30. Memories Are Made Of This

Synopsis - Alicia went to Greece and visited the Parthenon. It looked better from far then near she thought. Wait, she didn't go to Greece. Instead she got a memory transplant from her friend Mayte who was the actual traveller. They've exchanged memories so often that Alicia remembers many episodes of Mayte's experiences. But surely she doesn't feel like she owns Mayte's memories?

This story's a little complex. Psychological reductionism requires the continuation of mental lives as opposed to the conventional physical self as a matter of defining the self. An interesting thought - is your existence defined by what you remember? If you woke up one day and couldn't remember your past, would you still be you? This si sort of like Samantha on the TV show Samantha Who? She couldn't remember what happened or what she was like before her car accident, and begin life on a blank slate. A scary blank slate.

In some sense it is true. Your memories are the connections the brain has to everything around you. You can't learn anything without being able to remember. Does reflex action require memory? It should, at some deep level - the brain knows to tell your arm to move away when it touches a hot pot. Remember that movie, Memento? Poor guy couldn't remember a thing and had to tattoo stuff on his body. What about fears? Are they memory-based or hard-wired? Would be afraid of roaches if I lost my memory and encountered one? Hmm.

Yes, I agree that the self must be there to have memories. I exist and have memories. But at the same time, we live our lives based on our memories. So drawing that line becomes harder. The older we get, the more we cling on to our past as a way of defining who we are. It's really not pretty when you don't know who you are when you're helpless.

Finding it a little difficult to conclude this given that both angles to the argument make sense.