Your Say
To understand how memory works, how it is formed and gets stored in our brains, neuroscientists are developing new techniques to erase rats’ memories. At first glance, their work can look scary because it seems that for better or worse, our memories build our identity. As a consequence, we can’t help thinking about the implications of such research. Are we assisting in the birth of an Orwellian project? What if one day the techniques fell into the hands of a dangerous political party? What power could it give to the government? More than only accessing memories, they would penetrate into our brain, and manipulate our inner self and deep thoughts.
Martine Berrebi, a French psychologist in Paris, is convinced that an individual’s past builds his identity, helps him advance and look forward. “Erasing a memory would make a hole in our personal history,” she says. And even if that research could lead to treatment for Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder patients, Berrebi assumes that a trauma has to be processed verbally in order to heal. “It will be reflected in the body. And the memory will resurface when a certain event brings it back to the forefront.” She strongly believes that it all has to do with something more than only neurological phenomena.
Marco Nguyen, a French cartoonist, drew his interpretation of the neuroscientists’ work.
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Erasing memory