Memory: “Only Gets Fuzzier, Never Fresher”

This week we watched Marjorie Prime and Star Trek: The Next Generation’s “Measure of a Man,” both show how our memories, emotions, cognitions, and societies are built and connected. Especially Marjorie Prime made me cry a while watching it. The loved ones are gone, only their memory remains, and I can only talk to the memory over and over again, and I am no longer alone with the former one. The memories we remember each time are only those we remembered the last time, and the people in our memories will disappear in the end. Is memory just a piece of a story?

Marjorie Prime

One of the exciting things about the movie is Prime’s service in the film, which provides holograms for deceased family members and “feeds” according to the patient’s memory to assist Alzheimer’s patients. They can “recite” them just in case they forget them. Marjorie has a quote that stood out to me; she said, “You remember the last time you remembered it, not the source. So, it’s always getting fuzzier, like a photocopy of a photocopy. Even a very strong memory can be unreliable because it’s always in the process of dissolving.” My understanding is that all your memories are memories and not facts. Because, as mentioned in Voicethread, memory is constructed. It is not that in the mind of an archive, they aren’t recorded or stored, but they are being built. The mind is actively constructing them—also, the emotional value of memories changes with changing experiences. Thus, memory, emotion, and cognition are interrelated, and together they create our perception and understanding of the world.

Another point of the lecture relative that Andy Clark and David Chalmers mentioned is that the mind could expand into the world without being limited by the boundaries of the brain and body. Holograms are an example of extended cognition, as they use “the brain, the body, external tools and technologies, interpersonal and social support, and culture to create complex interactions that form a cognitive system. In the film, Walter is in the process of chatting with Marjorie; he is also constantly learning and revising those memories. He always says, “I’ll remember now or next time.” Therefore, Walter can extend Marjorie on What the memory she has spoken of in the past is now blurred. Moreover, Jon begins to create a holographic AI version of his beloved wife and fills “her” with his own memories. So memories between Jon and his wife, especially Jon’s flashbacks to their marriage, underscore emotions’ pivotal role in how and when we remember.

The director’s cleverness is that he chose an elegant and mysterious villa by the sea to house most of the scenes, and there is no high-tech expression. The audience sees the beach, rocking chairs, and dogs but does not see any computers or other technology. It seems that in the future of human life, all technologies have been hidden and penetrated our lives. The entire film also embodies the concept of autobiographical memory, through the construction and control of each “AI”‘s memory, the stories they tell others and themselves about who they are, with an element of self-preservation, self-control, and self-definition. For example, in Walter and Marjorie and Jon and Tess, the dialogues and memories between them affect Walter and Tess’s memory and style and also impact Marjorie and Jon’s emotions.

“Measure of a Man” Star Trek: The Next Generation 

Data isn’t just a robot; he’s family. Data is called IT, and this episode made me think about when robots will become human. For example, while Maddox promised to recover the data after analysis and assured Data that his memory would be intact, Data believes that while will be preserved the detail of his memory, the nuances of his experience may not be reserved. The data, therefore, reject surgery. The critical factor that Data is a human rather than a robot here is that he understands that his memory is full of emotion and values ​​the people and things in his memory. Memories and emotions shape our understanding and perception of the world and determine who we are. Without our memories and the feelings in our memories, we are not complete beings. So, Dade is not the property of Starfleet but a living being. Meanwhile, when Data finally found Riker alone in a conference room, ashamed of having to argue with his friends at the hearing, Data understood his behavior. Data said, “That action injured you and saved me. I will not forget it.” I comprehend that Riker’s actions and emotions strongly influence Data, and he can empathize with Riker’s actions and feelings.