Preliminary considerations
نویسندگان
چکیده
Of all the common afflictions from which humankind suffers, forgetting is probably the most common. Each of us, every day, forgets something we wish we could remember. It might be something we have done, something we intended to do, a fact, a name of a person or restaurant, and so on ad infinitum. As we age, our incidents of forgetting increase and we worry more about them. A whole industry of books, tapes, and even new mental gymnasia has grown up to deal with the cognitive frailties of old age, the primary one being rampant forgetting. Compared to other nuisances of life, forgetting probably tops the list. The “common cold” is actually quite rare compared to forgetting in all its manifestations. As Underwood (1966) wrote: “Forgetting is a most exasperating and sometimes even painful phenomenon” (p. 542). More recently, Nairne and Pandeirada (2008) maintained that for most people “forgetting is a scourge, a nuisance, a breakdown in an otherwise efficient mental capacity” (p. 179), although they quickly noted that there is often an adaptive value in forgetting too. Despite the fact that psychologists have been studying learning and memory for 125 years, the current volume is the only one we can find devoted solely to the topic of forgetting. “Forgetting” is a term used in the titles of many works of fiction and even cultural critique (see Markowitsch & Brand, Chapter 2), but this volume is the first scientific one devoted to it. Strange, you might think. Given the ubiquity of forgetting in our daily lives, the quote by Nietzsche that heads our chapter must seem stranger still. Given its ubiquity, how can the existence of forgetting be doubted? Difficulties of these sorts usually revolve around matters of definition, and that is the case here. We turn to this issue first.
منابع مشابه
Introducing Structural Considerations into Complexity Metrics
Field observations and focused interviews of Air Traffic Controllers have been used to generate a list of key complexity factors in Air Traffic Control. The underlying structure of the airspace was identified as relevant in many of the factors. A preliminary investigation has revealed that the structure appears to form the basis for abstractions that reduce the difficulty of maintaining Situati...
متن کاملDifferential Perception And Adolescent Drinking In The United States: Preliminary Considerations
متن کامل
Biodiversity and Wildlife Habitat Considerations for Opportunity Harvesting
Preface: This document was prepared for the Silviculture Working Group (SWG) of the Coast Region Implementation Team (CRIT), to provide preliminary considerations for biodiversity and wildlife habitat values during their development of a discussion paper on opportunity harvesting in the Coast Forest Region. for potential inclusion as an appendix to the draft opportunity wood discussion paper.
متن کاملThe Use of Societal Impacts Considerations in Grant Proposal Peer Review: a Comparison of Five Models
Increasing demands on the part of the public for a demonstrable return on their investment in scientific and technical research have led to the widespread introduction of considerations of societal impacts into the peer review processes at public science and technology funding agencies. This answer to the accountability challenge also introduces a peculiar strain on peer review: expertise in pa...
متن کاملConsiderations and preliminary design of patient exposure registry.
To aid in protecting patients from unnecessary exposures and to reduce radiation burdens to the public, a system for tracking a patient's medical exposure history and related radiation doses would be a useful tool. A patient-centred exposure registry, the Patient Exposure Registry (PER), is a mechanism that provides this tracking. This article outlines the objectives of the proposed Canadian PE...
متن کامل