memory

Memory is often described as a personal library or filing cabinet full of information and personal experiences. Our brains can contain a vast amount of information that helps us in encoding knowledge. Memory as a way of knowing questions how it can be used as a way of knowing and how reliable our memory is. However memory is a matter of perspective and is similar to how we interpret information. I can remember how I failed my physics test or I can remember how the 50 I received on my physics test motivated me to become an expert in that unit on the final. In essence, memory is actually a mix of emotion, sense perception, and our personal experiences from the past. Many theories support the fact that memory is the basis of our knowledge, such as our foundation of knowledge on history; therefore memory can be reliable to an extent. However memory can often times be unreliable, especially in eye witness testimony and during emotional experiences.

According to many historians, memory is the basis of our history books. History is something we all confirm to be concrete. Generally speaking, knowledge of the past starts on the foundation of memory. There would not be a past if we did not have memory itself. Stories of the My Lai Massacre in the Vietnam War are imbedded in history. According to Tuyet thousands of people had the same experience. She recalls, "Everyone in my family was killed in the My Lai massacre -- my mother, my father, my brother and three sisters," said Tuyet, who was 8 years old at the time. "They threw me into a ditch full of dead bodies. I was covered with blood and brains" (“Survivors Reflect After 40 Years”). Along with thousands of other accounts, the My Lai Massacre was confirmed to be the fault of the America...

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...sion, our knowledge is based on memory to an extent. We would not be able to have any knowledge of the past without memory. Although accounts of events in history may be different, the occurrence of the general events remains. Memory may not be a “primary” way of knowing, but it is useful in enhancing knowledge that is gained, especially through the foundations that is established in education, such as science, and language. On the other hand, memory can only be reliable up to a certain point. What we remember is often times selective and flexible. Since memory is interpretive, it can change by emotion or false recollection. Frequently reality is confirmed through collective accounts based on memory, which proves memory to be reliable, but when looked at in a deeper perspective memory is different for everyone. It just depends on the perspective and depth of memory.