very
dangerous power never experienced before by humanity.

~~~
SkyBelow
The honest truth is that you shouldn't. People treat memory like a video
recording. It is more like a play that is reenacted every time you remember
it, where props are pulled out of storage but sometimes the wrong prop is
pulled out and yet nothing feels wrong. For example, maybe you remember the
day you lost your keys and found them between the pottery. What exactly did
that pottery look like? Pull the pottery prop out of storage, which is based
off of the most recent memory of there being only two pots. You now have a
memory of finding the keys between your two pots.

Happen to find a third pot that went missing and place it back on the stand?
Next time you remember the incident with the keys, the pottery prop pulled out
is the one involving 3 pots. So you clearly remember finding your keys between
three plots.

Well what about the old memory? You pull up the memory of a memory, but each
memory is generated with props and there is a chance you end up remembering
your original memory had 3 pots as well.

The more trivial the detail, the more likely you'll only keep around the most
recent prop only and thus have a false memory. There is a lot of psychological
research into people watching cars driving where the psychologist then falsify
memories of the vehicles (something that is never called out as being worth
remembering at the start of the experiment). It works decently well in adults.
It works horrifyingly well in kids.

~~~
carterehsmith
"The honest truth is that you shouldn't. " (believe your own memory)

That does not seem like a good way to live.

Imagine "not trusting your memory" tomorrow morning, and refusing to recognize
your bedroom, your spouse, your kids, family, your house, car, coworkers etc.

Seems like one would go insane, quickly. So yeah, I guess you do need to trust
your memory - but judiciously.

~~~
ccvannorman
I think I remember you challenging my assumptions with your comment, but I
can't be sure. Tomorrow I'll probably trust in a fallback model for what I
think your comment's intention was.

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maitredusoi
Sorry guys this is absolutly not new!!!!

More than 30+ years of psychology research proved that the brain reconstruct
any memories as it needed to. One sample amongs thhousands :
[https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1002/acp.1390](https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1002/acp.1390)

There are 83,000 more researches on the subject
[https://scholar.google.fr/scholar?q=memories+creation+photos...](https://scholar.google.fr/scholar?q=memories+creation+photos+psychology+research&hl=fr&as_sdt=0&as_vis=1&oi=scholart)
So prepare to be scare if you think you need it, as there is nothing more
volatile than human memmories (including yours ;)

~~~
flanbiscuit
I have been aware of how easily my own memory can be manipulated, even by my
own self. I've taken stories told to me years ago and have retold them as I
had lived them. Then there was the whole Shaq Kazam movie that people swore
existed but never did.

~~~
corey_moncure
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kazaam](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kazaam)

You mean this movie?

~~~
wahern
I think he meant the mass delusion about Sinbad playing a genie in a movie
called Shazaam. See

[https://www.reddit.com/r/MandelaEffect/comments/55f5rt/the_s...](https://www.reddit.com/r/MandelaEffect/comments/55f5rt/the_sinbad_genie_movie_complete_analysis/)

[https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/sinbad-movie-
shazaam/](https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/sinbad-movie-shazaam/)

[https://news.avclub.com/sinbad-created-a-fake-version-of-
tha...](https://news.avclub.com/sinbad-created-a-fake-version-of-
that-90s-genie-movie-1798259845)

Personally, I think it happened because Sinbad regularly wore windbreakers and
parachute pants, the name Sinbad sounds stereotypically Arabic, and perhaps
because of his darker skin and pan-ethnic features. When I stumbled onto the
meme I never once thought I remembered such a movie, but I instantly
understood _why_ people would think that way.

~~~
flanbiscuit
oops, yes I meant Shazaam! thanks for the help!

------
apatters
Interesting article but I was hoping for more discussion of the ethical
implications mentioned in the title.

As a society we frequently start with with consent as a cornerstone of whether
something is ethical or not (if it's done to you against your will, it's bad).
Then we decide whether there are certain lines you shouldn't cross because the
result would be harmful for you or society. For instance, you can drink as
much alcohol as you want but at a certain point you can't get into a car
afterwards, because you might kill or maim someone else. And you can take out
a loan, but there's usually a cap on how much interest the lender can charge
because above a certain level you'd ruin yourself financially.

So we'll probably say you can alter your memories, but are there lines which
shouldn't be crossed?

~~~
dclowd9901
It shouldn’t be allowed at all. If your memory is alterable, who’s to say you
agreed to it in the first place.

I know there are people out there that can benefit from this, but it’s too
dangerous to exist.

~~~
guerrilla
Other forms of recording?

~~~
dclowd9901
Even currently, all other forms of recording are useless in terms of use as
verification.

------
pimmen
One of the regulations must be that hacking someone’s brain, as in deleting or
inserting memories into someone without consent, is a crime akin to rape and
torture. You are violating someone’s sense of self and identity in ways the
person can’t reverse (the offender merely has to insert a memory of the person
consenting, or delete the experience entirely) and you reduce the person’s
agency by treating them like an object to achieve your goals.

We can’t wait for this technology to be abused, we need regulations and
International treaties way ahead of time.

~~~
samplatt
They WON'T have regulations or treaties though - not any that mean a damn,
anyway. Putting aside the obvious issues of doing this against someone's will,
let's have a quick look at some extremes that could be done with someone's
full consent:

What if someone WANTED a memory implanted of raping someone, so they could get
off to it? The consensual BDSM sphere is huge. Obviously pedophilic false
memories would be outlawed immediately, but that doesn't mean they wouldn't
exist.

What if someone wanted to self-identify as a robot, or a sex slave, or just
plain simple property. Could they have elective surgery for blank-memory-
removal to assist with their transition?

Say we went nope, full blanket-banning of the technology as a whole, it's just
too legally messy to allow. What if someone has experienced severe emotional
trauma from real-life events, and needs them dulled or removed to function in
society? It instantly becomes a politically-charged pro-life/pro-choice ticket
issue that gets carted out every time the government wants to make some noise.

What if someone is the victim of such a procedure (done illegally) - is it
okay to have some governmental arm "anti-hack" their brain.

Also, <insert the whole plot of Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind>. Also,
<insert plots of various Ghost In the Shell TV series>.

If the technology ever genuinely bears fruit, then only two things are certain
to happen: it will be used illegally, and it will be used by governments in
secret. Sometimes both of these at once :-)

------
Sniffnoy
This seems less like an artificial memory and more like a real memory of an
artificial experience.

~~~
Sean1708
What would the difference be?

~~~
Sniffnoy
An artificial memory would be if they directly altered the system for storage
of memories (however that works), rather than spoofing inputs to that system.

------
lopmotr
Artificial memories in humans have already been done. In the 1980's there was
an epidemic of psychologists implanting memories of sexual abuse in children
who grew up believing they had actually been abused.

~~~
wruza
Interesting how much of #metoo could relate to these phenomena.

~~~
rsynnott
Eh? You mean, "not at all"? I assume they're talking about the 'satanic ritual
abuse' collective delusion here. In this, young children were convinced,
through improper questioning (largely by untrained police, not proper
psychologists AIUI), that they'd been exposed to some pretty non-specific
abuse, often with supernatural elements.

This is worlds apart from an adult saying, spontaneously and without any
brainwashing from the police, that they were abused by a specific person.

~~~
wruza
I only asked on similarities of big public involvement in both cases. If vague
memories or feelings can turn into false memories under high informational
stream, could it be related? I didn’t mean anything that could be viewed as a
refusal or silly joking.

I have a couple of my false memories myself, and these feel very real (but
still false). What prevents few of metoo public-induced cases to be alike?

------
mrleiter
> Memories are essential to the sense of identity that emerges from the
> narrative of personal experience.

That, for me, is one of the main ethical issues. No matter in which society
you live, a very large part of its identity is derived from memory and/or
common history. If you can manipulate that, you can manipulate society. And we
already have so many subconscious levers pushing our perception of self
(social media for one), we shouldn't have another one.

~~~
buboard
> a very large part of its identity is derived from memory and/or common
> history

There is vast literature about how this identity is partially built on
collective _false_ myths and the desire to collectively _forget_ inconvenient
facts. Our public identities are largely defined by our willingless to tell
white lies to each other.

"Forgetfulness, and I would even say historical error, are essential in the
creation of a nation."

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/What_Is_a_Nation%3F](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/What_Is_a_Nation%3F)

------
eternalban
This is a provocative experiment, both in terms of the results and certain
elements of the employed experimental techniques.

What I found particularly interesting is that it elicits a consideration of
what is memory. Is the association of stimulus-response a 'memory'? (Where
does that leave 'instinct'?)

One could argue that the experiment has created an artificial 'instinct' and
not 'memory' given that there was no 'experience'. If one were to counter that
the invasive (modifying) preparatory steps of the experiment are "the
experience", then we have discarded the 'body' entirely and are in the realm
of brains in vat conception of 'consciousness', since we are asserting that
direct manipulation of brain is functionally equivalent to 'phenomena' as
experienced through the mediation of the body, the sensory apparatus, and the
nervous system.

~~~
tsimionescu
It is obvious and well known that phenomena happen in the outisde world, but
experience happens in the brain - Perception, usually mediated through
Sensing. But when I remember seeing a friend in a dream, that is a real memory
of a real experience, but there was no phenomenon in the world outside my head
that caused the experience.

At the current level of understanding, it is pretty clear that if we could
send the correct signals we control on the optic nerve, we would be causing
the brain to have an experience to the same extent that the retina does. I
don't think we know enough yet to go further than the optic nerve and say that
we could induce a signal 'after' the optic nerve and produce the exact same
effect,but that is still plausible. The next level of manipulation would be to
induce signals into the brain as if they are coming from the visual processing
area without directly stimulating the visual processing center at all - this
is far further into the future, if it is even possible.

~~~
laf21
> The next level of manipulation would be to induce signals into the brain as
> if they are coming from the visual processing area without directly
> stimulating the visual processing center at all - this is far further into
> the future, if it is even possible.

There's a new wave of interesting work regarding inducing patterns of activity
in the cortex using spatially precise two-photon excitation methods (two-
photon holography). This paper does a relatively good job in controlling for
the behavior of the animals in the study and shows that recalling patterns of
activity can reliably reproduce a learned behavior based on the pattern of
activity (and also probes at some aspects of general computations in the
cortex):
[https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6711485/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6711485/)

------
aussieguy1234
Just because an animal can't tell the difference between the real and
artificial memory does not mean a human couldn't do the same.

Using animals in research is generally inaccurate.

~~~
lostjohnny
> Just because an animal can't tell the difference between the real and
> artificial memory does not mean a human couldn't do the same.

In the same way, we can't tell humans can do it without testing the hypothesis
first.

If animals can, probably we can, if animals can't, it's possible that we can't
as well.

~~~
jpttsn
...fly? Shed skin? Sleep upside down? Survive without oxygen? Travel to mars?

~~~
lostjohnny
Probably means probably.

On the same (wrong) line of thinking we can't say humans can walk because some
of them can't.

Not all birds fly as well...

besides, some animals are better than others for testing purpose.

Mice are well known for having a great memory, testing mice for memory makes
sense.

Recent studies proved that mice memory cells work on experiences and not on
places, just like ours.

~~~
jpttsn
I’m contesting your claim, not claiming the inverse.

------
koonsolo
On the other hand, this could mean that people will not have to study anymore
(eg a new language), because they can just download it to memory.

"Oh man why does this Speak French download takes an entire 3 hours!?!?"

~~~
buboard
"Downloads taking too long? Subscribe to our notifications service. Get faster
downloads for just a single daily memory implantation of a product you 've
never bought but already love! Hurry up, supply is limited!"

~~~
UnFleshedOne
Introducing new ad blocker: WetBlock Origin, for each new false desire
injected by a marketing campaign, WetBlock will introduce a false memory of
you already having a satisfying amount of the desired object and enough time
of using it as to be slightly bored by the concept.

------
b_tterc_p
It might have some downsides, but let’s not forget about the daily torture and
atrocities we experienced before the government started manipulating our
memories.

~~~
guerrilla
> government started

Why do you presume that governments are the only ones with an incentive to do
so?

~~~
b_tterc_p
I think I’d remember if someone else altered my memories.

------
im3w1l
The description of what they have accomplished sounds misleading.

They stimulated an olfactory sensory nerve. That causes a real memory of an
artificial sensation. They also stimulated the VTA, causing the mouse to learn
that the stimuli is bad.

The mouse will not have any memory it can "look back on" of receiving a shock.
It will just have a general feeling that the scent is "bad" and to be avoided.

------
ccvannorman
This seems to be the defacto state of the world, right? I mean, take a look in
any history book (especially US vs European, or any Latin American countries).

Now that it's being called a science perhaps the layperson can get better
metrics and telemetry on how it's already being performed by big actors at
scale.

------
sireat
Philip K.Dick was prescient:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/We_Can_Remember_It_for_You_Who...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/We_Can_Remember_It_for_You_Wholesale)

------
nabla9
If I remember correctly, Shoko Asahara's cult zapped the brain of Asahara'
driver so that he lost memory. There were people with PhD's in the cult and
they had all kinds of crazy sci-fi plot schemes.

------
sshb
Title reminded me of this short movie
[https://vimeo.com/187108162](https://vimeo.com/187108162)

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sysbin
The next most interesting direction the researchers could go would be if
deletion is possible. I’m assuming the question of deletion being even
possible would be amazing to find certainty. I’m speculating for an existing
memory to be deleted, it has to be rewritten and thus typical deletion is
impossible without rewriting. Once all this is perfected, the future
technology of brain interface for humans will have even more potential. We’re
going to be able to interact with our minds as we do everyday with computers.
Very exciting!

~~~
tsimionescu
I know this is all in the realm of pure speculation anyway, but why would you
think it's plausible that a memory must be re-written instead of being
deleted? People forget things all the time, so obviously you don't need to
have an uninterrupted memory of your life so far. Are you simply thinking that
memories only get deleted to make room for some other memories, not
necessarily of the same events?

~~~
sysbin
My theory is re-writing is simpler, more efficient, basically elegant and all
that's needed for achieving the task of producing a memory. I don't
necessarily think forgetting an event is illustrating memories being deleted
because the same result can be from re-writing neurons for newer memories.

------
algaeontoast
“Literally Inception in Real Life”

------
aszantu
#inmice

------
willart4food
INCEPTION !!!

