The bottom line is that memory is essential to constructing scenarios for ourselves in the future. Anecdotal evidence backs this up. Our ability to project forward and to recollect the past both develop around age 5, and people who are good at remembering also report having vivid thoughts about the future.
But would the results be different if the subjects were mystics?
This also makes one remind oneself of what Jean Cocteau said about art and how we make judgments about it. He was criticizing the lack of comprehension of new art because audience and critics knew of the past. He said, "We are inclined to judge what is beautiful by what is familiar."
ReplyDeleteMystics and bards and artists all seem to me to be able to step out of memory and into imagination and experience, and see new things.