How the Mind Forgets and Remembers by Daniel Schacter

Author:Daniel Schacter [Daniel L. Schacter]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780285640894
Publisher: Souvenir Press
Published: 2011-09-14T16:00:00+00:00

6

The Sin of Bias

IN GEORGE ORWELL’S chilling novel of life in a totalitarian political system, 1984, the ruling party achieved psychological mastery over its subjects by willfully altering the past. “Who controls the past,” ran the party slogan, “controls the future: who controls the present controls the past.” The government’s Ministry of Truth tried to alter the written historical record and even to manipulate the actual experience of remembering:

Past events, it is argued, have no objective existence, but survive only in written records and in human memories. The past is whatever the records and the memories agree upon … control of the past depends above all on the training of memory. To make sure that all written records agree with the orthodoxy of the moment is merely a mechanical act. But it is also necessary to remember that events happened in the desired manner. And if it is necessary to rearrange one’s memories or to tamper with written records, then it is necessary to forget that one has done so. The trick of doing this can be learned like any other mental technique.

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