The Vagaries of Memory 19/08/2005 Yesterday, an email from "Book Millionaire Real" appeared in my Gmail inbox. I was about to delete it as spam when the heading and first words caught my eye: "Book Millionaire Update - Dear Clive, Thank you for yo..." It looked as though it might be legitimate. A brief internal debate followed before I decided to open it. And here's the text:Dear Clive,Thank you for your interest in Book Millionaire Reality TV Show. The application deadline has passed as of July 31, 2005. We gave last week for any applications postmarked by July 31 to make it into our offices.On Tuesday, August 9, we finished the filming of another TV series which is now in post production. Many of the team members of that television series are also involved in Book Millionaire.With the other show completed and off their production schedule, we will continue the process of working through applications.The amount of talent and creativity and great stories, WOW, it’s inspiring and incredible. These applications certainly speak well of authors and soon-to-be authors. I have found that the most successful and happy authors are those who are the kindest and most creative. And I can tell by the applications I’ve looked through so far, we have a group of highly creative and good hearted people with important stories with which they want to help people.As we go through the applications, because they are all so good, we may need to reach out to you and others in the Book Millionaire Community for your votes and opinions.Right now, I’m working my way through applications. I will share more shortly.Lori ProkopExecutive Producer and TV HostBook Millionaire Reality TV ShowAiring Nationally Fall 2005www.bookmillionaire.comVague memories stirred. I recalled coming across details of this show and knew I had downloaded the application form. But I could not, and still cannot, recall whether I actually applied. The email would seem to indicate that I did but that may be misleading; on reading the only other letter to do with Book Millionaire that Gmail could find, I saw that I had also signed up for their newsletter. This could be the first of them.So I may or may not be entered for the show. I suppose time will give me the answer to that one. But this does illustrate very clearly what a fickle beast my memory is. I have reason to believe, too, that I'm not the only one to suffer occasional strange effects emanating from the memory department. A couple of days ago Wayne, of Rag & Bone Shop, posted an excellent article entitled Math, Moth and I quote from it here:One night, riding home and feeling resentful of the debauchery I had missed, I saw a gypsy moth fall from a streetlight. It spiraled, hit the asphalt, and writhed back and forth across the yellow lines in the road. I stopped pedaling and coasted, and between the clicking spokes of the wheel I could hear the moth’s wings slapping the pavement. It’s been nearly two decades since that night, and often I’ve replayed the scene in my mind: the disorientation of flight, the mangled wings, the painted specks of gravel that materialized from the blur of pavement when I looked down. A moment arrested in memory. But it’s been at least a decade since I thought of Mrs. Pooler, or Rachel Meeropol, or Andy Curto - I haven’t thought of them at all until this afternoon, when my mind turned them up, for no good reason, while I was waiting for a light to turn green.Where are they all now, these people? It doesn’t matter. Give me a week, and I’ll have forgotten them again.How odd is memory in its choice of materials. For twenty years it will haunt Wayne's mind with a dying moth in the road, yet will not store for me the potentially important completion of an application form that might be a path to wealth and fame.I had this to say in response to Wayne's post:Memory is a strange thing, especially a child’s memory, in what it chooses to keep or otherwise discard. I have this theory that memory is like a filing system with limited capacity and we are forced to select what can be stored and what must hit the waste bin. In later years, when space is becoming cramped, we have to throw out old files to make room for the new and it may be that, in going through these old files to select those no longer needed, we come upon such things as you have written of here. For a moment our eyes glaze over as we relive those times of long ago and recall the feelings they evoke. Then, with a shrug, the file is bundled together again and tossed towards the bin...I think I may have inadvertently thrown out the Book Millionaire file to make room for something else!
Clive
Kurt Interesting commentary, Clive. Being 20, I don't think I've got a 'full file' yet, but it is interesting to think of how many of my old friends from back home have fallen by the wayside of my memory; even just living alone for the summer, I find myself adjusting to a solitary life without my friends, and yet I suspect that when I move back to Queens in a week and a half I'll regard this summer period as merely interstitial, a blip on the radar of memory. Date Added: 19/08/2005
Gone Away It's true that, when young, we add plenty of files to the memory archive without a thought of whether it might ever be full. I stored all sorts of useless junk in those days (and still come across odd survivors), as well as more important stuff. But my experience is that I store less now that I am old and often forget things that others regard as crucial (I get accused of having a selective memory - but isn't everyone's selective?). Or it might be that the whole system is beginning to shut down. I'd rather not think about that... ;) Date Added: 19/08/2005
Mad Sorry, who are you again? Date Added: 19/08/2005
Gone Away I was hoping you'd be able to tell me that... Date Added: 19/08/2005
John (SYNTAGMA) There's a very ancient belief that all events no matter how small, and from everyone's point of view, are stored in the "Akashi Record", a kind of celestial memory bank. It would certainly account for the amazing feats of memory that some people can perform, and also for tales of one's whole life passing before one's eyes at death. I don't belief that 3lbs of fat and cholestorol (the brain) could ever do that ... but I may be wrong. Date Added: 19/08/2005
Gary I remember the strangest things, and forget the most useful things--like names. My wife marvels that I can remember old jingles from TV commecials I saw as a kid. Like the corn flakes ad with chicken accompaniement: "New Country Corn Flakes! New Country Corn Flakes! Bawk, bawk, bawk, baaawk. Bawk, bawk, bawk, baaaaaawk!. Oh, they don't wiiilt, when you pour on miiilk!" But my new neighbors names? Haven't a clue. Date Added: 19/08/2005
Gone Away That ancient belief may be forcing its way into reality right now, John. They call it the "internet", I think... But is the brain really just 3lbs of fat and cholestorol? Can that actually be the whole truth? Is it possible that what I experience as consciousness emanates entirely from a lump of matter? Personally, I think the scientists are missing something somewhere... Date Added: 19/08/2005
Gone Away Gary, your memory sounds remarkably like mine! :D Date Added: 19/08/2005
ME Strauss Great read, Clive. You had me with you all of the way. Fat and cholestorol? Eewww! My friends have discussed how people with "a good memory" are drawn to publishing, and soon after we got there we felt sure we had lost our memory completely. I feel like new information comes into my head through the front door and pushes seconds-older information out through the back door. I'm betting on that cosmic memory bank, just to remember myself.-me Date Added: 19/08/2005
Gone Away Thank you, Liz. I've seen that principle at work - the new in the front door, pushing older stuff out the back. It's very visible in kids being taught to read by the "word recognition" method. Date Added: 19/08/2005
ME Strauss Maybe that's where I got it! So if I learn to read . . . Date Added: 19/08/2005
Gone Away LOL Date Added: 19/08/2005
John (SYNTAGMA) You're absolutely right, Clive. Matter arises from consciousness, not the other way around. Science has got it completely wrong. Not all scientists, though. Rupert Sheldrake for one ..... I'd better not go on, or you'll never stop me. Date Added: 19/08/2005
Gone Away I expect we could both expound at great length on the subject, John. ;) And I will on the subject you posted on today - Blogging the Blues - but not in a comments system, yours or mine. It's very relevant to the series on Writers Blogs that I've begun in WBA and that would probably be the best place to carry it on. Date Added: 19/08/2005
Kurt Let's not do a disservice to science and scientists here (I'm not one, but I've worked for and with them pretty heavily in the past). Just calling it three pounds of fatty tissue does a disservice to the complexity and beauty of the functioning of the human brain. We rational-thought types may have the issues of creation, animation, and inspiration wrong, but we do know a significant amount about how things work. And in any scenario, even one in which the brain isn't responsible for animation or inspiration, for my money it's still the most incredible three pounds in the universe. Between the billions of neurons that develop into precise pathways, the interaction of those neurons with hundreds or thousands of other neurons each, the precise timing and mechanisms of those electrical pulses, and the interactions of the blood-brain barrier and the effect of chemicals on the brain, it would be doing your own worldview a disservice to sweep it aside and say that just because you believe we have creation, animation, and inspiration wrong, that the brain is just a big lump of tissue. Not to start a flame war (which this inevitably does in the lower-rent neighborhoods of the Internet, but I'll say this and then hold my tongue), but in my book, nothing created by humans has yet approached the complexity and beauty of the human brain, be it a creation of God or emergent from the natural beauty of the universe. Date Added: 19/08/2005
Gone Away Agreed, Kurt. Let's hear it for the brain.... Yayyyyyy! Date Added: 19/08/2005
Quills Off the memory front, but on the TV shows : http://leegoldberg.typepad.com/a_writers_life/2005/08/more_ways_for_t.html an interesting read ;) Date Added: 19/08/2005
Kurt Okay, so perhaps I'm overenthusiastic. Being young and idealistic will do that to you, I guess. Also, I've been looking into the WBA, since it keeps getting mentioned... are us non-professional, casual writers of fiction/nonfiction welcome? Is there any barrier of entry (do we have to submit some work to prove we can actually write), or is this an open project? I'm pretty intrigued by the whole concept, and I think you're on to something with it. I poked around on the FAQ there, but it's pretty short and lacking a few things. Date Added: 19/08/2005
Gone Away Interesting indeed, Quills! I'm pretty sure I forgot to fill in that application form anyway - about 95%... ;) Date Added: 19/08/2005
Gone Away WBA is open to anyone with an interest in writing, Kurt, and that includes readers. Let me quote from a letter I wrote to someone enquiring about what was needed to "qualify" for membership: "So how was I to increase the importance of my blog in the eyes of the search engines - a necessary step if I were ever to achieve my goal for it? And then I had the idea. Writers needed heavyweight blogs to give us links so that we might rise in stature; why not CREATE a few blogs like that? "This is the driving principle behind WBA - it will be a links whore, collecting links from the thousands of writers blogging on the net and giving links back in return. As it rises in importance in the blogosphere, so too will it drag its members from the general cacophony of the millions of blogs to a position where they stand a chance of being noticed by the people that matter. "I make no secret of my selfish intentions in the project. It is invented purely to serve the purpose of my own blog. But it is also true that it can do the same for any writer's blog. In fact, it requires that as many writers join as we can persuade, cajole, bully, indoctrinate, envision to do so. United in such a blog we can be a powerful force in the blogosphere and beyond it into the net; divided, we are fated to forever speak to a tiny audience of bloggers who happen to chance upon us." And we need young and idealistic people like yourself. The project is an experiment, an attempt to put a theory into practice. There's no way I'm going to be able to think of everything possible to make it succeed - but with many people thinking about our strategy and possible pitfalls, we stand a good chance of covering most of the ground. And young, idealistic people have fertile, original minds! I must apologize for the FAQ. What is shown there is the Short Version of a much more detailed and comprehensive Long Version that I intend to put up as soon as I can find the time to write it. Part of the problem, too, is that the idea grows all the time as I realize more and more of its possibilities and potential. It's hard to keep up with! By the way, there was no sarcasm intended in my salute to the brain. It is an incredible piece of design, utterly amazing in its capabilities. Date Added: 19/08/2005
Mark I was recently walking by a place I worked at not six months ago. The faces of co-workers flashed before my eyes and I began to put face to name, all except one. For the life of me I still can’t remember his name and I worked with him every day for over a year up to six months ago. And yet I can tell you the names of people I worked with 20 years ago no problem. It is weird. Does anyone else ever have this happen, you’ll be talking to someone and forget the simplest words, like ‘fork’ or ‘chair’ or something equally simplistic. So you try to describe the object to the person you’re speaking to and they look at you like you’re a complete imbecile and say, “Do you mean chair?” If this has never happened to any of you then never mind, me neither. Date Added: 19/08/2005
Gone Away All too often, Mark, all too often.... LOL Date Added: 19/08/2005
Wayne Thanks for the plug, Gone! I'm very flattered to be mentioned at all.Incidentally, I did join WBA. My profile is here. Is there something else I should do to make my account more active or visible?Oh, and thank you again for pointing out on my site that I couldn't have been waiting for the light to turn RED. My goodness! Date Added: 20/08/2005
Gone Away Sorry, Wayne, you are quite right - I was speaking from memory and thought you hadn't joined. As far as I know there's not a lot more we can do to become more noticeable but I have plans in that direction when we move into the new application. The blog will have a page for each member where they can give a bio and perhaps a few samples of their work. As for the red light, you had me fooled for a long time! ;) Date Added: 20/08/2005
Wayne Well, what's good about your not remembering that I joined was that I visited the WBA website and read a lot of cool stuff and started getting excited about being a member. Good thing your memory is occasionally questionable. :) Date Added: 20/08/2005
Gone Away Then I am glad my memory is so bad, Wayne. Catch the vision! WBA has new articles every day and is worth visiting when you can. :) Date Added: 20/08/2005
John (SYNTAGMA) Kurt, the brain is 3lbs of fatty tissue that exists for a mere blink in the totality of time and space that is the universe and beyond. Does anyone really think it can begin to understand what's out there? Yes, many scientists think we can know everything. That's because they believe the brain creates human intelligence and consciousness. But what if it's the other way round, that the brain is merely an instrument created according to a pattern (morphogenic field) by consciousness itself? That makes much more sense, and I'll give you two sources that think so. 1) The Oxford biologist Dr. Rupert Sheldrake. 2) The Gospel of Thomas.The secrets of consciousness have hardly been touched on by conventional science, in fact, some scientists believe it doesn't exist at all! Only 3lbs of fatty tissue. Mysterious. Date Added: 20/08/2005
Gone Away .oO(I would have thought that one would have to be conscious to formulate a theory of consciousness at all but there ya go, that's just me... :D) Date Added: 20/08/2005
Kitty Surely memory is such a weird thing! even my computer is telling me that - my outlook express is asking me if i want to compass my folders and hence having to erase some files for new ones! so what is WBA again Clive? Seriously I don't remember! Date Added: 20/08/2005
Gone Away Hi Kitty. :) WBA stands for Writers Blog Alliance. Go here, have a look around, decide that it's a wonderful idea, and sign up! You'll enjoy, honest. :D Date Added: 20/08/2005
Kurt John, not all of us science types believe we can understand everything. In fact, I'd say that there are very definite limits to what the human brain can achieve. As for Sheldrake, I've not seen enough of his work in the mainstream to know what to think of him. I know the scientists and professors I've spoken to (admittedly, they're very biased against dualism) regard him as something of a pariah or a New Age hack, although I've heard he keeps putting papers out. Do you have some links to peer-reviewed articles he's published? Date Added: 20/08/2005
John (SYNTAGMA) Hi Kurt, Ah, you use the word "dualism" by which I suspect you mean pure materialism. I too am against dualism, by which I mean pure "idealism". That means I believe that all is consciousness. The great British astronomer, James Jeans, wrote : "The universe is pure thought". Well, "thought" is not what I mean, but I believe he meant the same as I do.Sheldrake is one of the most enlightened of today's scientists. His recent book : "The Sense of Being Stared At : And Other Aspects of the Extended Mind" is a triumph of true science. Have a look at his works HERE. I'd be interested in your further thoughts. Date Added: 20/08/2005
Kurt At the risk of both derailing Clive's blog and being complete on the issue, I'm going to chew over what I've read and save it for a rainy day on my own blog, John. That way I can cover my thoughts a little more completely. Date Added: 21/08/2005
Janus I would be more suitable for Writers Block of America. But I hope this bears good fruit for you Goneaway. Janus Date Added: 21/08/2005
Gone Away The kind of discussion I stay well out of, Kurt. ;) But I shall follow it with interest when it resumes! Date Added: 21/08/2005
Gone Away Thank you, Janus. With your ability, you should be thinking of joining us, writer's block or not! Date Added: 21/08/2005
Ken To return to basics: I always remember best those things that at some point involved my entire being, my imagination, senses, emotions, intellect, and worst those things which involved external compulsion (of which there are a great many over a lifetime, too many) in pursuit of the merely factual and rote-learned. I think the reason for this may be a pre-disposition in my nature to reject and dissent from knowledge and information which I think interferes with my vision, both physical and otherwise. Rather in the way that one would reject the help of someone who wanted constantly to make you wear sunglasses in order to see the world more clearly! Date Added: 21/08/2005
Gone Away That sounds like wisdom to me, Ken. And I can envy a memory reserved so precisely for the things you would retain, for mine seems to be far more haphazard! Date Added: 21/08/2005
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