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Doctoring our autobiographies

Anne Dalke's picture

From a NYTimes article today about Why Indiscretions Appear Youthful: "memory amplifies righteous self-messaging. In piecing together a life story, the mind nudges moral lapses back in time and shunts good deeds forward ... creating a doctored autobiography .... “We can’t make up the past, but the brain has difficulty placing events in time, and we’re able to shift elements around .... The result is that we can create a personal history that ... makes us feel we’re getting better and better.”

Comments

Roy Nelson's picture

Ah yes! the question of who we are...

What is this thing we call "self"...
Thanks!! Anne that is a lovely pointer! so we also distance ourselves in time! from our bad moral behaviour very interesting!

Another eye-opening book is "A mind of its own" by Cordelia Fine... it is scary yet helpful to read...

#R;

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