Remember this, Susan Spencer

[Baldwin]

(Not sure if this belongs in Guggenheim, but it involves a tv show.)

I was just watching CBS Sunday Morning News. They had an interesting piece about amnesia, reported by Susan Spencer.

During the piece, they showed clips from various movies, e.g. Spellbound, The Bourne Identity, and -- to my point -- Memento.

In referring to Memento, Susan Spencer said the protagonist had "no short-term memory."

Ms. Spencer, what the hell is wrong with you? How could you interview all those memory experts and come away without understanding the difference between long-term and short-term memory? The protagonist in Memento has functional short-term memory; it's his long-term memory that doesn't work. He has anterograde amnesia.

She was assigned to the story, she (presumably) did some basic research, she interviewed an amnesia patient, she went to a famous brain research center and spoke to experts; then the piece was edited, and presumably somebody looked at it before it was aired. All through that process, why did nobody at CBS catch such a simple error?

What baffles me is that I've seen the same specific error many times: a reference to the character in Memento as having "short-term memory loss". Do people just not think about the words that they're speaking or writing? Oh, I am flustered. I shall stamp m'little foot.

[jali]

I'm guilty of using the same terminology to discuss the film.

Didn't the character remember things from the past, but had no memory of anything that happened before he fell asleep?

[Ferret Herder]

He remembers things that happened before his injury, so his long-term memory is working. After the injury, his short-term memory works but he cannot convert the memories into long-term memory, therefore he loses them eventually. Apparently the film is highly praised for its depiction of how memory works.

[Exy]

In referring to Memento, Susan Spencer said the protagonist had "no short-term memory."

That's bizarre.

It's a small error so I'm not devastated by it, but I can't help but think it's kind of an indictment of the general quality of science reporting that a reporter discussing a scientific issue is apparently not expected to get even the simplest facts right.

[Baldwin]

He remembers things that happened before his injury, so his long-term memory is working. After the injury, his short-term memory works but he cannot convert the memories into long-term memory, therefore he loses them eventually. Apparently the film is highly praised for its depiction of how memory works.

Thanks for the link; I didn't know that. (Unless . . . I forgot.)

Other movies have certainly contributed to confusing the issue. Not only is trauma-induced amnesia a staple of melodramas, but the specific form of amnesia in Memento has been played for comedy in a few other movies. Fifty First Dates had a fictional variation in which Drew Barrymore's character, following a brain injury in a car crash, has a bizarre form of amnesia in which, at the end of a day, she can remember everything that took place that day, but when she goes to sleep her brain "resets" itself and she awakes with no memory of the previous day. It was actually an entertaining movie, in a silly way.

Gene Wolfe used something similar (if I recall) in his novels Soldier in the Mist and Soldier of Arete.

Now I think I'll watch Memento again, when I've got two hours blocked out. That's one of those movies you want to watch without interruption.