Hi Joachim, in partial answer Working Memory is taken as a new type of memory because it has new functions that implicit memory doesn't have.

In my theory of memory implicit content accessible functional clusters are translated into equivalent implicit place-code addressable chunks, by the Working Memory. By including the ability to quickly search a functional Cluster to find it's activation points, it makes it possible for the activation points to be activated without the presence of the functional cluster, which allows for addressable memory. This allows the reinforcement of a memory by "Rehearsing" it periodically.

The source of the memory is of course the cortex, but it is echoed in a separate buffer in the prefrontal cortex. Of course it can't hold the whole implicit memory in the buffer, so the buffer echoes specific parts of the cortex.

Apart from working memory and long term memory

is also a type of memory that operates

activation based. This can be demonstrated

with a thought experiment. Literally.

One knows hundreds of first names

(or another class of words). They do not

fit all in working memory at the same

time. Now the task is to enumerate them

in a random order, without repetitions.

That works quite well. The phenomenon

can be modelled with a kind of tag

that is attached to a word, and which

vanishes after some time. Say, a few hours.

If the experiment is repeated

immediately, the 'tags' of one

experiment will interfere with those

of the following.

Regards,

Joachim

Here is a simple thought experiment that highlights the difference between working memory and simple states of memory:

Little John accidentally locks himself in a garden shed. There is no one within shouting distance who can get him out. Lined up along one wall of the shed are, a small basket containing garden tools, ten 10-pound bags of garden mulch, and a bottle of insect spray. High on the opposite 
wall is a small window. Hanging next to the window, well above John’s reach, is a key to the lock on the shed door.

If you have figured out how the child gets out of the shed, then I think 
you would agree that the most reasonable explanation is that your brain created spatial representations analogous to the layout of significant 
physical objects and affordances inside the shed that have been recalled from your store of simple memories, and then assumed that 
John planned his escape accordingly. In all of this your heuristic self-locus (selective attention) is projected and moved about through phenomenal spaces well beyond your skull. But all the while that you are thinking about this, your heuristic self-locus is well contained within your retinoid space (your internal model of the world), within your brain, within your head, which is probably located in your office or wherever you are. John’s predicament is entirely imaginary but the excursions of your self-locus through retinoid space are real biophysical events happening only where you are located in the world. In this formulation, the performance of working memory requires that we be in a conscious state because activation of retinoid space and feature binding is needed. Activation of simple states of memory can be unconscious events because spatiotemporal binding of separate memory elements is not needed.

Hi everybody!

Nice to have a corner to discuss scientific topics that go a little more far beyond that the experimental practice. I think human cognition itself is teleonomic. We are designed to do what we know to do, and we can´t do those thinks we are not biological prepared for (this reasoning looks simple but conceal great mysteries of human condition). So we are determined by our brain configuration. And this brain human wire connectivity has been designed by the evolution to adapt successfully to the environment, and how? Neuraldarwinism (Edelman, 2000), that posits that only the neural networks that are activated will survive phylogenetically.

So, what would be the role of working memory here? Well, working memory has been related to fronto-parietal networks, and is this network which control all the mental activity selecting and unselecting the neural networks that are required to process information efficiently (Cole et al, 2013). So, working memory and its neural representation, fronto-parietal network, could be the key that drive the human teleonomy.

On the other hand, here we are discussing whether memory is a special kind of memory or it is a state of memory. From my humble opinion, working memory is a state not of memory, but human condition. Working memory could be seen as a state of awareness or the capability that the human being has to process efficiently external information. Working memory depicts the human itslef, his past, present and future and the conscious experience itself. Some of you could think that Insula and ventral prefrontal cortex are more related to the conscious experience, and it is true, but they have no sense if they don´t have a working memory to depict their cognitions.

So, from my point of view, working memory is the core unit of the Global Neural Workspace of Dehaene et al (1998) and Baars (2005), of the Dymanic Core of Tononi and Edelman (1998), of the executive control network of Crick and Koch (2003)... All these reasons pose, at least for me, that the working memory would be the core of the human condition itself and the final and biological reason we can experience consciousness.

By the way, I love the book of Jaques Monod (1971). And if someone is interesting in these kind of topics, they should read also Ilya Prigogine and the time problem. I think here we can find a match between neuroscience and physics.

Baars, B.J. (2005). Global workspace theory of consciousness: toward a cognitive neuroscience of human experience. Progress in Brain Research, 150, 45-53.

Cole, M.W., Reynolds, J.R., Power, J.D., Repovs, G., Anticevic, A. & Braver, T.S. (2013). Multi-task connectivity reveals flexible hubs for adaptive task control. Nature Neurosciences, 16,1348-55.

Crick, F. & Koch, C. (2003). A framework for consciousness. Nature Neuroscience, 6, 119-26.

Dehaene, S., Kerszberg, M. & Changeux, J.P. (1998) A neuronal model of a global workspace in effortful cognitive tasks. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 95, 14529-34.

Edelman, G.M. & Tononi, G. (2000). A universe of consciosuness: how matter becomes imagination. Basic Books: New York.

Tononi, G. & Edelman, G.M. (1998). Consciousness and complexity. Science, 282,1846-51.

Umberto,

The global neural workspace of Baars and Dehaene is missing a key feature that is needed to make it work, namely subjectivity. Their model does not provide an account of how the workspace is organized around the locus of perspectival origin that defines subjectivity. For example, see "A foundation for the scientific study of consciousness" on my RG page.

Hi Arnold,

Absolutely agree with you, not only in the global neural workspace, but most of consciousness models. And why? Because subjectivity lead to a one of the greatest mysteries currently in neuroscience: the hard problem of consciousness. The only way to study "subjectivity" is being inside the mind of the other person (by the way, you can do this in lucid dreaming).

Furthermore, what is subjectivity? I saw that in your article, you describe subjectivity as the representation of the world from a egocentric point of view. Absolutely agree this psychological assumption. But what does it means from a neurological point of view? How does the brain come up with subjectivity? 

And here we strike, from my opinion, with the most forgettable and marvelous region of the brain: the insula. The insula is the core component of subjective conscius experience, but it is the same as subjectivity? I don´t think so. As you posed in your article, you should compare you vegetative state (egocentric) with something outside of you. And where is all that external information "concealed"? in the fronto-parietal network (that is the brain region that process external stimuli), in the working memory. So, here the question, at least for me, is if real or healthy subjectivity (I have said real, because frontal damage patients is another world) will depend on the relationship between prefrontal and insula, that causally is the connection that is unique in the human being and modulate the brain activity (Craig, 2011).

REFERENCES

Craig AD. (2011). Significance of the insula for the evolution of human awareness of feelings from the body. Ann N Y Acad Sci, 1225, 72-82.

Umberto, the insula is indeed important to subjectivity, it's one of about 6 different brain areas that contribute to consciousness, and the greatest contributor of emotional content. In my "Integrated Model of Consciousness" I suggest that there is a core consciousness that is built on in about 6 different layers. The Insula is one of the first of the areas of the brain to be so combined with the core consciousness which I believe is in the brainstem in the optic tectum, an area with a unique overlapping of layers of senses. The problem is that there is a rich feedback to this area from the cortex, and so proof of the location from which the feedback came is somewhat limited by it's deep situation in the brainstem which eliminates the utility of fMRI because it is not as sensitive to deep locations in the brain.

I suggest that the area most associated with the Global Workspace is the fronto-parietal network which in conjunction with the Default Mode Network (DMN), and the Dorsal Activation Network(DAN) is the focus of Mind Wandering Studies. This area, I suggest is best linked to the core consciousness by the Parietal Lobe via the Posterior Cingulate Cortex, and the Precuneus (1 for each of the "Trains of Thought", [internal (DMN) and external (DAN) respectively]) Combined these are one of the last few areas that are linked to core consciousness, and bring with them a sense of the internal dialogue that makes up the bulk of our conscious thought.

One question: how do you define conciousness? It is a subjective feeling and we have not got any real way to measure it. For example, someone could be in a coma but still show brain activity when people are talking to them. We do not even know if my feelings of conciousness is the same as anyone else's. Moscovitch did a lot of work into conciousness and I reluctantly agree with his theory that we have not got any free will and all we do is respond to our internal and external environment. The whole idea that we can think of something totally randomly is impossible. You only need to think of the classic "do not think about a blue elephant" and you automatically think about a blue elephant even if it is only for a short period of time.

I am surprised that no one has mentioned metacognition in relation to working memory and conciousness. Metacognition and working memory are very similar and one can argue that metacognition is the executive functioning part of working memory. Personally, I think working memory is a type of memory like episodic memory. However, it is not only memory but also other cognitive functions. Obviously, the role of metacognition is really important because if we take the example of the boy who is locked in the shed, then he might try and escape a number of times and fail. However, with metacognition then he can learn from his mistakes and use the other components of working memory to successfully escape.

If you are describing working memory as a state of memory then why not describe all memories as this because you only activate your semantic memory or episodic memory when a task stimulates you to do so.

Nicholas, you have a major point there, how do you define consciousness? In fact all attempts to define it have foundered on the problem that there are too many definitions, and favoring any one definition tends to ignore others, which are strenuously objected to. In my "Integrated Model", I suggest that there may be as many as 6 different areas of the brain all cooperating in defining consciousness. Even to call it a subjective feeling, is disingenuous if only because it ignores the strange loopy-ness that Hofsteader noticed.

In Mind Wandering Studies, Metacognition is what makes you aware that your mind has wandered, without the stimulous of the probes that always are incorporated into such studies. Mind wandering is not random thoughts, although it might seem so, it is simply a loss of task focus, as the internal train of thought kicks in, and locks out the external train of thought which is task oriented thought. Evidence seems to suggest that this is prescriptive, in that focus too long on a particular task results in habituation on that task, and mind wandering, allows you to retain the task longer in memory at the loss of some immediate focus.

So two questions come to my mind: (1) what may be the difference between working memory and prospective memory?, (2) do e.g. ravens have working memory without cortex? (see TICS this month)

To 1) There is an addition theorem for

working memory: all components of memory

that are suited for storing any item

for a short time must add up in capacity

to the Miller number (7+-2).

To 2)

http://www.jneurosci.org/content/34/23/7778

http://derstandard.at/2000001793655/Wie-Rabenvoegel-Informationen-im-Gedaechtnis-behalten

http://www.scinexx.de/wissen-aktuell-17640-2014-06-05.html

Regards,

Joachim

I absolutely agree with the notion that in WM, attention is not just retrospective (i.e., directed 'backwards in time') but also prospective. A good example for this is the perceptual experiment by Carlisle et al. (2011, JoN). In this experiment, attention was directed to a memory representation of a pre-cue, which indicated the task-relevant target stimulus for a subsequent perceptual task. This demonstrates the relevance of WM for prospective action. Moreover, the study nicely shows how the activation states of memory changes over time with practice.

Here's another thought ...

The idea that WM is activated long-term memory (LTM) is well-established, and at the very core of Cowan's embedded processes model. However, I find it puzzling that at the same time, Cowan argued that WM and sensory memory (e.g. iconic memory) are separate 'stores' or 'memory systems' (Saults & Cowan, 2007; Cowan 2011).

Does it make sense to propose distinct stores in one case (WM vs sensory memory), but to reject the same idea in another case (WM vs LTM)? The argument that sensory memory has a much larger capacity than WM is not convincing here, because this is especially true for LTM. However, one might argue that sensory cortex - where sensory information is stored - has a somewhat different organization than higher-level cortical areas, which are not so much attuned to low-level sensory features (e.g., color, orientation, etc).

So I wonder what you do think about this: Does it make sense that the state of memory referred to as WM is fundamentally different from the state of memory called iconic memory? 

cheers, 

Tobi

Tobias, the problem with the assumption that WM is just activated LTM, is that there needs to be an activation step, that converts from STM to LTM. My assumption is that this activation step, is part of WM. That in fact there is actually a Mechanism for conversion that makes it possible to convert from STM to Activated LTM. That WM is both the storage buffers, and Mechanism.

Working memory content is not only

a set of items. In a set the order

of elements is not relevant, and

{a,a,b,c} is the same as {c,a,b}.

But the observation is that the order

of items is maintained in WM as well

as repetitions. WM content is a

tuple of items.

This speaks against a simple

activation of LTM.

Regards,

Joachim

Dear Joachim,

I am not sure whether I understand your argument against the hypothesis that WM is activated LTM. Because LTM is certainly in the position to represent the order of events.

For example, last year on christmas eve, we had dinner before - and not after - we had gift giving. And I remember that 9/11 happened before Barack Obama was elected for president.

Hence I assume that I misunderstood your argument. Could you point out this misunderstanding?

cheers

Tobi

You have never seen a t t q r t

before. Of course you have seen each

of the letters before; the letters are

in LTM, but not the sequence. The order

of these letters is not yet stored in

your LTM. If you don't repeat the

above sequence again and again, it

will not be settled in your LTM,

it will vanish.

Think of candles for each letter.

Activating a letter means lighting the

associated candle. Now how do you

represent order, how do you represent

that the letter t appears thrice?

WM rather resembles a shift register

with a limited capacity and with

decay of content.

Regards,

Joachim

Dear Joachim, thanks for your comment, I think I am now getting closer to understanding your point. WM certainly has a limited capacity, although I don't know whether it resembles a shift register whose content is subject to decay.

The view that loss of information in WM is caused by decay has been mainly inferred from auditory WM experiments, but this interpretation is not undisputed (e.g. Oberauer & Lewandowski 2013: JEP General; Lewandowski & Oberauer 2009: JEP Learn Mem Cogn). Visual studies rather suggest that WM representations 'die a sudden death' (Zhang & Luck 2009: Psych Sci), whereas a decay account would have predicted that WM representations fade out gradually.

Regarding your example (a t t q r t ): Yes, I agree, I would have to repeat these letters a couple of times to consolidate them into LTM. This repetition (= rehearsal) leads to a sequential activation of neural networks representing the individual letters. I don't know exactly how temporal order is represented in LTM, but the 'conversion' of WM representations into LTM can be explained by Hebbian principles (rehearsing the sequence would lead to changes in synaptic

weights; if these weights are robust enough, the representation would endure over time, entering a memory state called LTM).

Speculatively, sequential activation processes may play a role when the order of information is relevant, because such sequential processes lead to associations between items that depend on their position in a list (the association between the 3rd and 4th item should be stronger than between the 3rd and 7th item)... but as I said, that is just me speculating.

Here's a counterexample for a WM task that requires the activation of LTM content:

What's the 13th letter in the alphabet? ;-)

As WM capacity is limited, you cannot retrieve all 26 letters from LTM at the same time and keep them in WM. Also, at least for me, it is impossible to access the letter via its order in the list. The best solution I came up with is to mentally cycle through the alphabet, until I reached the 13th letter. Note that despite the alphabet is overlearned LTM content, it is a quite arbitrary sequence of letters (there is no physical law why Z should come after A). I furthermore assume that retrieval in an arbitrary list containing repetitions would work pretty much the same way as

for a list without repetitions (although it might be a bit easier, because repeated items can be 'chunked' together).

The bottom line is, I still think that your argument does not convincingly rule out the hypothesis that WM is (an activated) part of LTM, rather than a separate memory system. In fact, Joaquin Fuster stated this explicitly when he started this thread: "The evidence is now overwhelming that working memory consists of activated long-term memory [...]". 

This led to my question whether it makes sense to distinguish between WM and sensory (iconic) memory...

cheers

Tobi

Dear Tobi,

> Visual studies rather suggest that WM representations

> 'die a sudden death' (Zhang & Luck 2009: Psych Sci),

> whereas a decay account would have predicted that

> WM representations fade out gradually.

sounds reasonable for me. WM content in its

nature is symbolic. Fractions of symbols make

no sense. If the brain is not able to recover

a pattern, it should drop the remains completely.

> Speculatively, sequential activation processes may play

> a role when the order of information is relevant, because

> such sequential processes lead to associations between items

> that depend on their position in a list (the association

> between the 3rd and 4th item should be stronger than

> between the 3rd and 7th item)... but as I said, that is

> just me speculating.

Neural networks can work either as heteroassociative

memory (map an input vector to an output vector)

or as autoassociative memory (complete a partially

initialized pattern). Both can be used to bring

forth sequences.

Attached is an illustration. A feed-forward network

can map the symbol a to an output vector b c d e.

This works fast. I think it is necessary to add a

context symbol to the input vector, since it depends

on context what is following an a. I do also think

this is the way how we normally learn sequences,

poems.

Why? This can be shown with a thought experiment.

Everyone can go fast through a learned sequence in

forward direction (through the letters of the alphabet,

through one's phone number) but not in reverse. This

observation holds for any sequence. Of course it would

be possible to learn the alphabet in reverse order.

But then you're only able to enumerate the alphabet

fast in reverse order, but not all other sequences.

But is it possible to enumerate sequences in

reverse? Yes, definitely, but it takes more time.

Memory recall from LTM to WM can operate as

autoassociative memory. WM content is initialized

with ? ? ? x y z, and the content is completed

from LTM: u v w x y z. Now one has to shuffle WM

content a little bit, forget x y z, make

? ? ? u v w the new pattern to be recalled and

so on. This is also a way the brain can use

to bring forth a sequence, and it does work

in reverse direction as well.

> Here's a counterexample for a WM task that requires

> the activation of LTM content: What's the 13th letter

> in the alphabet? ;-)

>

> As WM capacity is limited, you cannot retrieve all 26 letters

> from LTM at the same time and keep them in WM.

This is, BTW, an argument for the organisation

of LTM in the form of 7+-2 tuples. It is possible

to recall a packet of that size, but not bigger ones.

> Also, at least for me, it is impossible to access the

> letter via its order in the list. The best solution

> I came up with is to mentally cycle through the alphabet,

> until I reached the 13th letter.

Agreed. It should be mentioned that counting reduces

WM capacity by one or more symbols needed for the

counter itself.

> I furthermore assume that retrieval in an arbitrary

> list containing repetitions would work pretty much

> the same way as for a list without repetitions

> (although it might be a bit easier, because

> repeated items can be 'chunked' together).

Chunking requires learning. If you encounter

ttttttttttt you can't have a chunk for it because

you've seen this sequence here first. But to keep it

in WM, you can simply use "eleven t", which requires

only two symbols instead of 11.

> The bottom line is, I still think that your argument

> does not convincingly rule out the hypothesis that WM is

> (an activated) part of LTM, rather than a separate

> memory system.

Imagine a new phone number. Of course you have seen

every single digit before. The digits are in LTM.

You have activated them. You can call the digits

activated LTM content, but you can't call the

sequence activated LTM content, since you have

not seen the sequence before. Yet the sequence

is stored somewhere, and this place is WM.

> This led to my question whether it makes sense to

> distinguish between WM and sensory (iconic) memory...

At the moment I have no opinion on that but a general

rule seems to be that you can't extend WM capacity

by using a "different" memory system.

Regards,

Joachim

Dear Tobi and Joachim

First, you are completely oversimplifying LTM; it is not just a big box where we keep all our old memories. It can be separated into episodic, semantic, procedural and arguably "flash bulb" memories. So when you are arguing whether WM activates LTM or vice versa you need to be more specific on the task. For example, I know the 13th letter of the alphabet is M for three or more reasons. 1) My first name is Nick I was born on 13th and I know that N is the 14th therefore I only need to count back one to work out 13th... Coincidentally my middle name is Mark which begins with M which I know is the 13th. 2) when I was younger (due to my disability) I used to use a computer emulator, which had the alphabet separated into two columns and M was at the top of the first column and because I know there are 26 letters in the alphabet I know that M must be the 13th. 3) For some strange reason I know that H is the 8th letter in the alphabet so I only need to count up from H to get to the 13th letter.

In the first two examples I am presuming that the WM activates my semantic memory which in turn uses some part of WM to work out the letter or it just uses semantic memory and does not require WM to be reactivated. However in the third example WM would be more involved because it would activate semantic memory and then WM would need to count up from H until I got to the 13th letter.

However, I have a fourth example; I could be watching a quiz tonight on TV and one of the questions could be “What is the 13th letter?” and three possibilities would come up. In this scenario I would not need to use WM at all because my episodic memory would be automatically activated because of this conversation today and I would know the answer. My point is that one can access LTM either explicitly or implicitly depending on the activity or experiment being undertaken. So when memory is activated implicitly such as in a recognition task then one can argue that WM is not involved. For example, people who have PFC damage have significant deficits on explicit memory tests but perform equal to healthy participants on implicit memory tests. On the other hand, people can have damage to their episodic memory and be unable to form new explicit memories but they can learn new motor skills (procedural memory).  

We are assuming that the PFC is responsible for WM but that is not the whole case, the hippocampi region is important for encoding and retrieving episodic memory. We also know that the temporal lobe is critical in forming long term memories without the need for the PFC, especially for implicit memories. Therefore, my argument is that in certain tasks we require WM before LTM, but in other tasks we do not require WM at all. So, it is not simply the case that one can argue that WM comes before LTM or vice versa, it is totally task dependant.

You are all ignoring the role of metacognition which is similar to executive functioning and prospective memory. Whether it is a cognitive task or a motor task that we are mastering we use metacognition to constantly improve our ability at performing the task. There is evidence that older adults have weaker metacognition than younger adults. However, there is clear evidence that older adults have the ability to recognise where they go wrong on a cognitive task, but they do not employ the right strategies to improve their performance when they repeat the task (without direct instruction). The point here is that metacognition has a very large impact on WM and all aspects of LTM. Hence, we cannot talk about WM and LTM without acknowledging the role of metacognition.

Dear Tobi,

 You have addressed most directly the two assumptions on which my question was based.  And you have reasoned persuasively for both: (a) WM is a prospective function, and (b) its content consists of a portion of LTM (semantic, episodic or other) that has been updated, reconfigured, and given present relevance for a prospective action.

With indispensable caution and respect for all those who have intelligently participated in this discussion, here I wish to make a few points regarding those two principal tenets:

 1.  The in-depth discussion of WM makes no sense, either psychologically or neurobiologically, by taking this function out of the perception-action (PA) cycle, the circular and dynamic interaction of the organism with its environment in goal-directed behavior and language.  WM mediates cross-temporal contingencies in that cycle (“if now this then later that; if earlier that then now this”).  That cybernetic cycle processes information from the environment through subcortical structures, the cortex, and back to the environment in the form of action.  It has cognitive as well as emotional components.  The cycle can be set in motion anywhere within it in addition to the environment: sensory receptors, internal milieu, limbic system (notably amygdala, insula or hippocampus), motor systems or associative cortex.

2.  The action that WM prospectively mediates can take many forms:  the response to an emergency, the correct answer to the tester, a mental arithmetical operation, etc.   Further, it can be part of a larger plan--with several PA cycles in it--toward a behavioral or linguistic goal.

3.  The evidence for the prospective property of WM is reviewed in the publications cited under the original post of my question.  Here is a tiny bit of it from our lab (Quintana and Fuster, 1999).  During the delay (retention) period of a WM task, while the discharge of some prefrontal neurons decays, that of others ramps up in anticipation of, and preparation for, the delayed choice to an ambiguous stimulus.  What’s more: the slope of that ramp is proportional to the degree of predictability (Bayesian certainty or probability) of the specific characteristics of that impending choice.

4.   The evidence for the LTM content of WM is also reviewed in those publications.  To reiterate, WM is a portion of LTM retrieved and activated by association (as also by association LTM was originally made, through a STM stage), updated to present context, and retained for a prospective action.  Without these qualifications, discussions of WM can become utterly fruitless or simplistic.

5.  Yes, WM can be viewed as a form of metacognition because it is a knowledgeable “manipulation” of knowledge.  Its content can be infinitely diverse, like LTM or knowledge (semantic memory).  No, there is nothing entirely new under the sun for WM.  The content of WM in a WM test or operation may be a sequence of letters making up a non-sense word, but the letters are part of an alphabet, which is very much a part of semantic LTM.  That piece of the alphabet has been reconfigured, updated, for present use in present context, within the PA cycle.  The sequence may be new, but the components are old.  What defines the content of that WM is the order, the relations (spatial or temporal) between its elements, the Gestalt, like all cognition and metacognition.

6.  As in any executive function, and as the highest stage of the PA cycle, the prefrontal cortex plays a critical role in WM.  It performs that role, however, in close coordination with subcortical, limbic and cortical structures.  It most certainly is not the “store” of WM.  An apt analogy is that of the director of orchestra.  

7.  WM has a temporal decay.  This has been amply substantiated in human and nonhuman primates, psychologically and neurobiologically.  What determines the “WM load” and the course of that decay is the complexity of the content being retained, not just the number of items in it, which may vary considerably about 7 (I am a proud holder of the Miller Prize for cognitive science).

I hope someone will find this helpful.  Cheers.

With kind regards,

Joaquin

Dear all!

I remember one of our lecturers in the field of neurology began his lecture on the memory with the words: "Working memory is formed, in order to remind people that it is necessary not only to relax but also to work."

Vladimir

agree with @ Umberto Leon-Dominguez

regards

Interesting question.

Agree with Umberto Leon-Dominguez

regards

This discussion has just been brought to my attention by Research Gate, having posited a few papers on it some months ago. I am struck and agree with many of the points made by Joaquin Fuster's last note dated two years ago, not having had time to go through the whole thread.

I have been working sporadically on the operation of memory since 1978, and having retired last year, am know making some progress, subjectively at least, in terms of the connection between my proposals and that of recent research in quantum entanglement.

I describe my thesis baldly as Duplication Theory, and it is remarkably similar to the morphic resonance of Rupert Sheldrake with whom I have been in contact regularly since 1983, albeit out separate approaches to the problems of memory and the mind's operation are vey different. I attempt to show that working memory is caused by DNA or similar molecules stored physically in the brain which act to instigate short term curtailed memory sequences, whereas perfect long term memory sequences , exemplified by perfect recall of eidetic memory very often under trance (with the brain's neurons firing randomly), operates on quantum connection basis across time.

If anybody might be intrigued enough to enquire further then I have a website (www.mindandmemory.net) started in 2007 which now needs updating when I have time to accommodate the latest advances in quantum entanglement as far as I or anybody understands that Gordian Knot. However I have a synopsis of Duplication Theory on my Research Gate site under my name completed some years ago, and which has little to do with the quantum aspect about which I knew nothing in 1978 when I took two years off to study and write a book in the wonderful reading room of the BM as it then was. There I learned to my astonishment that virtually nothing palpable was known about the operation of memory, which incidentally had little to do with the book I never completed in that august establishment.

However my position here has been recently improved by another four or five shorter recent papers dealing with the quantum involvement aspect, now I have had time enough following retirement last year. This resonance effect through time, as well as space at quantum levels has implications for other subjects than just memory, although my presentiment is that once the principle behind the mechanism of the latter is cracked open, then the operation of the mind should not be far behind.

Nicholas Greaves