Ho hum ...
.. another of those stupid bits of industry funded "research" non-stories that are, actually just "bad science".
Yawn -Why on earth is The Register bothering with this crap?
Some people may consider memories to be priceless, but one British boffin has devised a way to place a precise Sterling value on every reminiscence. Dr David Lewis, a self-styled "neuromarketing pioneer", has come up with the following formula, which factors in a memory's perceived importance, the kind of memory it is, how …
if all of the different personalities are represented by an arbitrarily assigned value, presumably memory type is also a similarly arbitrary value. It's almost as if the amount produced is completely meaningless!
As it happens i don't fall into any of the personality types listed, so i got a divide by zero error, does this mean my memories are worthless, priceless, or just a bit odd?
says it all really.
This guy has come up with a precise formula, giving 3 or 4-digit accuracy based on whimsy, rumour wishes, lies and mistaken assumptions - brilliant!
No wonder people would be willing to sell their intangible, ill-remembered, possibly planted or false memories for wonga - all you;ve got to do is find the next sucker.
P.S. I'm thinking of putting last night's dream up on eBay - any takers? Starting price £0.99, plus £25.00 p&p.
If there's one thing I hate, it's the journalistic regurgitation of pseudo-scientific press releases, especially ones that claim a mathematical 'formula' for a human characteristic.
Tenuous claim + tenuous link + lazy hacks = easy publicity, every damn time.
Panasonic can stick their Blu-ray players up their corporate bum.
- watching Thatcher leave Downing st crying
- watching Blair leave Downing st, sadly not crying
Best of all (although sadly the memory of a very vivid dream rather than yer pukka reality):
- Shagging Helen Mirren in zero G after watching 2010 at the cinema a couple more times than was strictly healthy
Mines the one with "A beginner guide to getting out more" in the pocket.
I was hoping to spend some money and get a working memory - no such luck!
IQ of one hundred and seventy-something, but I can't remember what I was doing last week.
I've worked in a group of 24 people for the last 7 or 8 years and I still couldn't tell you most of them's first name - let alone surname!
...... Total Recall or Ghost in the Shell?
Total Recall:
Melina: "I can't believe it, it's like a dream. What's wrong? "
Douglas Quaid: "I just had a terrible thought: what if this is a dream?"
Melina: "Well then kiss me quick before you wake up. "
Ghost in the Shell:
Batu: "That's all it is. Information. Even a simulated experience or a dream is a simultaneous reality and fantasy. Any way you look at it, all the information that a person accumulates in a lifetime is just a drop in the bucket."
Mines the one expecting a copy of Ghost in the Shell Redux in October.
"It also noted that 51 per cent of men and over 33 per cent of women would sell off memories for hard cash."
Who wouldn't?
1) Sell memories of wedding for £6 million (3 million each)
2) Have new big extravagant wedding for substantially less than £6 million (cant remember the first one any more, so the new one will be just as good, memory-wise)
3) Pocket £5,950,000 ish.
The marketing dept draw up the formula and then try to find a 'scientist' to 'invent' it.
They tend to do the rounds for a few months before somebody is desperate enough for the cash to let them use their name.
On the bright side, the cash the marketing dept pays usually helps some real research - generally in a totally unrelated area.
"I think if we played stories like this straight, you'd have a point. We don't, so you don't.
I draw your attention to the later paragraphs in the story..."
Fair point, I just thought that if you didn't print the 'silly formula' stories at all it might go some way toward stopping PR companies from coming out with such nonsense.
Anything that makes science reporting more credible has to be a good thing.
Anyway it's Friday night so have a beer on me :)
"in response to increasing interest, on the part of his clients, in the use of scientific research projects as a route into the media"
So basically his job title is "think up sciency sounding things to be proved-by-survey in order to draw attention to how awsome a paying customer is"
(*cough* minus the "paying customer" bit = undergrad project *cough*)
Less hard work than being a proper writer, slightly less degrading than the joss stick and whalesong brigade, more money than being a lab tech.... Genius!!!!!1
"the Lewis Formula puts the value of the average family Christmas at £542, a wedding at £3 million and a first kiss at just under £23,000."
How would most people put the memory of their first kiss onto a disc? There's laws against filming kids kissing, in private, in the dark, whilst playing doctors and nurses.
And not to be too pedantic.. that's worth considerably more than £23,000.
As for weddings.. is that to remember or to forget them?