Humans Evolved Gene That Erases Memories

Elaine Meinel Supkis

Scientists remove gene for erasing memories in mice, the mice remember everything all the time. This is part of Alzheimer's research but what is marvelous to me is how and why animals evolved a gene to forget things in the first place.

Associated Press:

The gene appears to inhibit learning, said Dr. Robert D'Alessandri, vice president of WVU health sciences and interim director, chief executive officer and president of the institute. It may also have more than one function.

"It may be a protective mechanism," D'Alessandri said. "You don't want to remember everything forever, right? The brain is all about balancing one thing with another — learning versus filling your head with stuff and not being able to do anything with it."

Yesterday, we learned that bright children's brains muture longer and slower than average or lower intelligence children's brains. Now we learn there is a gene for forgetting things. This gene operates, evidently, in all mammals. I would strongly suggest that this gene is for mammals to not obsess over the death of their babies or young ones. The mother must forge onwards. She must be aware enough to nurse them and groom them and protect them, teach them to hunt, etc. But not to be so shattered when the vast majority of them die, that she cannot go on.

Indeed, this goes back to dinosaurs. And earliest mammalian reptiles. We know that crocodiles care for their eggs and when they hatch, their young. They shelter them and escort them about until they can fend for themselves. Birds are a famous example of mating and rearing young very carefully. Birds go through elaborate displays and courtship and many build time consuming nests and then they have to protect and feed the young and teach them how to fly, for example. Once the young depart the nest and learn to fend for themselves, the parents promptly forget about them and turn to driving them away.

Many mammalian mothers do this, too. Even herds of hoofed animals, the mothers and daughters stick together while some top male drives away the sons. In lion prides, when a new male drives off the old one, he turns around and kills all the cubs and gets the mothers and daughters pregnant. If the mothers remembered their slain young, this wouldn't be possible but the gene of forgetting all this cuts out the memory that is painful from her point of view and life goes on.

In the great apes, sometimes they die of broken hearts, just like we humans. Evidently, they can remember painful things longer than a cat does, for example. Dogs, thanks to being co-evolvers with humans, have gained some ground in this, too, namely, learning to remember things which is why occasional pets might refuse to eat or leave a grave sometimes, when someone they were very close to dies.

The gene for not learning/forgetting is very powerful. Humans have evloved brains that strive to overcome these powerful gene which is why very smart people must literally grow longer, the cognitive parts of the brain, I would venture to guess. More than one parent has noticed that children who seem to soak up learning the first six years, suddenly stop and become cranky and difficult and the scholarly grind has to have many penalties and lures to get them to learn nearly anything. No longer do they rush forwards, seeking more information. I have noticed this, myself. I can literally feel my brain rebelling and telling me to stop trying to learn things. It is rather annoying, to say the least.

I resolved many years ago to not yield to that inner voice and to force myself to learn something new at frequent intervals. For example, today, I have to try new systems and learn more skills on the computer. This is why I tinker with this site and alter it frequently. It is part of a personal program to prevent the mind from not thinking.

Dreams are most disturbing. Most people use this gene to forget the ruminations of the mind which wanders all over the place when unleashed. I love dreams and think it would be a shame to lose 1/2 of my existence, unconcious of what is really going on, so I have striven all my life to remember dreams and am quite successful with this. Many dreams are scary which is why the forgetting gene goes to work and erases them.

One function of the forgetting gene is to remove the memory of our faux pas we commit on a daily basis. We are very social animals and in our interactions, we step on each other's toes, we are often wrong about little and big things and this troubles our brains which strive for unity and self aggrandizement. Bush deals with this by forbidding any of his bad stuff to be examined and corrected. He simply ignores all of it and pretends it hasn't happened.

In one ear and out the other is his motto, I would guess.

So it is with many humans. The difference between genius and not genius might be the lack of this gene or a weakness associated with it. I know I remember my zillions of mistakes and periodically, they pop into my mind, unbidden and very annoyingly and even thinking of them is embarrassing but also humbling. I can really screw up! As we all do.

But most people don't remember that. Moving forwards in blessed ignorance, they can do and say things without regard to the past and this makes life easier, in an animal way. But if one wants to look at history, existence and the fate of the universe, doing this mindlessly is pointless as well as impossible.

This might be why so many geniuses are emotionally unstable. I have seen it within my own family. Myself, for that matter! It is a two edged sword. And frankly, I would rather be slashed to ribbons by the sword of memory than to spend my pitiful life ignorant of nearly everything including most of what I have done! This is a monumental waste. Why bother living in the first place?

Societies have institutional memories which replace reality. These are very heavily edited by whoever has the power to impose unilaterally, a narrative. This is why the net has humongously disrupted that forgetting process! We often tell news organizations to learn to use Google so they can refer to their own past stories! They won't, if it interfers with the new directives they are issuing.

Computers and cameras now record at least one facet of reality and are a home base for us to reexamine what our brains are trying to erase or conceal. This is most disturbing to people who need to rewrite reality. Orwell's 1984 is a seminal book on this very process.

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Comments

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