I remember being put in the crib during the daytime and experiencing how the sunlight was glowing an orange red color through my thin baby eyelids,, and thinking about how I was breathing. Later in my life I remembered that as I was starting to be able to breath through my mouth on demand, and how I could switch from using my nose and then my mouth, because there was this sensation in my nasal cavity that I was feeling and controlling. Many years later, I found out this only happens in about the first 9 months of life. I definitely remember being a baby. I also remember what I now can call the great forgetting period, and I sort of argued with my mother, around the age of 4, that I had a harder time remembering things from before and she told me I couldn't remember those things, and yet I described some things that I obviously still remembered, and she said, oh your just reinforcing those memories from pictures or stories, but Noooooo, I remember from inside my head and my own eyes, what I was experiencing, and pictures could only help, but not be the cause of these memories of breathing and controlling my nasal vs mouth breathing.

this is a very difficult subject and I could tell that our guests were always clear with their answers.

I am delighted to see all of you sitting together once again, side by side, just like the good old days! I would like to express my gratitude to Brian Greene, Veronica O’Keane, Tim Bredy, Gail Robinson, and Oliver Baumann. Thank you! 🌈

In my opinion, one of the best WSF episodes ever! Terrific panel of guests.

Whenever I saw Dr Brian Greene talking, that itself turns into a good memory for me.😊 Lots of love and respect🙏 from India🇮🇳

Outstanding panel of experts! This topic is most fascinating. Thank you Brian.

I was very impressed with your guests. Certainly surprised of my own level of understanding the concepts expressed in your discussion. Thank you, most informative. As always Dr. Brian Greene does not disappoint.

Brian is so good at asking probing questions at depth!

Didn't recognize Randolph. As the Earth aged so did Brian. All this years I never paid much attention how we all have aged. Today, seeing Brian on UKposts caught me off guard. It's hard to accept that some of my favorite people changed with the time. Thank you Brian for all the shows and lectures. They have enriched my life to the utmost. I look forward to watching more of your shows.

Not only memories mark a section of life we lived, but emotions also do to. Emotions and mind can also write the script for your life story, and it happens quickly too. Especially when angry or in time of sadness. Once the mind is made up, and those emotions distills in us, the solutions running through our minds tend to get to the point where action is taken. It’s either good or bad, but it’s a normal process.

Science definitely gives new way of thinking 😊

I swear, I can recall almost every situation in my life, that has happened from childhood until today. Either its a good thing, or bad I have no idea, but I love it so far

One of these days, we will surely going to watch how the memories of the hallucinating mind's. Love it, from Nigeria 🇳🇬

Thank you for bringing this interesting topic to the table's surface. All of you made this potentially complicated topic regarding memory/brain brilliantly comprehendable ... Thank you again.

Great learning today. Thank you so much for the molecular level discussion.

Great talk, especially how the long stored memories can be affected and recorded depending on your current state or experience. Making it logical to recall unpleasant or traumatic memories in more positive or even comical light. However a specific thing here- going to an older doctor might be nice and quick but you are much more likely to get misdiagnosed, so to each their own.

❤fantastic to see live for the first time thank you all so very much❤❤❤❤

Very important topic, love to learn and study human brains!!

Memory is important to keep personal identity coherent (it’s a process).

Very fascinating topic. Still very much to uncover in the future.

Fascinating! I stumbled upon this video and I'm so glad I took the time to watch it all.

Many thanks Prof Greene for this amazing episode once again. Hopefully I won't forget it quickly all these valuable information I captured :)

Absolutely love the channel and this particular show. With this one and a few more I have noticed that towards the end, discussion reaches a point where there is no answer. I think that is where they need to have a couple of practitioners from spirituality such as vedantic scholars or monks that have done years of meditation. I love the modern science and gadgets and tests that discover new facts. The spiritualists can take it to the next level and show that it's not just that perception is reality but in fact reality is a perception.

A great discussion although from my POV I would have liked more talk on the use of implantable, synthetic devices for memory storage and BCIs for "off site" memory storage / computation. My organisations The Neural Archives Foundation, has particular interests in a number of the points that were discussed but primarily how this stored information might be recovered from frozen neural tissue. Also, as usual, Brian did a great job leading the discussion! Well done everyone!

I loved every minute of this. It's really fascinating to hear and try and understand the way our brains work.

Thanks Brian and WSF for these wonderful and educative videos. I have been a great fan of your writing for well over a decade. I have also been a subscriber to this channel for many years now, Have watched your documentaries and loved them. These videos with the brilliant guests you have are absolutely a breath of fresh air for someone like me with a curious mind. It’s staggering that we live in a time when such content is widely available at minimal monetary cost if that. Thanks for this brilliant content and wish you all the best.

I am schizophrene. This help me to understand myself. Thank you very much. Remember the one god and be thankfull...❤

I am amazed that my first memory is also me falling of the balcony lol

That guy at 37:00 really explained his own fundamental understanding clearly. Not many scientists put so much effort to explain others

Excellent discussion and Brian Greene always asks excellent questions. It would be interesting to ask the panel what their thoughts are about AI Superintelligence.

Admittedly dated, but I am reading Carl Sagan’s The Dragons of Eden. He talks about the structure of our brains and speculates on the origins of the right and left hemispheres. He speculates that originally they were redundant. Doing the same thing. But as humans evolved one of the hemispheres evolved to do rational thinking. He reminds us that the Greeks used geometry, shapes to perform mathematics, using the right hemisphere of the brain long before humans used numbers using the left hemisphere. Mathematics today is taught using shapes as well as numbers integrating the right and left hemisphere’s of the brain. Maps and multiplication are still quite relevant in the opinion of this writer.

This is fascinating, the first time I have seen a plausible (albeit superficial) explanation for how thought and memory work. However, I do not share the idea that this is reductive, or somehow diminishes what we are. We are made of the elemental forces of the universe, arranged into patterns that can expirence and contemplate its very existence. Then to further know that these patterns are the result of universal causation that traces back throughout time to the very moment of creation. If you think that a better understanding of how our bodily systems work, somehow diminishes what we are, then you do not fully grasp what you are. Also consider that the universe appears to be (and is almost certainly), infinite. In that case every pattern will inevitably repeat, and not just once, but throughout infinity. This implies that the perception we are separate finite beings, is in fact an illusion. We are far more than the some of our parts, and in more ways than we can possibly imagine. If these facts don't convince you, and fill you with awe and wonder, you're not paying attention.

My first memory is under a tree at a free festival... not sure if it was stonehendge or Glastonbury (I don't remember 😅) but I have a vivid memory of being under a tree, in a buggie, in the shade and our family dog was watching over me...that's it! But it remains vivid and I have later discovered that when I was

It’s very interesting that approaching my 40 I started to dream my past experiences - it’s like coming back memory of my birth- literally the peak of struggle reaching the light, other past lives in strong action moments- short but so vivid and clear dreams/memories 😅..

Fantastic discussion!

Excellent!

That was incredible. I particularly liked the bit piece towards the end, where Veronica made reference to that feeling we all have on occasion - when we sense something other than ourselves (in her words, consciousness looking back at us) - because it is reminiscent of a recent talk given by two well-known Dzogchen masters during which one of them described a meditation practice where the meditator would - in effect - throw their consciousness into a corner and have it look back at them. Great discussion guys. Thank you 🙏

This is golden, thank you very much! Best channel out there by far

😊 wow thank you all !!

Thank you for your education! love its!

Amazing information, huge thanks to professor Brain Greene

This was such a beautiful conversation

1:04:50 reconstruction of memory poses a very important question that contradicts their previous assumptions!

Remarkable, what an epoch to be a part of. I have so enjoyed all your experience and knowledge which has opened my mind to new possibilities for my own way forward. Thankyou one and all. Kind regards keith.

My earliest memory, ~ 2.5 yrs?, was of me in a crib (1st person; can picture the bottom of the crib set off the floor, bars, etc), and my mother leaving the room. Then shortly thereafter looking through the bars I see a spider - vague image, but lots of little legs and a body heading towards me on the floor. I scream “Mommy mommy”, freaking out, until she comes back, by which time the spider had crawled under the crib and disappeared! I am even more freaked out because I don’t know where it is, but with minimal language skills, cannot explain why I am screaming. My mother tries to convince me everything is all right, and leaves. Don’t remember much after that. Two points. (1) that was the first time (as far as I know) I saw a spider - and still I went ballistic. (2) I remember a minute or so before seeing the spider as part of the memory. This is VERY important, as it means that what was in working memory was also recorded with the memory. Without the earlier memory, you may not be able to predict a dangerous situation if it repeats. That is not relevent in this situation, but could be in may others. As for (1), a Columbian friend says he is “programmed” to react to a ball with 8 lines radiating out (symbolic of a spider) and even drawing a circle and 8 lines on a chalk board generates an adrenalin spike in him.

"Who am I without my memory?" I said that. I woke from a SE coma with a shredded memory. Realizing I was having trouble accessing my memories was disturbing and no one could see it. I can remember Monday on Tuesday well, come Thursday I'm not gonna know. I can prime a memory with a note/picture for months and when I stop it will be swept away. I couldn't recognize my daughter, friends, boyfriend shaved his face, he looked familiar but no memory came forward. If I close my eyes and listen/ed to their voice I'm in a better position. This started in 2015 I'm 37y/o

Fascinating!!

Surely a memorable episodic memory is formed of this episode on memory.

As always, this is just another piece of gerat knowledge festival... However, I have to say that there is always a pretty feelable sense of stage fright among almost all of the speakers and the host. I am always on alert for BRIAN GREENE`s work-of-art type topics and discussions on world science festival because I learn and get fantastic insights from the top notch professors and academics about the things that I am both personally and professionally interested in. Perhaps, I should not say that but I feel somehow compelled to express what I was kind of given by watching this discussion that is, I think, if these discussions on World Science Festival, are not made in front of live audience, instead, if BRIAN GREENE hosts these great festivals like in the times, when he was hosting it alone sitting alone infront of windows through each of which there was a scientist speaking with BRIAN GREENE,,, it would be marvelous because only then both the host and the speakers are feeling at the best level of comfort,,,, I know.... everone who is familiar with human behaviour, consciousness and language, is certainly realized that the stage fright is present in such discussions and it also hampers the level of productivity, level of questions, better insights and so on.......... I think I have made it clearer, at least, to those who think the same and wish the same. Hopefully, this great show would be hosted in a more intimate atmosphere, not in front of a live audiance and also the audiance hampers the producivaty of such discussions too is not that so ?...... because clearly, not everbody is keen on many details and what is really going on in the discussion..... Best regards to all the speakers and of course to BRIAN GREENE he is a real giant in the realm of science, we are really too luck to have him among us in this era.

1:23:43 dude, what she says here made so much sense. Us being aware of ourselves to this extent and looking at ourselves is the illusion of there being something more. More conscious things must be capable of becoming aware of this illusion too?

Thanks for posting

Well the Irish psychiatrist mentioned about hallucinations, some people do other people do experience esoteric phenomena which is much different. Extraterrestrial abductions, ghost apparitions, smoke suddenly appearing, moving lights suddenly, the soft halo of apparent souls moving, channelers written in sleep, all these phenomena happens. I saw a body of light and I was completely awaked and I saw that Sheddims ( souls without physical body mentioned in the Kabbalah), a body just of light where the rainbow of colors swirled. This phenomena is explained in the Kabbalah. A psychiatrist have to be an objective person and allows people that have witnessed these phenomena not to become traumatized by them but on the contrary value them, enrich or strengthen by them and continue moving on ahead.

Awesome program! Thanks to the experts for their professional explanations, which solved my hard thinking. Hopefully what I have learned from you will help you too. What is consciousness? The subconscious information of the network of neurons is decoded or encoded by the thalamus, and the resulting electrochemical substance is consciousness. Consciousness, subconsciousness, and deep consciousness are subjective distinctions created by the interaction of various organizational structures in the human brain. Our consciousness is like an electrochemical flow, divided into conscious stream, subconscious stream and deep conscious stream. Transfer information electrochemically between neuronal networks. But we cannot perceive the deep stream of consciousness, luckily we all know what we are thinking. That is, we all know our consciousness, so when the subconscious information of the network of neurons is decoded or encoded by the thalamus, the resulting electrochemical substance is consciousness.

Fabulous ! Yay !

A long line of kids walked in single file in a great big room to where a nun sat with a tennis racket. What was going on? Each crying kid was laid across her lap and whacked once, then hurried out a side door. It was 1943. My sister and I were at Angel Guardian Orphanage in Chicago while my mother was treated for TB at the TB Sanitarium. Years later figured out the whack aimed to keep kids afraid and quiet. It was dark and warm when Mom and Dad picked us up. He carried the baby. She had to be there, but I don't remember seeing my sister with us. We passed a streetlight that brightened the sidewalk briefly. I felt happy to be going home. We must have taken a bus. No car. Second Memory.

With Brian Greene at helm, you can be sure that the talk would be high quality and interesting. However I would have wanted to hear a bit more on the exact mechanics of memory formation and retrieval, involving neurons and circuits. The talk was more general.

Thank you ❤

This conversation has invoked my memory of watching " Total Recall " for the first time.

I find it a bit perplexing that people can assume, limit, their belief to thinking what we see and know is enough to explain something like consciousness or life. What we do know, if we look from a sufficient perspective of the whole, is that life repeats on all scales in all directions, and its safe to assume that we do not know all scales. This makes it hard to think that mind, consciousness, awareness is original, and limited to and a result of the brain as we understand it, that it isn't a version of something else, like a microcosm of something fundamental. Mind as far as we know is intrinsic to everything, because we cannot know anything without it, if it is intrinsic, then as nature does it must be intrinsic on other scales. Truth is with or without understanding, our job is to find the understanding that reveals truth, and not create truths that we can understand, because our understanding is always behind.

Thank you so much

I think the extent and reach of human memory is a very different process for people. Some have extraordinary reach and depth of memory and others very brief. It's also different for people on different subjects, making it a personal and unique way in which our neurochemistry is defined and functions. I can see Dr Greene has a specific interest in this subject and I wonder, why is that?

Somthing beyond the molecule is gods job that we deserve for human kind.

35:00 - I think the expert misunderstood the question, though the answer was interesting. ‘How do I feel emotion attached to the partial reliving of remembered events, how is that emotion encoded?’ It’s the reliving of the event that causes an emotional reaction, at the present time. It’s why your emotional reaction to an event can change over time (think of a bad break-up/being cheated on, and good/bad memories twisting). I think that’s important in addition to meta-encoding at the post-synaptic level (amount of dopamine vs nonciceptin).

My first memory is from when I was in the back yard with my brothers and a German Shepherd (no surprises there...lol). The weird part is that when we left that house for a different house i was eighteen months old. So I can remember something from when I was a toddler.

Awesome + Informative = The Mind is very powerful.🙃😎✌️

I am happy to have seen this... we have come a long way in chunking down the mechanics; if scientific method holds, next we can conduct experiments to see an actual emotional orchestration of the brain in color.

Thanks Brian I’ve always enjoyed your presentations this one is really good and presents some very important information on consciousness that I have been seeking you did a great job makes me want to claim you as an Aussie. Fair dinkum

This was great, particularly the bit about RNA function in synaptic plasticity - perhaps this is why some instinct (learned lessons from one lifetime) can be passed to offspring. Do you think even our understanding of 3D space/shape was learned via evolution and passed on in DNA? I think some memories are triggered by what 3D shape we are currently attending to, and what shapes from memory may be similar (that there is a mechanism for triggerability via proximity/likeness in perceptual space). For example, once when attending to my torso while lying in bed, I had a memory flash of my torso while driving a Volvo, but the road going towards ceiling for torso in memory to align with torso of current attention.

Consciousness is the key word

I feel like the panelists missed the mark in answering some of Greene's questions, but it was definitely a great episode.

Thank you very much, I am very interested in memory formation and functioning, I just wander about the kids that speaks 7 languages without learning before (how the Plasticity formed). Thank you again!

0::48, smell is probably the oldest of our senses

1:10:00 in some cases of severe trauma (both psychological and physical trauma but here specifically psychological trauma ) some cases could block both memory and the process of generating personal identity. why and how?!

Thank you very much for the remarkable discussion on memory, indeed it was a complex process (at the end of discussion, does it pointing on human's soul?). And actually, I have question, beside organic trauma which could affect the human memory, is that possible that the brain/memory it selves get injured by psychologic trauma? and how this could be explained through molecular basis?... Based on my own experience, huge lies impact on my memory and as consequences conflicted with the identity. And also, is that possible our memory already made before our birth? and if it is possible, how it could be?....any answer are welcomed....

Very informative

Impressed by the detail

Awesome range of views. Somewhere along I imagined the " synergy" that takes form when Hydrogen and Oxygen give rise to water. I wonder if consciousness expresses it self in the synergy. That it happens invariably and repetitively suggests that the synergy isn't the cause but the expression by some law of this consciousness. All creatures therefore have this power. It is seemingly more pronounced and nuanced in man.... Thanks for this episode WSF.

What is Selective Memory? I've been using it to protect myself for things that are not important to me. Is it good for me?

Concepts as I understand them are a representations of what humans not fully understand but at the same time they acknowledge its existence even if only mentally,…etc usually it’s something agreed on its existence, but may not be agreed on its essence (ambiguity)… to concise it’s a concept till they agreed on its essence!

Interesting.Thank you

Brian asked some really good, tough questions

When I look back on my life Alma I find that these traumatic events also happen through the eyes of the third person too! I have Aunts that went with me at that time and she could not believe an take some of these.

As a toddler, I opened a door closed to keep heat in the kitchen of the coldwater flat in Chicago. What is behind the door? Trotted past dark dressers to bright windows with closed curtained blinds, a couch and chairs. Brr cold in diapers, a shirt, and bare feet. Satisfied, I quickly turned back and closed the door behind me. First memory.

1:22:00 matter (human brain) can yield consciousness type one because it’s a process that requires human brain (in this case), consciousness type one is the key for mankind to decipher both consciousness type one and type two. even though at the end self concept (one of the most advanced coding systems in existence itself), but it’s possible to decipher consciousness type one.

0:55,, that word, intuitively, remembering your future

Brian and Beast have totally different audiences. Tell your 200+ friends with emails to forward this to their 200+ email contacts. That's 40,000+ possible viewings. Two more forwarding levels could yield at least 1,600,000,000 viewings. Just a thought.

I was missing the applause ... Fantastic show. I had around 5 epiphanies the hour.

Consciousness is just the loopback circuit between the memory system of the brain and the emotion system , which are so intricately bound together. Being conscient is a feeling based on memories of being alive.

44:00 maintaining the state and regenerating them regularly in such a very complex active environment (human brain), the mechanism they mentioned is impossible to maintain continuously changing states!

Very interesting,

Thanx once again Brian.

It's interesting that till the point the experts were sharing the techniques of their individual expertise they seemed very precise and certain. But soon as the conversation came to the collective result of their work, they started rambling. The experts might have charted parts of the brain and the mind and have come to understand the two as units of form and function but they still have very little understanding of the combined processes of the two. And if you really want to see them perplexed, just look at them the moment the word "consciousness" was thrown into the mix. That word is the Achilles heal of neurosciences.

An interesting follow up might be the impact of technology such as asocial media and AI on the brain and behavior.

🎉🎉🎉🎉super episode

The smells of rotting leaves in the fall always reminds me of high school.

Assalamualaikum sir 💓💓💓💓💓

This not actual reality (far more complicated than that), but just to make it easier to comprehend: you can imagine cycle two (this existence), is the software that generates this universe (cycle one which built within cycle two). This was written many years ago (respond) It was about how human at the end will find out that they are already on the top of one of the most advanced technology in existence itself,….etc

Do memories ever really fade away? Or do memories simply move from one part of the brain to another as time goes on?

I wonder if we start removing everything unpleasant from our minds. How will we know joy?

Saw my hand turn the doornob. I was inside, moving thru the rooms as in a video. Like it was happening again. 😊