This article was published in Nature
Scientists Erase Single Memory in Mice
Can a company that does this on a consumer level, for humans, possibly come to exist?
Pick up the movie Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, starring Jim Carrey and Kate Winslet.
There are… a few people, a few moments, I could definitely do without. I’m not certain I want someone erasing my brain, though.
Okay, I’m chiming in. So I went and read the article and while learning and memory is not my field the study is preliminary enough that I can give a solid opinion on it. Don’t get me wrong, this is a very interesting report but I’m not sure if it means what you think it means. I also haven’t seen Eternal Sunshine so I may be off base, I just wanted to clarify things.
First: That is a very misleading title for that article. Also, the brief snippets that they give you on the Nature website have been in my experience extremely misleading as to the content of the actual paper.
Second: The actual experiment showed that they blocked the reconsolidation of a specific trained memory, not the actual memory. They never actually claim to have erased the actual memory. They say that: “This in turn suggests ‘de-consolidation’ of the fear memory trace in the lateral amygdala; that is, possibly an erasure of initial encoded plasticity.”. There is the possibility that they erased the original memory, but not solid proof as far as I can tell from what they wrote.
Third: This works for conditioned stimuli. So it would have to be a conditioned memory, such as a Vietnam vet hearing a helicopter and it triggering him to freak out. That I think it would work for, but I don’t think it would help you forget some jackass you meet on the street last week. I think for it work in a person, say using the Nam vet example, you would have to reliably trigger that response repeatedly and then give them the treatment in order to target the right pathways. Also, the time span was short on this, 24 hours later. While entirely relevant, I’m not sure if it would work on something that someone has been living with for say 40 years (to extend the Nam example) who has really consolidated that memory strongly.
This is a brief communication article, which means basically they did a few specific experiments, found something interesting and wanted to get it out there quick. I’ll be interested to see a follow up article. It shows some promise but it is far, far away from being able to erase single specific memories.
Also, while I didn’t see Eternal Sunshine I’ve been told they tried to erase all memories of Winslett’s character. That is far, far more extensive and different than what they did in the article.
Oh, I get that part. But… every new tech has a first step.
Thanks for the scientific info, Rem. I knew we kept you around for more than beer and man-yeti love.
Not to mention that giving you a drug that has the same effect as the one they gave the mice systemically would be really, really freakin’ bad for you. They would have to do repeated, brain coordinate specific injections for it to even have a chance.
Yeah but that title is sooooooo misleading. Don’t misinform the masses.
If I wanted to misinform the masses, I would have put the title, “Hitler broght back from the dead to fight in an arena deathmatch with Elvis.”
Or you could have put it in the Wikipedia.
And how did you know what the next sequel to Bubba Ho-Tep is? (actually, there is a prequel to Bubba Ho-tep being made)