Not insomnia. An aggravating sore throat from the flu won’t let me rest for longer than a few minutes.
For night owls and transatlantic readers, here’s a cool bit of psychology/neuroscience to think about while murkans dream of electric sheep. It seems reasonable to think that memories don’t go away when the hypnotist tells you to forget or the subconscious swallows them up for emotional reasons. After all, tricks exist to bring them back in either case. In fact the memory is there just like other memories, the brain knows that it’s there, but when the mind tries to put it ‘on screen,’ so to speak, a brain region called the rostrolateral prefrontal cortex steps in like an internet filter blocks porn.
This makes sense because a memory isn’t like a DVD on a shelf, it is a learned experience. “Buried” memories often have a profound influence on the lives of people who bury them. In the same way that everything that we know about the world we know because at some point we saw ‘A’ and heard someone say “eih” or we pressed a pedal and the car went forward, psychologists proved a long time back that even if you can’t remember the time you touched a hot stove you will still avoid laying a hand on it.
Unfortunately the Psych field recently went through a cringe-worthy fad for bogus repressed memories. The phenomenon is hardly as pervasive as some hyperventilating therapists tried to claim, but there is no doubt that some have unrecallable memories that act like learned reflex arcs just the same. Say that you react to a friendly handshake like a hot stove and can’t explain why; it can be a major component of PTSD. Adam Sandler’s one good movie takes the point to a logical extreme, but the film is right to show that before you break the unhelpful reflex arc you need to bring its source into the light. Hypnosis and talk therapy can do that, but for a generalized therapy it will be great to know that the filter has an off switch.
Use the space to chat about things you just remembered, or whatever.
A different matt
Dude,
Reign Over Me was better than Anger Management?
Happy Gilmore was some funny shit too.
Pb
Regarding memory and false memories, I’ll just point out that it’s perfectly possible to remember and indeed experience events that never really happened–they’re called ‘dreams’, for one. Now maybe dreams are some sort of process of experiencing whatever it is your brain’s doing when it’s busy making sense of / assimilating the new information of the day or whatnot. I know it’s possible to remember that you’ve had a dream before, even if you didn’t remember having that dream in the first place; ergo, those memories, such as they are, are still there too.
Tim F.
Yes. SATFRQ.
A gimmicky fistfight with Bob Barker makes it briefly funny, not good.
Adam Sandler in his element is just unbearable for me anyway. It’s like watching a spoiled kid ruin a middle school play. He’s not a bad actor, but Reign Over Me is the only movie that reigned in his Jim Carey side enough to show it.
Jake
One of the questions I started asking way back in college was what exactly people mean by “repressed.”
Now, I assume for the sake of argument that some people’s brains are capable squashing a memory so far back into the mothballs that it never comes out at all. But if that’s the case I don’t see how it can affect the person with the memory. If I forget about the stack of porn at the back of my closet I won’t even think of dig it out to um …. you get the idea. However, I think that’s very rare. (Total repression of memories, not forgetting about porn stashes.)
With people who have the “as seen on TV” repressed memories I think a lot more of peoples brains are very efficient at heading off the replay of bad memories. You start to think of the bad incident and your brain says “Look at the pretty birdy!” but in that .0005 second that you begin to experience the memory your body might start up all sorts of physical reactions. The memory isn’t repressed, it is very active, but there is some other system (call it the Ooo shiny! reflex) that distracts the person from thinking of the whole event.
Looked at from an evolutionary stand point I’m not sure how it would make sense. You’d need to remember where that bear jumped out and ate your family. I guess if your brain gave you just enough memory to make you break into a cold sweat when you came near the spot you’d just stay away and still be able to devote more time to hunting, tool making, etc and less to mourning your dead relatives.
k
better than Punch Drunk Love?
Punchy
First of all, all Adam Sandler movies suck. Big time. His whiny ass voice, stupid facial ticks, etc. No acting talent. Second, I distrust “repressed memories”. Too many people nowadays “remembering” they were sexually molested by their 3rd uncle’s cousin’s nephew when they were, like, 8 months old. I call shenanigans.
Thanks, Jake, for allowing me to remember my prOn stash at, yes, the back of the closet. good minds think alike.
Jake
Sure Punchy, any time.
And I forgot to say earlier: Hope you feel better soon, Tim.
Tim F.
Why? Repressed memory is a well-documented symptom of PTSD. You can say that it cannot possibly happen as often as some self-promoting therapists claimed, like I do in the post above, but to pretend that the mind never blocks conscious access to a memory is just silly. I have seen it myself and believe me, the memories were quite real.
MNPundit
Do you actually have the flu? So many people say “flu” when it’s just a bad cold and not influenza.
I got a nasty cold just after Christmas and the first two days were agonizing sore throat followed by tired and feeling rather germy in the face and lungs for 3, as well as congestion and some moderate-severe coughing but no fever. It lasted a week.
Also, hypnotism rocks. In high school, a girl I knew got all freaked out because someone (who was an asshole) placed a voodoo curse on her and she started feeling sick that day. So I hypnotized her and cured her. Sure I knew her mind tricked her into feeling sick and then feeling better, but it still feels like a triumph of science over magic for me personally.
Punchy
Never said “never”. Should have been more specific. I meant I am leary of the claims of “remembering” child abuse from kids when they were 18 months old. I am leary of teenagers suddenly remembering that their uncle, 15 years back, may have touched them. In the first example, I think the child is too young to have that depth of memory. In the latter, I believe emotions interfere with recollection.
True story: I have been the subject of an attempted hypnosis. It didn’t take, but I felt obliged to pretend, so as not to embarrass the hypnotist. I just wonder how many others have similarly “faked” their subconscious recollections so as to either not embarrass the analyst or embellish to make him/her appear worth the money spent.
Punchy
there’s so much in here that just SCREAMS high school…
caustics
Hmm. I’ve always viewed shaking hands as a horrifying, atavistic custom that leads to things like…getting the flu.
But what do I know, I liked Little Nicky.
Blue Jean
Sorry about the sore throat, Tim. Have you tried honey and lemon? If that doesn’t work, you could always drink a shot of liquid Tylenol, or Nyquil.
Bombadil
I think you should skip the folk remedies and over the counter stuff and go straight to the big guns. My personal preference is Talisker. It won’t cure your cold/flu any more than Nyquil, but you’ll sleep much better.
cajunpunk
I second Punch Drunk Love as Sandler’s best movie.
Blue Jean
Hey, have you seen how much alcohol is in Nyquil? You might as well have a shot of brandy while you’re at it.