To what extent can memories change and affect future generations as they connect with others and make decisions?

The world we live in today is a canvas that has been filled with colors from ancient times to modernity. It’s the representation of all lives, memories, feelings, and experiences, shaping the world as we know it. We are defined by the past, from an individual level, a societal level, all the way to a global level, keeping us all cemented and connected together. However, in recent times, people want to erase or revise their memories. My stimulus excerpts, such as the Maori article and the article “My Mothers House”, emphasize that memories aren’t just nostalgia, but the bonds that connect us with our family and culture. This paper will argue that protecting our memories is important: it connects generations, decision making, and serves as a guidestone for future endeavors. In a time where memories can be changed with medicine, remembering the past serves not only as a way to honor ancestors, but also as a foundation to create a better future. 

Memories are vital for humans, as they shape our individuality and societies. They are the mechanism by which culture, traditions, and knowledge is preserved and shared. The past is vital to humans, as it defines and guides us. Some say that moving away and forgetting the past is necessary for progress, but others say that forgetting history prevents us from fixing our mistakes. It’s begun recently, with medicine used to “using drugs to manipulate memories”(gale). It’s been studied since 100 years ago, but medicine is coming now. It can be used to wash away memories, and causes people to forget themselves. It can also be used against people, since “If we're successful in doing these sorts of things, it will raise a societal debate about how far we want to go”(Gale). They say that revising or forgetting memories helps people move on from traumatic and painful experiences, but it comes with a great cost. It removes what makes us human, what makes us unique. Memories are the foundation of humans, as without them, societies, individuals, and cultures will be forgotten and will provide a weaker basis to prepare for the future. 

At its core, this paper aims to safeguard what defines who we are, our memories. First, memories bind generations together, providing a path for culture, values, and knowledge to pass from one generation to the next. Second, they serve as crucial tools for decision-making by giving background knowledge on what to do. Finally, maintaining an accurate historical record allows us to learn our success and weaknesses, so we can learn and prevent mistakes from happening again. Some may say that forgetting the past might be key to forging a new path, yet doing so risks severing the vital connections that have historically guided human progress. A society that discards its past is one adrift—unable to draw on the wisdom of previous generations to navigate future challenges. 

Memories should be preserved to connect with different generations, to help with our decision making, and to remember past societies. Memories are the backbone of a society; Each person builds on top of that tower, adding their own memories and experiences for others to learn and connect from. The Maori oral narratives, for example, stress that preserving history through “whakapapa” is essential not only for maintaining tradition but also for ensuring that cultural bonds remain intact (Binney 3). Whereas in Rachel Kaadzi Ghansah’s My Mother’s House, she explores the past when “my aunt made me promise that I would go across to Pineville and try to find my great-grandparents’ graves.” (Ghansah 16). Without memories, the bonds that connect generations will weaken, causing people to feel disconnected from their family and weaken the cultural foundation of society. People are a collection of all actions and experiences from the past. Knowing what defines us helps us know ourselves, and with that we can better connect with similar people. Especially in families where they share the same cultures and similar personalities, understanding those similarities ensures for a proper connection, from which families share knowledge, values, and get closer with each other. Some may argue that preserving these small cultures is insignificant due to its relevance, but it’s diversity that makes a society stronger. Preserving these memories is what unites a society in struggle and in victory, helping solve societal issues within the community and its people. In this way, memory preservation fosters social solidarity and reinforces cultural resilience.

A person cannot run without being able to walk first. Similarly, people can’t prepare for the future without knowing what happened. Research has indicated that negative memories remind people of their past errors and of circumstances they should avoid in the future”(Giorra). We make our decisions based on what we know, since we think that it might happen again. Due to our memories, we expect certain actions to have certain outcomes, since we might’ve experienced them ourselves or heard of them. These memories serve as a guidance telling us what and what not to do. But on the other hand, “recalling [memories and] its rare moments of satisfaction,then they may make predictions and plans accordingly” (Morewedge). We can also use our memories to know what actions are good, so we can repeatedly perform them. The brain stores these memories as a “model of a world”, constantly updating it with new details it remembers. Using that, the brain makes predictions of what will happen. As we continue to live, these predictions, weather right or wrong, get updated and changed to match our experiences.  This happens due to the mind, which is highly adaptable, has something to look at, and from their help we know and prepare for what may come in the future. Some may say that relying on the past too much prevents us from learning new things. While progress can’t be achieved by only sticking to the past, it doesn’t mean we should abandon it completely. A balanced approach–where memories and forward-thinking strategies are used–is when society can get real growth while strengthening the foundation of society, their memories. 

Looking at it from a scientific perspective, the brain is designed to retain past information and use it to imagine what might happen in the future. The brain often uses “episodic memory-a particular mode of future thinking that involves imagining specific personal scenarios.”(Bar). We don’t know what will happen in the future, but we know what has happened before. Our brain uses those details, what went right and wrong, and imagines something that could happen later on. These ideas help us figure out what we need to work on and be prepared for the future, especially since the future is always changing. The episodic memory is caused when “the past can come to mind uninvited, color the present, and push individuals into action; people can use their memories to guide their selection of goals and plans”(Kariniol). The past is what we base our thoughts on; it’s what gives the brain details on what and what not to do. With the details from the past, the brain can figure out how to deal with the same situation later on, since it can analyze what went well and what didn’t, and figure out how to fix that. Some critics may argue that memory may continuously change, it shouldn't be confused with complete revision or erasing our memories. It’s instead small changes in what we remember, and maintaining these memories with accuracy can give the mind a steady basis to retain the past. 

Given the challenge of maintaining the past, and the variety of angles needed to understand this problem, a comprehensive solution is required—one that integrates policy, education, and technology.    This solution should be implemented by policymakers and educators. They should take part of the documentation process, ensuring that the past isn’t being “revised” or written biased, and that it’s the truth. They could have a department that’s focussed on safeguarding past information to be used at a later point. They can play a part in recording information, processing it, and storing it, making sure that the “agency's ensure that the "real stuff" of history endures for future generations to see for themselves”(Ryan) according to the National Archives. Laws should also be passed that mandate transparency of historical data and ensure that revisions can’t be made to textbooks or documents. These textbooks should then be properly used by the schools, who emphasize on teaching the truth of what happened. They should discuss the variety of ways the past and memories can be viewed, ensuring that students have a strong understanding of what happened, keeping them prepared to tackle the future. Along with government archives, digital archives should be created to keep the memories of the past within easy reach of the public. These digital archives should be created to store large amounts of data and be created with security in mind, preventing others from changing facts of what happened. Collaborative initiatives between governments, academic institutions, and technology can help develop best practices for preserving the past. 

Although the past can be preserved, several limitations are to be considered first. A major concern is bias. Many historical narratives have already been tampered with in the past, and have caused many cultures and people to be marginalized since they didn’t fit into the narrative. Especially with history creating a ““apocalyptic vision, in its current form, problematises the space development inhabits”(Oceania), according to Gale in Context. This causes people to instead look down on cultures, as they are portrayed as evil or dangerous to the public. Another major concern is selective memory. Due to people’s memories adding new details everytime the past is remembered, it causes “those memories are notoriously unreliable”(Norberg 6). As new details accumulate in people’s minds as time goes on, it can cause people to completely forget what really happened, and instead causes them to believe in this fake memory as the truth. 

In a time period where culture and medicine face rapid changes, it’s more important than ever to safeguard our memories. The past isn’t just something that happened, it’s a guide where we can constantly learn new experiences, memories, decisions, etc to constantly shape and prepare us for the future. It’s vital for policymakers, educators, and cultural institutions to take the next step forward and protect the backbone of our identity and society. By protecting, teaching, and storing the past can we ensure that it remains safe and accessed by the public, serving as a connector and guide for life. As we move forward, we have to recognize that the past isn’t just something to be forgotten, it’s meant to guide us, meant to remind us of what we went through to get to this place. Only through protecting the past can we ensure that we’ll have this same guidance in the future. 

Works Cited

Binney, Judith. Maori Oral Narratives, Pakeha Written Texts: Two Forms of Telling History.

Ghansah, Rachel Kaadzi. My Mother’s House.

Gioia, Dennis A., et al. “Revising the Past (While Thinking in the Future Perfect Tense).” Journal of Organizational Change Management, vol. 15, no. 6, Dec. 2002, pp. 622–34, https://doi.org/10.1108/09534810210449532. Accessed 9 Oct. 2019.

Karniol, Rachel, and Michael Ross. “THE MOTIVATIONAL IMPACT of TEMPORAL FOCUS: Thinking about the Future and the Past.” Annual Review of Psychology, vol. 47, no. 1, Feb. 1996, pp. 593–620, https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev.psych.47.1.593.

Morewedge, C. K., et al. “The Least Likely of Times: How Remembering the Past Biases Forecasts of the Future.” Psychological Science, vol. 16, no. 8, Aug. 2005, pp. 626–30, https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9280.2005.01585.x.

My Mother’s House(By Rachel Kaadzi Ghansah)

Powell, Colin. Of Memory and Our Democracy.

“Predictions in the Brain.” Google Books, 2025, books.google.com/books?hl=en&lr&id=OfUJCAAAQBAJ&oi=fnd&pg=PR9&dq=how+does+changing+the+past+affect+the+future&ots=JuaNFL1iyR&sig=mOiw3W8BcxcYtup3CgEGvCXUjBM&safe=active#v=onepage&q=how%20does%20changing%20the%20past%20affect%20the%20future&f=false. Accessed 11 Feb. 2025.

“Preserving the Past, Keeping Pace with the Future.” National Archives, 15 Aug. 2016, www.archives.gov/publications/prologue/2007/fall/preservation.html.

Schacter, Daniel L., et al. "Remembering the past to imagine the future: the prospective brain." Nature Reviews Neuroscience, vol. 8, no. 9, Sept. 2007, pp. 657+. Gale Academic OneFile, dx.doi.org/10.1038/nrn2213. Accessed 19 Feb. 2025.

Seligman, Martin E. P., et al. “Navigating into the Future or Driven by the Past.” Perspectives on Psychological Science, vol. 8, no. 2, 27 Feb. 2013, pp. 119–141, https://doi.org/10.1177/1745691612474317.