Memory and Artificial Intelligence

In "The Battle to Save Your Memory," Time magazine writer Jeffrey Walker poses the question as to how one should improve one's memory as one losses stamina, vision and the trim body after one hits the big "4-0" (Walker seems to be referring to men only since he talks about not being able to fit into his "slacks" anymore.) Walker explains his journey by describing his search for ways to improve his memory. One stop is at Amazon.com, where he found lots of books with tips on improving memory. Another was to join a club that encouraged to learn names by memory. His last remedy against loss of memory was to try Ginko and Vitamin E, which did not prove helpful to recovering his sudden loss of memory. Seems that Vitamin E only helps patients affected by Alzheimer's, but only on a partial basis. So, what does Walker conclude about how to improve your memory as one grows older? In short (and being sweet), Walker states that "improving memory requires little more than a bit of concentration and practice" (5). So then is memory all about being focused enough to allow concentration as a means to retain information and remember as much as we can? Seems so.

I find it very interesting that the majority of recent articles I read about memory are, for the most part, tragically ahistorical. Much of the discourse about memory never regards the way in which memory developed from the domain of rhetoric in classical antiquity. British historian Francis Yates seems to be the only one who specifically states that the art of memory originated with the three Latin texts: "Rhetoric Ad Herennium," Cicero's "De Oratore" and Quintilian's "Institutio Oratoria".

This week I have been thinking that the more I read about memory, the more I am distanced from the field of Rhetoric. I want to bring back the art of memory, as Yates has done, to Rhetoric. I want to know more about the way in which speeches were remembered and why they were remembered. All of it has to do with oral culture and then the shift to a literate culture. This week I am watching A.I.--which taps into issues of memory by talking about the relationship between humanity and technology (Orga vs. Mecha). My observation is that David (the protagonist) is a boy whose memory is shaped by observation. He observes the way in which his adopted--and human--mother regards her "real" son Martin. David yearns to be loved like a "real" boy in order to feel love from her. However, David is regarded as a machine whose only purpose is to fulfill the role of a son. However, his request to be loved back remains unreciprocated. In other words, if technology has emotion, then it will ask of humans for emotion. So, in sum, humans will not reciprocate love for technology because technology is not "born" but constructed. Therefore, the Mechas, by having an emotional deficiency must not possess memories. It is only when they are "put into motion" that the Mechas observe and record information. However, David is the exception because he was "born" from love and had the body of a machine.

More later when I finish watching the movie…