Michael Colella
Photographs and Memories
7/15/16
Hyman is correct in his belief that we must put our cameras down and rely more on our
memories. Humanity has become too focused on trying to remember life with their
smartphones rather than remember life with their brains. Cell phones are now used to
record everything, no matter how inconsequential. Obtaining photographical proof of an
event now seems to be far more important than actually experiencing the event itself.
Photographs surely play an important role in sharing your experiences with others, but
society has become too reliant on this method of documentation, leading to less reliance on
the brain and more dependence on technology. Unfortunately, this reliance often leads to
both increased forgetfulness and false memories.
It is first important to understand how memories are formed in order to see the importance
of memory over photography. Memories form based on visual images experienced by a
person. Joshua Sarinana, a neuroscientist at MIT writes, “Of all our senses, vision is the
strongest and most influential in memory formation.” It is therefore reasonable to assume
that whatever your eyes experience at the time a memory is formed will be the dominant
source of information during the recall of that specific memory. This means that if you use
your phone to record a memorable event, when trying to recall this memory you will
necessarily remember the phone taking the photograph instead of the actual object or event
you were photographing at the time. The photograph will provide a strong foundation for
the situation in which you took it, but you will ultimately end up with a distorted memory
