When does memory editing threaten authenticity?
On a dual-basis process view of a narrative self, deleting factual memory content can threaten authenticity, while stripping sensory vividness often does not.
Source
Memory Modification and Authenticity: A Narrative Approach
Study at a glance
- Design
- Other — Narrative-self ethics of authenticity applied to memory-modification technologies
- N
- Philosophical analysis; not an empirical sample
- Population
- Authenticity and narrative self under memory-modification technologies (MMT)
- Outcome
- Factual memory deletion threatens authenticity more than dampening sensory vividness
Structured fields used in claim comparison tables when every cited study has a complete layer.
What they did
The author contrasts a conservation view of authenticity (keep a fixed set of traits) with a process view (judge the process of change). They defend a dual-basis process account built on a sustainable, well-defined self-narrative, then apply it to kinds of memory-modification technology (MMT).
What they found
Editing or deleting factual content can make the narrative less accurate and coherent. Reducing sensory-like memory, or a mere lack of ‘mineness’, need not threaten authenticity. Victim versus perpetrator memories, and gradual versus instantaneous change, matter for how disruptive MMTs are. MMTs can also shift the balance between self-discovery and self-creation.
The limits
What it doesn't show
This is a conceptual analysis, not a trial of propranolol or optogenetic editing. It does not measure how often real MMTs would meet the author’s conditions, and the victim/perpetrator contrast is ethical illustration rather than legal advice.
Key terms
- Conservation view
- Authenticity as preserving a fixed set of characteristics after the intervention.
- Process view
- Authenticity judged by how the change happens (e.g. free choice), not by frozen traits.
- Sustainable self-narrative
- A story of oneself that accurately and coherently represents lived experience and depicts a well-defined person.
- MMT
- Memory-modification technology, from dampening emotion to deleting factual content.
Flashcards
Research intelligence for this paper
See its role on concept claims, tensions it is part of, placement history, and related discoveries.
Quiz yourself
Author’s authenticity model?
Common questions
Is any memory change inauthentic?
No. Sensory dampening and missing ‘mineness’ need not wreck a sustainable narrative.
What is most threatening?
Deleting or editing factual content so the story no longer fits what was lived.
Why do victim and perpetrator differ?
What we do defines us differently from what happens to us.
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