It turns out that in order for the brain to function effectively, it is necessary to be able to forget. Neuroscientist Henning Beck proves this and explains why trying to «remember everything» is harmful. And yes, you will forget this article, but it will help you become smarter.
Sherlock Holmes in the Soviet adaptation said: “Watson, understand: the human brain is an empty attic where you can stuff anything you like. The fool does just that: he drags there the necessary and the unnecessary. And finally, there comes a moment when you can no longer stuff the most necessary thing there. Or it is hidden so far away that you can’t reach it. I do it differently. My attic has only the tools I need. There are many of them, but they are in perfect order and always at hand. I don’t need any extra junk.» Brought up in respect for broad encyclopedic knowledge, Watson was shocked. But is the great detective so wrong?
German neuroscientist Henning Beck studies how the human brain works in the process of learning and understanding, and advocates for our forgetfulness. “Do you remember the first headline you saw on a news site this morning? Or the second piece of news that you read today in the social media feed on your smartphone? Or what did you have for lunch four days ago? The more you try to remember, the more you realize how bad your memory is. If you just forgot the headline of the news or the lunch menu, it’s okay, but unsuccessfully trying to remember the person’s name when you meet can be confusing or embarrassing.
No wonder we try to fight forgetfulness. Mnemonics will help you remember important things, numerous trainings will “open up new possibilities”, manufacturers of pharmaceutical preparations based on ginkgo biloba promise that we will stop forgetting anything, an entire industry is working to help us achieve perfect memory. But trying to remember everything can have a big cognitive disadvantage.
The point, Beck argues, is that there is nothing wrong with being forgetful. Of course, not remembering someone’s name in time will make us feel embarrassed. But if you think about the alternative, it’s easy to conclude that perfect memory will eventually lead to cognitive fatigue. If we remembered everything, it would be difficult for us to distinguish between important and unimportant information.
Asking How long we can remember is like asking how many tunes an orchestra can play.
Also, the more we know, the longer it takes to retrieve what we need from memory. In a way, it’s like an overflowing mailbox: the more emails we have, the longer it takes to find the specific, most needed at the moment. This is what happens when any name, term or name literally rolls around on the tongue. We are sure that we know the name of the person in front of us, but it takes time for the neural networks of the brain to synchronize and retrieve it from memory.
We need to forget in order to remember the important. The brain organizes information differently than we do on a computer, recalls Henning Beck. Here we have folders where we put files and documents according to the chosen system. When after a while we want to see them, just click on the desired icon and get access to the information. This is very different from how the brain works, where we don’t have folders or specific memory locations. Moreover, there is no specific area where we store information.
No matter how deep we look into our heads, we will never find memory: it is only how brain cells interact at a certain moment. Just as an orchestra does not “contain” music in itself, but gives rise to this or that melody when the musicians play in synchronization, and the memory in the brain is not located somewhere in the neural network, but is created by cells every time we remember something.
And this has two advantages. First, we are highly flexible and dynamic, so we can quickly combine memories, and this is how new ideas are born. And secondly, the brain is never crowded. Asking How long we can remember is like asking how many tunes an orchestra can play.
But this way of processing comes at a cost: we are easily overwhelmed by incoming information. Every time we experience or learn something new, brain cells have to train a particular activity pattern, they adjust their connections and adjust the neural network. This requires the expansion or destruction of neural contacts — the activation of a certain pattern each time tends to simplify.
A «mental explosion» can have different manifestations: forgetfulness, absent-mindedness, a feeling that time flies, difficulty concentrating
Thus, our brain networks take some time to adjust to the incoming information. We need to forget something in order to improve our memories of what is important.
In order to immediately filter incoming information, we must behave as in the process of eating. First we eat food, and then it takes time to digest it. “For example, I love muesli,” Beck explains. “Every morning I hope that their molecules will promote muscle growth in my body. But that will only happen if I give my body time to digest them. If I eat muesli all the time, I’ll burst.»
It’s the same with information: if we consume information non-stop, we can burst. This type of «mental explosion» can have many manifestations: forgetfulness, absent-mindedness, a feeling that time flies, difficulty concentrating and prioritizing, problems remembering important facts. According to the neuroscientist, these “diseases of civilization” are the result of our cognitive behavior: we underestimate the time it takes to digest information and forget unnecessary things.
“After reading the morning news at breakfast, I don’t scroll through social networks and media on my smartphone while I’m on the subway. Instead, I give myself time and don’t look at my smartphone at all. It’s complicated. Under the pitiful glances of teenagers scrolling through Instagram (an extremist organization banned in Russia), it’s easy to feel like a museum piece from the 1990s, isolated from the modern universe of Apple and Android, the scientist grins. — Yes, I know I won’t be able to remember all the details of the article I read in the newspaper at breakfast. But while the body is digesting the muesli, the brain is processing and assimilating the pieces of information I received in the morning. This is the moment when information becomes knowledge.”
Konsènan otè a: Henning Beck se yon byochimis ak nerosyantifik.