3 ms·

> Because it was significant, you keep recalling it regularly, maybe every week or so. That's not how two year olds work. Even something as significant as losi

> Because it was significant, you keep recalling it regularly, maybe every week or so. That's not how two year olds work. Even something as significant as losing a (or both) parents is still not significant enough to be recalled periodically, and we have many cases of that to support the hypothesis that "that's not how two year old brains work". > I have a couple of such early memories which I believe survived through this recall mechanism. I'm still skeptical. The first reason is that two year olds don't understand the concept of age in years (or age at all, TBH - they recognoise larger people and smaller poeple, but hafve no conept of age). The second reason is that the odds are very much against your hypothesis. I have maybe ... two memories which I think were from age 2, but before age 3. But I cannot determine if I was three or four at the time, instead of two. I cannot determine if they were real or a dream (because they are memories of an event of such non-significance[1] that no one else remembered). I also cannot determine if they were not real and not a dream! I cannot tell if I "remember" them purely because when I was older my mum used to talk about the place they lived in when I was born, and with all the details, 6yo me simply interleaved actual facts with something my mind made up so that my made up memory is consistent with the facts I heard. So, yeah, very skeptical when people tell me they can remember being two, because the odds are very much against it, and I say this as someone who has "memories" from 2yo, and I don't believe that those memories are, in fact, the memories of a 2yo me. Not even a little bit. [1] Memory #1: being taken to the bathroom one morning by an aunt who sometimes lived with us (and so babysat me quite often and would have done this quite often). I only have a memory of it happening once though, even though it must have happened at least a hundred times. Memory #2: Looking at a patch of grass with a path that lead to the landlords house (also on same property, I was told when older). With either of these, I can't be sure if I was 1, 2, 3 or 4 years old at the time. I also cannot tell if either was a dream, and if it was, was it a dream I had at 6yo, dreaming about being 2 yo or was it a dream I had when 2yo?

The_Colonel 3y ago
> and we have many cases of that to support the hypothesis that "that's not how two year old brains work". What are those cases preventing a 2-year-old remembering something from a week ago, thus strengthening the memory, rinse and repeat? > The first reason is that two year olds don't understand the concept of age in years In my case, the memory is linked to potty training and I know when that happened. > I cannot determine if they were real or a dream (because they are memories of an event of such non-significance[1] that no one else remembered). I'm kind of confused that on one hand you say that you don't know if it was a dream or reality, and on the other hand completely discount the possibility of having such an early memory. > because the odds are very much against it You keep mentioning the odds. How do you calculate them?
- lelanthran 3y ago
  > What are those cases preventing a 2-year-old remembering something from a week ago, thus strengthening the memory, rinse and repeat? I don't see how that is relevant to "we have all these examples of two-year-olds not remembering recent signficant events". I mean, we have observation that $X doesn't happen, but you know want to know what the mechanism is? Why is the mechanism at all important to the observation? With or without a plausible mechanism, the observation still stands. > I'm kind of confused that on one hand you say that you don't know if it was a dream or reality, and on the other hand completely discount the possibility of having such an early memory. Well, it's the same reason I am an atheist - as there's literally no evidence for any religions' specific story of a god, I discount the possibility of there being a god at all. People's subjective experience isn't "evidence". > You keep mentioning the odds. How do you calculate them? Because there's too many much more likely explanations, many of which I mentioned already, than a non-falsifiable belief in the memory of a two-year old. Unless you want to dismiss the suggestibility of children, that's basically the most likely explanation.
  - sethammons 3y ago
    > we have observation that $X doesn't happen You can't prove a negative. Did you know that the blue whale was declared extinct in the 80s only to have a pod show up some years later? We observed there were no blue whales and then there were. You didn't know about anyone with that early of memories and now you do.
    - lelanthran 3y ago
      > > we have observation that $X doesn't happen > You can't prove a negative. Sure, but it becomes exceedingly unlikely as lack of evidence of existence continues. > You didn't know about anyone with that early of memories and now you do. Actually, no I don't. I know many many people with self-reported experiences, which is not the same as anyone with early memories. I mean, if we're talking purely numbers, I'm guessing that the number of people who report god, divinity or occult experiences far outnumber those who self-report early memories, so it should be completely unsurprising that I am unconvinced of an assertion that has even fewer self-reported positive data than religion and god. Looking at your other response, I don't understand why you feel my skepticism warrants (what I consider, maybe wrongly) your rather forceful assertions that your worldview is correct. Would you respond the same way to someone who asserted "Well, I'm skeptical that the Gods of Abrahamic Mythology ever existed"? Would you really tell someone "You didn't know anyone who experienced the biblical god before, and now you do"? How is your assertion of "You didn't know about anyone with early memories and now you do" at all different from "You didn't know about anyone who was visited by aliens and now you do"?
smeej 3y ago
One of my earliest vivid memories is specifically of my 2nd birthday party, so I'm confident I wasn't actually 3 or 4. I might not quite have been 2, or I might have been a few days older than 2, but I can pinpoint my age within a couple weeks on either side. I remember details other people didn't notice or care about, like my disappointment that the teal color of the frosting on my cake was only on the surface, not all the way through (which I discovered by shoving my hands into it), and that the water was too hot when my grandma took me to wash the frosting off my hands. I remember it the same way I remember anything else. It's probable I encoded my memories verbally much earlier than most children, though. My mom made a list in my baby book of the hundred words I could use correctly on my first birthday, and I was conversational and fluent well before my second. The theory that "childhood amnesia" happens because we start encoding memories verbally and forget how to access the nonverbal ones would track with my experience. I just encoded mine verbally much earlier than most children. Most people do not have memories of being two. But some of us certainly do.

The_Colonel 3y ago

> and we have many cases of that to support the hypothesis that "that's not how two year old brains work". What are those cases preventing a 2-year-old remembering something from a week ago, thus strengthening the memory, rinse and repeat? > The first reason is that two year olds don't understand the concept of age in years In my case, the memory is linked to potty training and I know when that happened. > I cannot determine if they were real or a dream (because they are memories of an event of such non-significance[1] that no one else remembered). I'm kind of confused that on one hand you say that you don't know if it was a dream or reality, and on the other hand completely discount the possibility of having such an early memory. > because the odds are very much against it You keep mentioning the odds. How do you calculate them?

lelanthran 3y ago
> What are those cases preventing a 2-year-old remembering something from a week ago, thus strengthening the memory, rinse and repeat? I don't see how that is relevant to "we have all these examples of two-year-olds not remembering recent signficant events". I mean, we have observation that $X doesn't happen, but you know want to know what the mechanism is? Why is the mechanism at all important to the observation? With or without a plausible mechanism, the observation still stands. > I'm kind of confused that on one hand you say that you don't know if it was a dream or reality, and on the other hand completely discount the possibility of having such an early memory. Well, it's the same reason I am an atheist - as there's literally no evidence for any religions' specific story of a god, I discount the possibility of there being a god at all. People's subjective experience isn't "evidence". > You keep mentioning the odds. How do you calculate them? Because there's too many much more likely explanations, many of which I mentioned already, than a non-falsifiable belief in the memory of a two-year old. Unless you want to dismiss the suggestibility of children, that's basically the most likely explanation.
- sethammons 3y ago
  > we have observation that $X doesn't happen You can't prove a negative. Did you know that the blue whale was declared extinct in the 80s only to have a pod show up some years later? We observed there were no blue whales and then there were. You didn't know about anyone with that early of memories and now you do.
  - lelanthran 3y ago
    > > we have observation that $X doesn't happen > You can't prove a negative. Sure, but it becomes exceedingly unlikely as lack of evidence of existence continues. > You didn't know about anyone with that early of memories and now you do. Actually, no I don't. I know many many people with self-reported experiences, which is not the same as anyone with early memories. I mean, if we're talking purely numbers, I'm guessing that the number of people who report god, divinity or occult experiences far outnumber those who self-report early memories, so it should be completely unsurprising that I am unconvinced of an assertion that has even fewer self-reported positive data than religion and god. Looking at your other response, I don't understand why you feel my skepticism warrants (what I consider, maybe wrongly) your rather forceful assertions that your worldview is correct. Would you respond the same way to someone who asserted "Well, I'm skeptical that the Gods of Abrahamic Mythology ever existed"? Would you really tell someone "You didn't know anyone who experienced the biblical god before, and now you do"? How is your assertion of "You didn't know about anyone with early memories and now you do" at all different from "You didn't know about anyone who was visited by aliens and now you do"?

smeej 3y ago

One of my earliest vivid memories is specifically of my 2nd birthday party, so I'm confident I wasn't actually 3 or 4. I might not quite have been 2, or I might have been a few days older than 2, but I can pinpoint my age within a couple weeks on either side. I remember details other people didn't notice or care about, like my disappointment that the teal color of the frosting on my cake was only on the surface, not all the way through (which I discovered by shoving my hands into it), and that the water was too hot when my grandma took me to wash the frosting off my hands. I remember it the same way I remember anything else. It's probable I encoded my memories verbally much earlier than most children, though. My mom made a list in my baby book of the hundred words I could use correctly on my first birthday, and I was conversational and fluent well before my second. The theory that "childhood amnesia" happens because we start encoding memories verbally and forget how to access the nonverbal ones would track with my experience. I just encoded mine verbally much earlier than most children. Most people do not have memories of being two. But some of us certainly do.