November 7, 2011

  • braaaaaaaaains

    i've been on this kick of reading and learning about our brains and how we think and decide and perceive. my nerdy, nerdy heart has been reveling in learning about how little we understand ourselves. 

    one of the things that kind of blew my mind was the idea that perception actually alters our experience of objective reality. our perceptions make a difference, which i've also known about how i experience subjective things but i never thought it changed how i might experience with defined parameters. or how memory works-- the latest research tends to support the idea that  we actually recreate our memories each time we recall or retell a memory, and every time we recall/retell the memory it might change a touch.  which then kind of crosses paths with law and justice for instances such as eye witness testimony.  eye witness testimony is really unreliable but there's a part of the legal system, and ourselves, that just believes that what we saw with our own eyes is essentially more reliable than anything else.  but it's not, it's really not.  and all this to say, i was really excited when i ran across an article about how the supreme court is revisiting the issue of eye witness testimony.  law and science. fascinating.  very curious to see how this plays out.