What role does memory play in our understanding of reality?
SUNDAY 21st NOVEMBER 2021
Gerrards Cross Memorial Centre, East Common,
Bucks, SL9 7AD and on-line via Zoom
Four speakers presented their answers to the question which is arguably
the key for understanding philosophy in general:
What role does memory play in our understanding of
reality?
This question has been debated since ancient times. In the late 1990’s,
following incorporation of empirical and theoretical developments in
psychology and the sciences of memory, philosophy of memory emerged as a
distinct branch of philosophical research. Philosophy of memory is now an
interdisciplinary subject overlapping with numerous other fields of
research, including (but not exclusively) philosophy of mind, philosophy of
psychology, philosophy of neuroscience, epistemology, and ethics. Indeed,
there might be no crisp boundary between philosophy of memory and other
off-shoots of philosophy.
PROGRAMME
10.15 Registration
10.30 Welcome to the Away Day
10.35 Introduction to the
QuestionFauzia Rahman-Greasley
Video Recording (MP4 format, member access only)
Our capacity to recollect the past is something with which we are personally
familiar. Yet it is one of the least understood phenomena.
Much of our present day thinking about human memory is directed and
constrained by a framework of analogies from computer technology. Is this
the correct way to think about human memory?
The question ‘What role does memory play in our understanding of reality’ is
arguably more difficult to answer than ‘What role does memory play in human
behaviour’ or ‘Can machines do what we (as thinking entities) do?’ For
whereas the latter questions are seemingly answerable by experimental
(“scientific”) research, the former requires conceptual analysis. The
answers we give may have far-reaching implications.
10.50 Can memory give us a true picture of
who we are?Bob Stone
Video Recording (MP4 format, member access only)
From Locke onwards, memory has been a prime candidate for what constitutes
‘the self’. I shall argue that a memory-based ‘narrative self’ is probably
the best model, but that problems with the way memory works undermine any
claim we may make to having an accurate image of ourselves. Memories, like
all experiences, arise from a combination of the sensations that come into
our brains with the existing state of the brain into which they come. That
means that, for both memory and perception, what we experience or remember
is limited by (a) what strikes us as important, (b) what we want to
perceive/remember, (c) the (socially) constructed concepts under which we
categorize our experiences, (d) the group we are in at the time, (e) our
past history as we see it through memories formed earlier, (f) our emotional
state at that moment or at the moment when we recall the experience. What is
more, this is true not only for the individual, but also for the collective
memory of a family, society, nation, race, species. Insofar as we try to
stand outside all these contexts, the ‘self’ that stands outside cannot be
some ethereal disembodied self but the very self that is constituted by
them. Yet maybe this doesn’t matter, since our perceptions and memories and
concepts have no doubt evolved not to make us dispassionate observers of the
world, or of ourselves, but to get us through life with as little
existential Angst as possible.
Bob Stone has a degree in classics, specialising in Greek philosophy, but
since retiring from a career teaching classics in schools has attacked other
areas of philosophy with a vengeance. He loves reading, talking, writing and
arguing about all kinds of philosophical topics, and is always keen to get
immersed in new ones. Since 2010 he has been a member of Philsoc, which is
now his spiritual home!
11.40 Refreshment break
12.10 The problem of validating ostensible
memoriesAlexandra Turner
Video Recording (MP4 format, member access only)
Is there a means of validating ostensible memories that avoids a
question-begging assumption of their reliability? The analytic response to
this problem develops two main claims, aiming to show that necessarily,
confident memory beliefs are generally true.
The first claim is that an agent who consistently made sincere and
confident, yet highly inaccurate memory statements, would be doing so
because they misunderstood, or made deviant use of, terms such as
‘remember’.
According to the second claim, it is a ‘logical’ fact (not a ‘psychological’
one) that an agent must regard their own confident memory beliefs as
instances of knowledge.
Alexandra contends that, while this analytic response is not sustainable, it
suggests fruitful ways of looking at the problem.
Alexandra Turner taught Philosophy, Religious Studies and English in the
tutorial college sector. She is currently taking a break from teaching in
order to pursue her own philosophical interests, which include topics in the
areas of metaphysics, ethics and the philosophy of well-being.
1.00pm Lunch
2.10pm How memories shape our understandingDavid Burridge
Video Recording (MP4 format, member access only)
An object is not just sensed, but is perceived by our memories.
Merleau-Ponty argued that the sensation as a unit of experience is
inadequate because our senses are subject to perceptual interpretation. Hume
thought ideas are like a heap of waste in our minds and we pick on them, in
accordance to what our senses need to recall. I would argue that this is too
simplistic. Our perception shapes our understanding of what we sense, and
our memories are established in our unconscious in a preordained structure.
We make sense of things and order our collation of memories, because of
personal belief, experienced facts, or social and cultural values.
Following a successful career in business and employment law, David
Burridge now has time to focus on his interest in philosophy and poetry.
He has undertaken a range of courses at Oxford OUDCE, from Kant to
Heidegger, and as a member of the Philosophical Society has contributed to
various Reviews over the years. As a poet, David has so far published three
collections: PAUSING FOR BREATH ALONG MY WAY, CHILD’S PLAY, and MAKING
SENSE, the latter bringing together what he calls his “philo-poems”. His
latest collection, STREETWISE, is due out in the autumn.
3.00pm What is the role of memory-imagination
when dealing with reality?Elena Draghici-Vasilescu
Video Recording (MP4 format, member access only)
Imagination creates, which means it projects into the future. Imagination
also informs the past; ie. it influences memory. For instance, memory and
imagination in art (as opposed to artists and model books) are the real agents
of the transmission of artistic forms and ideas.
Memory is often affective, which
means it retains events which have a strong emotional impact on a person; it
also fuels the projection of events people imagine when in an emotional
situation.
Elena's paper will elaborate on these reflections.
Elena Draghici-Vasilescu is a Professor of Byzantine and Medieval
Studies. She teaches and researches in the fields of Byzantine culture
(Philosophy, iconography) for the University of Oxford and also
independently. Her work focuses, inter alia, on the texts of Gregory
Nazianzen, Gregory of Nyssa, and Pseudo-Dionysius the Areopagite. Among her
latest books are Creation and Time. Byzantine and Modern (2021);
Heavenly sustenance in Patristic Texts and Byzantine iconography,
Palgrave, 2018; Michelangelo, the Byzantines, and Plato, 2021;
Visions of God and ideas on deification in Patristic Thought (co-ed.
Mark Edwards); Routledge/Taylor & Francis, 2017, Devotion to St. Anne
from Byzantium to the Middle Ages (ed.), Palgrave, 2018; and Glimpses
into Byzantium. Its Philosophy and arts (2021).
