In the book series The Mysterious Benedict Society, there is an invention called the Whisperer.
It is a machine capable of erasing memories and manipulating people's thoughts and beliefs. A Mr. Curtain created the Whisperer to aid his attempts in what was basically world domination, and "whispered" thoughts into every mind through radio, television, and cell phone waves, gaining people's trust and support without their knowledge or consent.
In the right hands, its effects were reversible, but the machine was used wrongly on many people, essentially turning them into one man's minions. The world was a darker, colder place overall. And like Lacuna's treatment in the "Eternal Sunshine" movie, people were changed...not always for the better.
That is why I do not think people should seek to erase memories. It may start with horrid and traumatic experiences, but the more used to the idea people got, it would progress to embarrassing or simply sad/depressing moments. And if it were continued for long enough without being kept in check, soon we would be erasing memories like we do pictures, because one tiny detail was wrong -- a hair out of place, or my nose looks too big. Messing with the mind is dangerous territory, and not something I'd recommend.
Interesting! I see parallels with the recent issues with social media, especially Facebook. Facebook collects data on their members (not just when you are actually on Facebook, but whatever you do online) and then uses that information to target ads to you, using techniques that have been psychologically proven to manipulate how someone thinks about something. That might seem fine, but in practice this has been used to deepen political polarization and to spread false information about important topics. So in some ways Facebook can be a sort of "whisperer" that influences how we think in subtle ways that we may not be aware of.
ReplyDeleteI agree wholeheartedly! Especially in this age of seeming perfection, erasing memories could get dangerous really fast. We as a culture have not learned to embrace the messy and hurting things enough. Nietzche speaks to embracing pain and letting it catapult us into the better, into territories we have not reached yet. Erasing memories, even painful ones, takes away that option for human growth.
ReplyDeleteI completely agree with this. The original idea for this doesn't seem too bad, but there are always going to be people who take this too far, like she previously stated. Our flaws, experiences, and past mistakes make us who we are. If we erase these things, who will we be? How will we know how to make an educated decision when life presents us with opportunities? When you do this, you are ultimately changing who you are and making everything you have gone through be for nothing. Be proud of what you've overcome and where you have come from. These things are your motivations to better yourself and to grow.
ReplyDeleteI understand completely where you’re coming from and can see a situation where that would happen, but just because there is a possibility of someone using it in an evil way, doesn’t mean that we should the door on this idea entirely. There have been many innovative developments over the years that have been used for the greater good but could have been used in the wrong ways, had the wrong people been allowed to do so. For example, in many research labs all over the world, scientists are creating and testing on different strands of viruses for the purpose of finding cures for ailments and future possible ailments, however; it’s entirely likely that in some lab someone could be creating a virus in the hopes of using it for biological warfare. Just because this is a possibility doesn’t mean that humans have done away with the scientific research on viruses. This is why countries have checks in place, to deal with these types of issues, and if a technology, like the one described above, were created to manipulate memories, it’s reasonable to assume that checks would be put in place on this as well. I think it’s important to recognize that we, as a society, can choose to put checks in place to prohibit evil things from happening. Yes, there are evil people in the world, but we as a society should recognize that we can dictate the course in which certain things are taken.
ReplyDeleteI agree with what you are saying here. If memories of painful events were erased, people would not become the same person they would have originally been. Like Nietzsche said,we must "examine the lives of the best and most fruitful people and peoples and ask yourselves whether a tree that is supposed to grow to a profound height can dispense with bad weather and storms". He would also agree with this post, because he believes that pain is necessary to bring about good to a person.
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteI think that the reason for memories, especially the painful ones, is to help us grow and learn from our past experiences. A lot of times our brains will block really bad or traumatic experiences from us to protect us, but I think that at that point we couldn't really learn from those memories,and they would just cause us pain.
ReplyDelete