# A memory is a physical thing. **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [March 2, 2005, 11:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-memory-is-a-physical-thing/292584 "2005-03-02T11:33:21Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Loopydude](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e56c9b/32.png) [@Loopydude](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Loopydude)\ **Post date:** [March 2, 2005, 6:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-memory-is-a-physical-thing/292584/21 "2005-03-02T18:09:49Z")
> [@other-wise](#): > > ``` > * “The neurobiological process of recollecting an experience is in some ways identical to the process of experiencing it in the first place!”* > > ``` > > This is hyperbole, exclamation point and all. Otherwise, we wouldn’t be able to tell the difference between a recalled memory and a currently happening event. Actually, brain surgery patients who have consented to be experimental subjects have reported exceedingly vivid recall upon having certain areas of their brains electrically stimulated. I cannot think of any physiological, or even pathophysiological process this quality of phenomenon might mimick, but it remains nonetheless that it is possible to access a human memory in such a way that the experience of recall at least approaches being indistinguishable from experiencing the original event. ---
**Author:** ![other-wise](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/4bbf92/32.png) [@other-wise](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/other-wise)\ **Post date:** [March 2, 2005, 6:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-memory-is-a-physical-thing/292584/22 "2005-03-02T18:28:52Z")
> [@Loopydude](#): > > Actually, brain surgery patients who have consented to be experimental subjects have reported exceedingly vivid recall upon having certain areas of their brains electrically stimulated. I cannot think of any physiological, or even pathophysiological process this quality of phenomenon might mimick, but it remains nonetheless that it is possible to access a human memory in such a way that the experience of recall at least approaches being indistinguishable from experiencing the original event. I do not question the fact that _extremely_ vivid recall of memories is possible. I disagree with the idea that vivid recall is indistinguishable from the original event. After all, the original event did not include lying on an operating table reporting the vivid memory of the original event itself. Also, the forgoing discussion assumes that human memory is a bit-for-bit recreation of original experience. Brains show a tremendous plasticity over time and memories become more like photocopies of photocopies. People routinely claim to have vivid memories of a given event, yet the details they report will vary wildly. ---
**Author:** ![other-wise](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/4bbf92/32.png) [@other-wise](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/other-wise)\ **Post date:** [March 2, 2005, 6:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-memory-is-a-physical-thing/292584/23 "2005-03-02T18:32:47Z")
That last sentence should read: "Different people routinely claim to have vivid memories of a given event, yet the details they report will vary wildly. ---
**Author:** ![Loopydude](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e56c9b/32.png) [@Loopydude](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Loopydude)\ **Post date:** [March 2, 2005, 6:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-memory-is-a-physical-thing/292584/24 "2005-03-02T18:42:25Z")
> [@other-wise](#): > > I do not question the fact that _extremely_ vivid recall of memories is possible. I disagree with the idea that vivid recall is indistinguishable from the original event. After all, the original event did not include lying on an operating table reporting the vivid memory of the original event itself. > > Also, the forgoing discussion assumes that human memory is a bit-for-bit recreation of original experience. Brains show a tremendous plasticity over time and memories become more like photocopies of photocopies. People routinely claim to have vivid memories of a given event, yet the details they report will vary wildly. I dunno. These folks apparently reported that they could see, hear, feel, smell the things they were recalling, an experience quite unlike any form of recall I’ve ever been able to conjure on my own. But your right; the awareness of recall precludes it being _excactly_ like reliving the original event. As for the imperfection of the recall, since the memory is all we retain as a record of the original event, we’d never know if it was flawed or not without reference to some other recording medium, be it another brain, or a videotape or what-have-you. ---
**Author:** ![Loopydude](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e56c9b/32.png) [@Loopydude](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Loopydude)\ **Post date:** [March 2, 2005, 6:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-memory-is-a-physical-thing/292584/25 "2005-03-02T18:57:57Z")
> [@other-wise](#): > > I do not question the fact that _extremely_ vivid recall of memories is possible. I disagree with the idea that vivid recall is indistinguishable from the original event. After all, the original event did not include lying on an operating table reporting the vivid memory of the original event itself. > > Also, the forgoing discussion assumes that human memory is a bit-for-bit recreation of original experience. Brains show a tremendous plasticity over time and memories become more like photocopies of photocopies. People routinely claim to have vivid memories of a given event, yet the details they report will vary wildly. I dunno. These folks apparently reported that they could see, hear, feel, smell the things they were recalling, an experience quite unlike any form of recall I’ve ever been able to conjure on my own. But your right; the awareness of recall precludes it being _excactly_ like reliving the original event. As for the imperfection of the recall, since the memory is all we retain as a record of the original event, we’d never know if it was flawed or not without reference to some other recording medium, be it another brain, or a videotape or what-have-you. ---
**Author:** ![Loopydude](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e56c9b/32.png) [@Loopydude](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Loopydude)\ **Post date:** [March 2, 2005, 7:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-memory-is-a-physical-thing/292584/26 "2005-03-02T19:04:43Z")
WTF? I don’t remember hitting “submit” twice! 😉 ---
**Author:** ![SentientMeat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/43a26b/32.png) [@SentientMeat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SentientMeat)\ **Post date:** [March 2, 2005, 7:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-memory-is-a-physical-thing/292584/27 "2005-03-02T19:06:29Z")
> [@o-w](#): > > So what makes one pattern a newspaper and the other a memory of a newspaper? Its temporal location (_ie._ which came _first_), and the exact form it takes: is the Guardian online a “newspaper”? My OP was using the word with an emphasis on the _paper_. The original was made of pulped cellulose, the copied memory is made of pixels or the biological equivalent: the first is a newspaper, the second a memory of it. If the copied memory was _also_ made of pulped cellulose, _ie._ the copy was _indistiguishable even in form_, like a copy of a DNA molecule, one could say that the memory is _itself_ a newspaper also. > [@](#): > > This is hyperbole, exclamation point and all. Otherwise, we wouldn’t be able to tell the difference between a recalled memory and a currently happening event. Not wishing to speak for him, I’d suggest that’s why he said “in **some** ways”. There are interesting experiments in which subject are asked to visualise a banana on a wall. When a banana is faintly projected there simultaneously, they _can’t tell_, whereas someone entering the room spots it almost immediately. This suggests that its similar but “fainter”: hardly “absolutely identical to the point where we can’t distinguish between the two”. > [@](#): > > This is non-sensical. We don’t perceive experience. We perceive and then experience those perceptions (which then enters our short-term memory). To perceive experience requires a cartesian homunculus. I suppose it’s easy to get tied up in linguistical knots like the author if one’s not careful: I’d agree there’s a bit of muddle here, but is it really all that _fatal_ to what she’s trying to say? I suspect someone as rigorous as yourself could find sloppiness in similar work in _any_ subject, from geophysics to evolution. That still does not mean that explanations for magnetic north or the extinction of the dinosaurs are wholly without merit. > [@](#): > > (Sentient, you’re going to love “Where Mathematics Comes From”) I sincerely hope so. What did you take from it, if I may ask? ---
**Author:** ![Liberal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/848f3c/32.png) [@Liberal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Liberal)\ **Post date:** [March 2, 2005, 8:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-memory-is-a-physical-thing/292584/28 "2005-03-02T20:01:45Z")
I’d let to get back to the oil pressure gauge, if I may. As I understand physicalism (and maybe I’m like Eris in that regard), the very gauge itself is supposed to have a memory of its own states. If the gauge is dependent on me or some other observer to document that it once had a 31 psi state, then its memory isn’t very good. ---
**Author:** ![SentientMeat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/43a26b/32.png) [@SentientMeat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SentientMeat)\ **Post date:** [March 2, 2005, 8:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-memory-is-a-physical-thing/292584/29 "2005-03-02T20:13:21Z")
> [@](#): > > the very gauge itself is supposed to have a memory of its own states. If the gauge is dependent on me or some other observer to document that it once had a 31 psi state, then its memory isn’t very good. That’s why I ask you what precise _mechanism for memorizing its states_ you’re proposing. It doesn’t seem to me that it has anything I’d call a ‘memory’ _at all_. Perhaps we could examine its structure to find some clues as to what pressures it has been exposed to in the past: if it was exposed to extremely high pressures, it might have _broken_ in some manner, thus forming what you could call a permanent record of that pressure, I guess. ---
**Author:** ![Liberal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/848f3c/32.png) [@Liberal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Liberal)\ **Post date:** [March 2, 2005, 8:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-memory-is-a-physical-thing/292584/30 "2005-03-02T20:19:33Z")
Why should I have to propose the mechanism? I’m not a physicalist. I don’t even think it HAS a memory. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![SentientMeat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/43a26b/32.png) [@SentientMeat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SentientMeat)\ **Post date:** [March 2, 2005, 8:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-memory-is-a-physical-thing/292584/31 "2005-03-02T20:25:47Z")
Well, OK: I wouldn’t say it had what I’d term a memory either. Why would physicalism require it to have a “memory” of its own states, beyond simply _attaining_ those states? ---
**Author:** ![Loopydude](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e56c9b/32.png) [@Loopydude](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Loopydude)\ **Post date:** [March 2, 2005, 8:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-memory-is-a-physical-thing/292584/32 "2005-03-02T20:28:00Z")
I don’t get it either. Unless it’s a special kind of pressure guage, it’s not a recording device. There’s no easily-retrievable imprint of a prior state upon the next, so there’s nothing like a functioning memory that I can see. Of course, being a big object, it’s reasonable to conclude it did not transition instantaneously from one widely discrete state to another (not impossible, just highly unlikely), but that’s not saying it remembers its past, just that we can rationally speculate about its past by induction. ---
**Author:** ![treis](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/bc79bd/32.png) [@treis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/treis)\ **Post date:** [March 2, 2005, 9:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-memory-is-a-physical-thing/292584/33 "2005-03-02T21:00:09Z")
I too don’t get it. A pressure gauge is a device to measure the oil pressure not a device to record it. ---
**Author:** ![Liberal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/848f3c/32.png) [@Liberal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Liberal)\ **Post date:** [March 2, 2005, 9:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-memory-is-a-physical-thing/292584/34 "2005-03-02T21:14:23Z")
Again, maybe I’m like Eris and am just massively confused by physicalism. But I’m happy to proceed directly to Loopydude’s rational speculation. I agree that we can prove satisfactorally that, at some point, the gauge read 31 psi. But did the gauge ever exist in a 31 psi state? No one observed it. No one knows whether some malfunction might have caused it to jump from 32 to 30. And, as you say, there is no record of it. Does its existence in a 31 psi state, as physical object A, depend on our knowledge, as physical object B? ---
**Author:** ![SentientMeat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/43a26b/32.png) [@SentientMeat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SentientMeat)\ **Post date:** [March 2, 2005, 9:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-memory-is-a-physical-thing/292584/35 "2005-03-02T21:43:22Z")
> [@](#): > > Does its existence in a 31 psi state, as physical object A, depend on our knowledge, as physical object B? If I may suggest, let us be very careful with this word ‘knowledge’. I’m saying that our knowledge is (largely) our _memory_: if the cognitive modules responsible for our logical processing make inferences _from_ those memories in a Darth Vader+watering can kind of way, they are not _strictly_ knowledge or memories but things we’ve ultimately _made up_. This is what, _given_ memories of 40 and 30 psi states, the 31 psi state ultimately “is”. Again, this does rather seem like an exploration of induction in terms of neuropsychology, which I feel is a little asking me to walk before I can run (_I’m_ no “physicalism expert” either - it’s just the option my computer, if such it is, decides to choose given the alternatives), but I’ll do my best. ---
**Author:** ![other-wise](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/4bbf92/32.png) [@other-wise](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/other-wise)\ **Post date:** [March 2, 2005, 9:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-memory-is-a-physical-thing/292584/36 "2005-03-02T21:50:35Z")
> [@Loopydude](#): > > As for the imperfection of the recall, since the memory is all we retain as a record of the original event, we’d never know if it was flawed or not without reference to some other recording medium, be it another brain, or a videotape or what-have-you. Good point, and I agree. > [@SentientMeat](#): > > Its temporal location (_ie._ which came _first_), and the exact form it takes: is the Guardian online a “newspaper”? My OP was using the word with an emphasis on the _paper_. The original was made of pulped cellulose, the copied memory is made of pixels or the biological equivalent: the first is a newspaper, the second a memory of it. If the copied memory was _also_ made of pulped cellulose, _ie._ the copy was _indistiguishable even in form_, like a copy of a DNA molecule, one could say that the memory is _itself_ a newspaper also. We may be whooshing each other here. I was using “pattern” as essentially synonymous with “form”. If “form” does not refer to “the arrangement of atoms”, what does it refer to? > [@](#): > > I suppose it’s easy to get tied up in linguistical knots like the author if one’s not careful: I’d agree there’s a bit of muddle here, but is it really all that _fatal_ to what she’s trying to say? I suspect someone as rigorous as yourself could find sloppiness in similar work in _any_ subject, from geophysics to evolution. That still does not mean that explanations for magnetic north or the extinction of the dinosaurs are wholly without merit. Is it all that fatal? You tell me: Do you _want_ to grant the existence of a cartesian homunculus in your arguement? > [@](#): > > I sincerely hope so. What did you take from it, if I may ask? Well, roughly, it takes an evolutionary psychology approach to mathematics. Bad evolutionary psychology makes my teeth hurt. Good evolutionary psychology is riveting and exhilarating. WMCF is riveting and exhilarating. ---
**Author:** ![treis](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/bc79bd/32.png) [@treis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/treis)\ **Post date:** [March 2, 2005, 9:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-memory-is-a-physical-thing/292584/37 "2005-03-02T21:57:28Z")
> [@Liberal](#): > > Again, maybe I’m like Eris and am just massively confused by physicalism. But I’m happy to proceed directly to Loopydude’s rational speculation. I agree that we can prove satisfactorally that, at some point, the gauge read 31 psi. But did the gauge ever exist in a 31 psi state? No one observed it. No one knows whether some malfunction might have caused it to jump from 32 to 30. And, as you say, there is no record of it. Does its existence in a 31 psi state, as physical object A, depend on our knowledge, as physical object B? Of course not all it means is that we do not have a record of it being in the 31 psi state. Things do or do not exist (on a macro scale) on account of whether they are observed or not. Just becuase I don’t remember my high school graduation does not mean it never took place. I still don’t understand what this has to do with memory. The gage has no memory of what state it, there was no other device recording its output, nor do I have a memory of seeing it at 31 psi. ---
**Author:** ![Liberal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/848f3c/32.png) [@Liberal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Liberal)\ **Post date:** [March 2, 2005, 10:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-memory-is-a-physical-thing/292584/38 "2005-03-02T22:25:59Z")
Let me go straight to what I’m getting at. Please believe me that I’m not baiting or pretending or arguing devil’s advocate here. I honestly do not get this philosophy. My understanding has been that gauges, thermometers, meters, and such, from a physicalist perspective, have awareness of their own states via the mechanism of supervenience. Even rocks, I recall reading, are aware of their expansions and contractions due to fluctuations of temperature. I do not see how there can be awareness without memory. What precisely is the error of my ways? ---
**Author:** ![Digital\_Stimulus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/aeb1de/32.png) [@Digital\_Stimulus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Digital_Stimulus)\ **Post date:** [March 2, 2005, 11:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-memory-is-a-physical-thing/292584/39 "2005-03-02T23:25:44Z")
OK, so this has been bothering me all day. I came back from work after discussing Fodor with a friend and reread the posts multiple times. I think there’s a problem here, which is that too many different ideas are being tossed around. It’s too expansive to start in on _philosophical zombies_ and _qualia_, much less cognition in general. (I’m as guilty of this as anyone else; I’ll refrain from posting anything about Fodor until it’s appropriate, if it ever gets to that point. I think **Liberal** is doing a fine job of being focussed.) So, the jumping off point is: > [@SentientMeat](#): > > All I seek to explore here is the contention that our memories of objects are not _fundamentally different in nature_ to the objects themselves. If we can agree that this is so, we can move forward to use senses and memory as the basis for an explanation of other aspects of cognition. and > [@SentientMeat](#): > > There is no fundamental difference between the nature of things and the nature of memories of those things. With that said, it seems to me that a proper framing of the question (at least for me, and I need it) might be this – with an eye towards discussing the possibility of the _computational theory of mind_, we’ll start with an attempt at establishing the possibility that _memories_ are purely physical. I think some of my confusion came from not being careful about what was meant by referring to “the _nature_ of memories” which, it is posited, is that they (adhere to? supervene on? derive from?) the purely physical. Since objects are also purely physical, memories and things have the same nature. **SentientMeat** , do I have this right? > [@Liberal](#): > > My understanding has been that gauges, thermometers, meters, and such, from a physicalist perspective, have awareness of their own states via the mechanism of supervenience. Even rocks, I recall reading, are aware of their expansions and contractions due to fluctuations of temperature. I do not see how there can be awareness without memory. I think you might be imbuing _awareness_ with more than it needs. For instance, is an amoeba aware? Does it have memories? Personally, I’d answer yes to the first and no to the second (with the caveat that I don’t really know). Does a thermometer have memory (assume a standard mercury or alcohol filled tube)? No. Is it aware? Well, sure – depending on what you mean by aware. It certainly reacts to outside stimulus, albeit in a limited way. To settle on some meaningful definition of the term, I’d like to ask: does that qualify as _aware_? If not, why not? ---
**Author:** ![SentientMeat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/43a26b/32.png) [@SentientMeat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SentientMeat)\ **Post date:** [March 2, 2005, 11:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-memory-is-a-physical-thing/292584/40 "2005-03-02T23:43:59Z")
> [@o-w](#): > > I was using “pattern” as essentially synonymous with “form”. If “form” does not refer to “the arrangement of atoms”, what does it refer to? In that case, could you rephrase the question. It’s as though you’ve asked “if dimaond and graphite are just different arrangements of the same atoms, what makes diamond diamond and graphite graphite?” > [@](#): > > Is it all that fatal? You tell me: Do you want to grant the existence of a cartesian homunculus in your arguement? No, of course not, but in terrotory as tricky as trying to _explain_ the “self”, it is perhaps to be expected that some references to “what I tell my brain to do” or the like crop up even when everybody’s trying to be very careful. Sloppy phrasing, to me, doesn’t impugn the entire edifice: I try to be lenient in these matters - even if we’re computers, we’re only human. 🙂 > [@](#): > > My understanding has been that gauges, thermometers, meters, and such, from a physicalist perspective, have awareness of their own states via the mechanism of supervenience. Even rocks, I recall reading, are aware of their expansions and contractions due to fluctuations of temperature. I do not see how there can be awareness without memory. What precisely is the error of my ways? That sounds rather more like _panpsychism_ to me, **Lib**. I’m setting forth a basis for what we call “awareness” based on memory and computation - I’m not sure one could say these things remember or compute anything. **D-S** , yes, that’s what I seek to establish first of all. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-memory-is-a-physical-thing/292584.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-memory-is-a-physical-thing/292584.md?page=3)