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"I kind of take it for granted that our great-grandchildren will regard us as a sort of precursor species. That they won't think of us as human and if we could see them, we probably wouldn't think of them as human either."
- William Gibson
 |
| Extra-Factual Memory | ||
| A "memory" placed in a person's mind by artifice, rather than by real life experience. |
This is a really remarkable idea; in it we find the basis for much of today's experience economy. For example, when you go to Disney's Animal Kingdom, you can experience a safari. Well, not a real safari - but when you try to remember it days later, you have a remarkable and complete set of memories that were all "implanted" by Disney magic: you remember the loud diesel-powered engines (the vehicles are gas/electric, and silent at the right times), the smell of the diesel engine (only once, at the start - nobody wants to go on a 10 minute safari with that smell the whole time) and so on.
At Rekal, Incorporated, they have the technology to really make it work.
| "Is an extra-factual memory that convincing?" Quail asked. "More than the real thing, sir...our analysis of true-mem systems - authentic recollections of major events in a person's life - shows that a variety of details are very quickly lost..." ...Quail said, "Okay...I guess I'll have to settle for this." "Don't think of it that way," McClane said severely. "You're not accepting second-best. The actual memory, with all its vagueness ... that's second-best." |
| Technovelgy from We Can Remember It For You Wholesale,
by Philip K. Dick. Published by Fantasy and SF in 1966 Additional resources -
|
The novel also calls the process of implanting memories "vicarious surrogate retrospection."
This 1966 short story was the basis of the movie Total Recall, with Arnold Schwarzenegger.
Research has been done on implanting false memories. One study shows participants a set of 12 words, all of which are closely related to a common, emotional word. For example, you might use words like upset, unhappy, displeased, furious, etc. - every word but the common related word, namely, angry. The studies show that when participants are asked days later to recall the words, about 40% "remember" the word angry.
Compare to the movie pill from Ben Gleed, King of Speed (1939) by Don Wilcox.
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Tech news articles related to We Can Remember It For You Wholesale
Tech news articles related to works by Philip K. Dick
Extra-Factual Memory-related
news articles:
- New Technique Detects False Memories
- Northwestern Researchers Can Remember It For You Wholesale
- Russians Enjoy 'Total Recall'-Style Fake Vacations
- Hack Your Reality The Virtual Way
- First Artificial Memory Formed In Animals
| Has Elon Musk Given Up On Mars? |
| 'They Erased My Memory' Says Ariana Grande |
| 'Spikeless' Brand Swizzle Stick Detects Spiked Drinks |
| Musk Proposes Sites For Martian Cities |
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