10 ms·

The growing science of memory manipulation

251 points by occamschainsaw 7y ago

eternalban 7y ago
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 7y ago
  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 7y ago
    > 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/
- lostjohnny 7y ago
  you can't have a memory of something that hasn't stimulated you in some way. You don't remember the faces of all the people you meet on the way to work, even though they usually are the same people everyday.
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aussieguy1234 7y ago
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.
- npstr 7y ago
  A human is just an animal.
  - simonh 7y ago
    An animal with analytical and self-reflective mental faculties other animals do not seem to possess, or be able to articulate. For example, I know that some of my memories are not original. They are memories of me previously remembering something, which I was able to remember clearly at the time, but can’t recall as clearly now. But my memory of the experience of remembering it and the circumstances in which I did so are quite clear. So I know some of my memories are reconstructions. It seems unlikely there are many nonhuman animals capable of making that sort of distinction.
    - nine_k 7y ago
      Great apes, corvids, large parrots recognize their reflection in a mirror. Some of them are known to use tools in the wild. Cetaceans are officially recognized as conscious beings. What separates humans from animals is not a sharp edge, but something more like a smooth gradient.
      - simonh 7y ago
        None of which addresses the point in question. To re-iterate: >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. These animals seem to uncritically follow the artificially stimulated behaviour as though it was 'real' or original to them. It seems a reasonable suggestion that, perhaps, a human would be able to distinguish it from an original memory. Are you suggesting that is wrong? If so sure, explain why. It seems to me these objections are merely intellectual nit-pick points scoring, devoid of any actual critical or analytical point that I can discern. It's just so tedious. 'people are animals too' Genius! Now how about making an actual point?
Sniffnoy 7y ago
This seems less like an artificial memory and more like a real memory of an artificial experience.
- whytaka 7y ago
  Indeed. It seems to me that the more impressive bit is that the instilled neural pattern actually really correlated with the experience of the odor. But the association with the foot shock was real to the second mouse as well.
- simonh 7y ago
  That was my thought as well, but the article was confusing. It was talking about memories when what it was describing seemed more like experiences, but I’m not familiar enough with the technical aspects to be sure.
- Sean1708 7y ago
  What would the difference be?
  - Sniffnoy 7y ago
    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.
- tduberne 7y ago
  I would not even qualify this as an "artificial" experience. In both cases, the mice are subjected to very similar stimuli. The technology used to create those stimuli seems completely irrelevant to the resulting conditioning. I would have been surprised by any other outcome, to be honest. This seems quite different from the type of memory that is described afterwards.
sysbin 7y ago
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!
- pintxo 7y ago
  Not sure I am looking forward to experience a blue screen like, in my brain.
  - sysbin 7y ago
    I assume humans already experience a blue screen when suffering schizophrenia and or hallucinating.
    - samplatt 7y ago
      We experience blue screens dropping a bottle of milk. There's ways to freeze a brain or trap it into a kernal panic that require zero technology whatsoever.
- tsimionescu 7y ago
  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 7y ago
    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.
slim 7y ago
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.
- aloknnikhil 7y ago
  It also complicates the legal system as it exists today. The fact that artificial memory can be induced in someone's brain makes believing a witness a lot harder. So in addition to social and ethical concerns, it also upends the legal system.
  - dclowd9901 7y ago
    To be honest, witness testimony should never be or have been the sole basis for convictions. Peoples’ memory is so fraught with error that it’s basically useless on its own merits.
    - raxxorrax 7y ago
      I think this is an exaggeration. Witnesses often try to be as helpful as possible and in doing so may supply too much information they themselves aren't able to verify. Of course that can prove to undermine their statements in the first place, but I don't believe attesting memory failures addresses the core of the problem with witness reports.
      - beobab 7y ago
        And yet, direct witness statements from two helpful people standing next to each other, made immediately after the event can vary so wildly that you would wonder if they are describing the same event. paraphrased from "The Invisible Gorilla: and other ways our intuition deceives us" (Chabris and Simons) https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B003P9XE56/ https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B003P9XE56/
pimmen 7y ago
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 7y ago
  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 :-)
apatters 7y ago
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?
- sysbin 7y ago
  Those lines will be crossed by just visiting a country that has different interpretations of what's acceptable to do. I could also see the severely mentally ill or mentally handicapped, having no personal say in what happens to them and similar to today when it comes to medication being used.
  - TeMPOraL 7y ago
    > Those lines will be crossed by just visiting a country that has different interpretations of what's acceptable to do. To some extent. For instance, I know of no country that allows you to drive while intoxicated (modulo varying minimums) while having enough car and population density for such driving to be a problem. You're probably thinking of China and their laxer approach towards human genetic research. But that's arguably just having lines that shall not be crossed and staying on the good side of them; US and Europe seem to have decided instead to ban the whole field.
- dclowd9901 7y ago
  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.
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aszantu 7y ago
#inmice
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lopmotr 7y ago
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 7y ago
  Interesting how much of #metoo could relate to these phenomena.
  - rsynnott 7y ago
    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 7y ago
      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?
- function_seven 7y ago
  I have my own example of this. Something I remember with clarity, but didn't happen. Not as horrific as sexual abuse, but close enough to convince me how fallible our memories are. A few years ago a friend an I were having dinner at a restaurant. The waiter came by to serve water, and as he was filling our glasses, he would raise the pitcher up very high above the glass while saying to himself, "Easy, Franciso... Eeeasy!" It was funny. Except that's not what happened at all. What really happened was that we were there at dinner when my friend told me the story of some other time he had a waiter that did just that. He must have described it to me in sufficient detail for me to form the mental image and merge it with our dinner that night. A couple years later, I start telling this story as if I had been there, to a group of people that included my friend from that night. That's when I learned that it was a false memory. It was disorienting to say the least. As soon as this was pointed out to me, I did remember the real conversation and him telling me.
sshb 7y ago
Title reminded me of this short movie https://vimeo.com/187108162 https://vimeo.com/187108162
koonsolo 7y ago
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!?!?"
- rimliu 7y ago
  O wonder would that work as well as becoming the musician at the moment you buy a violin.
- buboard 7y ago
  "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!"
  - tomaskafka 7y ago
    No, you'll just have a free learn-french-in-3-seconds course by Google, which will bundle a set of preferences (like cheeseburger, detergent, or designer bag brand) from advertisers who are paying this. At this point all that remains of "you" is a bag of meat.
  - UnFleshedOne 7y ago
    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.
mrleiter 7y ago
> 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 7y ago
  > 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
nabla9 7y ago
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.
im3w1l 7y ago
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.
b_tterc_p 7y ago
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 7y ago
  > government started Why do you presume that governments are the only ones with an incentive to do so?
  - b_tterc_p 7y ago
    I think I’d remember if someone else altered my memories.
- deleted 7y ago
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sireat 7y ago
Philip K.Dick was prescient: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/We_Can_Remember_It_for_You_Wholesale https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/We_Can_Remember_It_for_You_Who...
willart4food 7y ago
INCEPTION !!!
maitredusoi 7y ago
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+psychology+research&hl=fr&as_sdt=0&as_vis=1&oi=scholart https://scholar.google.fr/scholar?q=memories+creation+photos... So prepare to be scare if you think you need it, as there is nothing more volatile than human memmories (including yours ;)
- flanbiscuit 7y ago
  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 7y ago
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kazaam https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kazaam You mean this movie?
    - wahern 7y ago
      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_sinbad_genie_movie_complete_analysis/ https://www.reddit.com/r/MandelaEffect/comments/55f5rt/the_s... 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-that-90s-genie-movie-1798259845 https://news.avclub.com/sinbad-created-a-fake-version-of-tha... 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.
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algaeontoast 7y ago
“Literally Inception in Real Life”
ccvannorman 7y ago
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.

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 7y ago
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 7y ago
  > 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/
lostjohnny 7y ago
you can't have a memory of something that hasn't stimulated you in some way. You don't remember the faces of all the people you meet on the way to work, even though they usually are the same people everyday.

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aussieguy1234 7y ago

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.

npstr 7y ago
A human is just an animal.
- simonh 7y ago
  An animal with analytical and self-reflective mental faculties other animals do not seem to possess, or be able to articulate. For example, I know that some of my memories are not original. They are memories of me previously remembering something, which I was able to remember clearly at the time, but can’t recall as clearly now. But my memory of the experience of remembering it and the circumstances in which I did so are quite clear. So I know some of my memories are reconstructions. It seems unlikely there are many nonhuman animals capable of making that sort of distinction.
  - nine_k 7y ago
    Great apes, corvids, large parrots recognize their reflection in a mirror. Some of them are known to use tools in the wild. Cetaceans are officially recognized as conscious beings. What separates humans from animals is not a sharp edge, but something more like a smooth gradient.
    - simonh 7y ago
      None of which addresses the point in question. To re-iterate: >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. These animals seem to uncritically follow the artificially stimulated behaviour as though it was 'real' or original to them. It seems a reasonable suggestion that, perhaps, a human would be able to distinguish it from an original memory. Are you suggesting that is wrong? If so sure, explain why. It seems to me these objections are merely intellectual nit-pick points scoring, devoid of any actual critical or analytical point that I can discern. It's just so tedious. 'people are animals too' Genius! Now how about making an actual point?

Sniffnoy 7y ago

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

whytaka 7y ago
Indeed. It seems to me that the more impressive bit is that the instilled neural pattern actually really correlated with the experience of the odor. But the association with the foot shock was real to the second mouse as well.
simonh 7y ago
That was my thought as well, but the article was confusing. It was talking about memories when what it was describing seemed more like experiences, but I’m not familiar enough with the technical aspects to be sure.
Sean1708 7y ago
What would the difference be?
- Sniffnoy 7y ago
  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.
tduberne 7y ago
I would not even qualify this as an "artificial" experience. In both cases, the mice are subjected to very similar stimuli. The technology used to create those stimuli seems completely irrelevant to the resulting conditioning. I would have been surprised by any other outcome, to be honest. This seems quite different from the type of memory that is described afterwards.

sysbin 7y ago

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!

pintxo 7y ago
Not sure I am looking forward to experience a blue screen like, in my brain.
- sysbin 7y ago
  I assume humans already experience a blue screen when suffering schizophrenia and or hallucinating.
  - samplatt 7y ago
    We experience blue screens dropping a bottle of milk. There's ways to freeze a brain or trap it into a kernal panic that require zero technology whatsoever.
tsimionescu 7y ago
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 7y ago
  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.

slim 7y ago

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.

aloknnikhil 7y ago
It also complicates the legal system as it exists today. The fact that artificial memory can be induced in someone's brain makes believing a witness a lot harder. So in addition to social and ethical concerns, it also upends the legal system.
- dclowd9901 7y ago
  To be honest, witness testimony should never be or have been the sole basis for convictions. Peoples’ memory is so fraught with error that it’s basically useless on its own merits.
  - raxxorrax 7y ago
    I think this is an exaggeration. Witnesses often try to be as helpful as possible and in doing so may supply too much information they themselves aren't able to verify. Of course that can prove to undermine their statements in the first place, but I don't believe attesting memory failures addresses the core of the problem with witness reports.
    - beobab 7y ago
      And yet, direct witness statements from two helpful people standing next to each other, made immediately after the event can vary so wildly that you would wonder if they are describing the same event. paraphrased from "The Invisible Gorilla: and other ways our intuition deceives us" (Chabris and Simons) https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B003P9XE56/ https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B003P9XE56/

pimmen 7y ago

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 7y ago
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 :-)

apatters 7y ago

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?

sysbin 7y ago
Those lines will be crossed by just visiting a country that has different interpretations of what's acceptable to do. I could also see the severely mentally ill or mentally handicapped, having no personal say in what happens to them and similar to today when it comes to medication being used.
- TeMPOraL 7y ago
  > Those lines will be crossed by just visiting a country that has different interpretations of what's acceptable to do. To some extent. For instance, I know of no country that allows you to drive while intoxicated (modulo varying minimums) while having enough car and population density for such driving to be a problem. You're probably thinking of China and their laxer approach towards human genetic research. But that's arguably just having lines that shall not be crossed and staying on the good side of them; US and Europe seem to have decided instead to ban the whole field.
dclowd9901 7y ago
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.

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aszantu 7y ago

#inmice

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lopmotr 7y ago

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 7y ago
Interesting how much of #metoo could relate to these phenomena.
- rsynnott 7y ago
  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 7y ago
    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?
function_seven 7y ago
I have my own example of this. Something I remember with clarity, but didn't happen. Not as horrific as sexual abuse, but close enough to convince me how fallible our memories are. A few years ago a friend an I were having dinner at a restaurant. The waiter came by to serve water, and as he was filling our glasses, he would raise the pitcher up very high above the glass while saying to himself, "Easy, Franciso... Eeeasy!" It was funny. Except that's not what happened at all. What really happened was that we were there at dinner when my friend told me the story of some other time he had a waiter that did just that. He must have described it to me in sufficient detail for me to form the mental image and merge it with our dinner that night. A couple years later, I start telling this story as if I had been there, to a group of people that included my friend from that night. That's when I learned that it was a false memory. It was disorienting to say the least. As soon as this was pointed out to me, I did remember the real conversation and him telling me.

sshb 7y ago

Title reminded me of this short movie https://vimeo.com/187108162 https://vimeo.com/187108162

koonsolo 7y ago

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!?!?"

rimliu 7y ago
O wonder would that work as well as becoming the musician at the moment you buy a violin.
buboard 7y ago
"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!"
- tomaskafka 7y ago
  No, you'll just have a free learn-french-in-3-seconds course by Google, which will bundle a set of preferences (like cheeseburger, detergent, or designer bag brand) from advertisers who are paying this. At this point all that remains of "you" is a bag of meat.
- UnFleshedOne 7y ago
  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.

mrleiter 7y ago

> 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 7y ago
> 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

nabla9 7y ago

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.

im3w1l 7y ago

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.

b_tterc_p 7y ago

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 7y ago
> government started Why do you presume that governments are the only ones with an incentive to do so?
- b_tterc_p 7y ago
  I think I’d remember if someone else altered my memories.
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sireat 7y ago

Philip K.Dick was prescient: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/We_Can_Remember_It_for_You_Wholesale https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/We_Can_Remember_It_for_You_Who...

willart4food 7y ago

INCEPTION !!!

maitredusoi 7y ago

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

flanbiscuit 7y ago
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 7y ago
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kazaam https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kazaam You mean this movie?
  - wahern 7y ago
    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_sinbad_genie_movie_complete_analysis/ https://www.reddit.com/r/MandelaEffect/comments/55f5rt/the_s... 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-that-90s-genie-movie-1798259845 https://news.avclub.com/sinbad-created-a-fake-version-of-tha... 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.

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algaeontoast 7y ago

“Literally Inception in Real Life”

ccvannorman 7y ago

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.