poemranker ::The Same by newdawnfades

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Free verse № 65774

The Same

by newdawnfades

Member since 2002 · Posted 18 Sep 2003 · 6 comments

Trying to break our own biological code of behavior For I will do today what I have done tomorrow and tomorrow will sink into yesterday. Days and nights will rise and dip, with the rays of light, and dark and night. Past memories will curl up in a mass of identical experiences, and they will all be the same experience with no distinction or difference and our entire life will come and go in a single day, a single memory, lived in different ways but always the same. When our eyes have shut and our souls have left us, that will be the same too, just in a different way.

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6 comments

[n/a] Geschäftsreise 18-Sep-03/2:23 PM Reply
Interesting. I think (open to discussion) that the middle stanza is flawed in your understanding of memories. Your brain is only set up to record memories of unique incidents. Therefore we do not carry memories of the menial day-to-day. They do not form a mass.

They form a hole in our existence - vast stretches of our life without any record of our having lived it!

I think if you rewrite this poem with this understanding it will even be stronger (and the connection between death and routine that much closer).

Just a thought.
[n/a] newdawnfades › Geschäftsreise 18-Sep-03/2:29 PM Reply
Actually we do have memories of common experiences, it's because they are not unique that they 'combine' and form one experience. But I see where you are getting at, a mass implies an ever growing accumulation, whereas it should be a stasis of memory, where memories combine.

Thanks for the suggestions,
NDF
[n/a] Geschäftsreise › newdawnfades 19-Sep-03/1:04 AM Reply
Are you interested in a discussion on this? I'm fairly confident that I could convince you that this combination idea (while figuratively attractive) is not literally true.
[n/a] newdawnfades › Geschäftsreise 19-Sep-03/9:29 AM Reply
Well I have about 3 years of memory research under my belt, so current research suggests it is true. But I usually don't aim for logic in my poetry, it's more of a case of just saying what feels appropriate, even if it isn't correct in the real world.
[n/a] Geschäftsreise › newdawnfades 19-Sep-03/11:18 AM Reply
Fair enough to the second part (that's a good enough reason).
However I'm not aware of any serious research that suggest the first (I would appreciate any contrary references?) however there is a laundry list of research to support the idea that long term memories are formed only after a novel stimulus:

Here are some references if you are interested:

Cortical cholinergic activity is related to the novelty of the stimulus. - Miranda MI et al. (Neuroscience Letters)

Bidirectional modulation of long-term potentiation by novelty-exploration in rat dentate gyrus. - Straube T et al. (Brain Res)

The role of identified neurotransmitter systems in the response of insular cortex to unfamiliar taste: activation of ERK1-2 and formation of a memory trace. - Berman DE et al. (J Neurosci)

Human hippocampus associates information in memory.
Henke K et al. (PNAS)

Contribution of human hippocampal region to novelty detection.
Knight R. (Nature)

(I'm not trying to be an ass here, I'm just having a discussion and trying my best to keep you honest. There are people with more experience than both you or I who don't know everything that's out there in the literature.)




[n/a] newdawnfades › Geschäftsreise 19-Sep-03/12:21 PM Reply
Excellent! It looks like you have some background in bio-psychology! I will have to russle up my references, as I graduated almost a year ago, but I am more from the Cognitive perspective, which sheds some light in how we have a different take on memory.

Give me a little time and i'll be back with my references. I am going to have to peruse those papers you posted as well.

Regards,
NDF