Memory

We know that as we get older, we may slowly lose more and more of our memory, and that this can impair our sense of where we belong and how we connect to others. We might relax a little if we consider the improvements in computer data storage, which may lead us to a future in which the limits of our memories become less constricting. In this book, John Scanlan explores the nature of memory and how we have come to live both with and within it, as well as what it might mean for memory to become a process as simple as retrieving and reading data.

Probing the ways various philospohers have looked at memory, John Scanlan revals that some argue being human means having the ability to remember, in order to see oneself as a being in time, with a past and future. At the same time, he shows that our memories can undo our present sense of time and place by confronting us with our past lives. And in this digital age we are immersed in a vast archive of data that not only colours our every day experiences but also suppies us with information on anything we might otherwise have forgotten, breaking down the distinction between the memories of the individual and the collective. Drawing on history, philosophy and technology, Memory: Encounters with the Strange and the Familiar offers an engaging investigation of how the phenomenon of memory continually remakes everyday life.