0:00:04this is the rundown o'hara srinivasan if you've ever notice that you don't bother remembering
0:00:08things that you can find on the internet you are a low and there's a
0:00:12new study of the journal science the delves into back in much more the title
0:00:15of the paper is called google a fax on memory cognitive consequences of having information
0:00:20at our fingertips
0:00:22which were badly off their batteries parapsychology from columbia university actually with us and so
0:00:27what are the kind of key findings you're essentially telling me that
0:00:31i am able to take the space where used to remember things and now i'm
0:00:37remembering how to find the information better
0:00:40the overall findings are that when people don't know that
0:00:44don't know things they tend to think about the computer first i think about the
0:00:48place to find it
0:00:50when people expect to have information accessible to them later they don't remember it is
0:00:54well is one they don't expect to so they do located externally instead of internally
0:00:59and then finally yes that people tend to prioritise where the findings as opposed to
0:01:04the things themselves
0:01:05which actually i think is pretty adaptive
0:01:07so what kinds of information are we essentially keeping on the internet and not keeping
0:01:12in our brains anymore
0:01:13my guess is mostly the information that we don't have to use an outdated a
0:01:17lives the things that we are experts in so the things that we aren't be
0:01:20transacted memory source for other people
0:01:23so what is transacted memory so transacted memory of this idea that we have an
0:01:27external memory systems that are available to us and it typically are historically they were
0:01:34describe just other people
0:01:36so there be other people in our lives say in our office
0:01:40or are home life with no specific things
0:01:42it's we would go to them when we needed to know the interest of those
0:01:45things but we wouldn't bother to encode the information internally
0:01:48we would just know what they knew and no to go to them to find
0:01:51out
0:01:52so you know people been complaining about this idea ever since we have the written
0:01:55word i mean they're a philosopher saying my gosh we're gonna forget everything in the
0:01:59oral tradition is words that we really need to remember this is this kind of
0:02:03that next evolution or we essentially taking or memories and putting them outside of our
0:02:06brains not memories as a but huge chunks of our brain and putting them outside
0:02:10i don't i don't think so necessarily i think you know that there may be
0:02:14more information that we look up quickly online when we could often times you know
0:02:20go back and insider all memories to find it we're just you know in a
0:02:24hurry
0:02:26so the stuff is still there is just were not accessing it as much as
0:02:29we use two
0:02:30and i also think it's not all that different from the transacted memory sources that
0:02:34we've always used
0:02:36it's just more salient the people that we're using it this way
0:02:39so people don't really think about the other people in their lives of their using
0:02:42you know with external memory sources but the computer is really you know everyone realises
0:02:48that they're doing this you know resonates with everybody so it's it seems that much
0:02:51more
0:02:55i guess scary in some ways you know that the idea that where
0:02:58locating everything that we learn outside of ourselves and so does that have any
0:03:04kind of impact on our ability to remember things in general
0:03:08i don't think that the case but i'd actually don't have date on that
0:03:11i least with this question it if we're using this transacted memory online so much
0:03:16what happens on those moments one where not connected to the internet do we
0:03:21just get dumber
0:03:22i well i guess that it depends it depends on how much you want to
0:03:25know the answer to the question right so they did something that's really crucial to
0:03:29something you're doing at the time you'll find some other way
0:03:32right you'll call up the person might know you'll you know you'll actually track over
0:03:37to the library to look up the information i mean if it really depends and
0:03:41this is actually one of things my husband that we're talking about you know we
0:03:43said you know what does happen you know if you just wanna know of anyone
0:03:46actors that's optical important you know
0:03:49it's without well you know you can kind of do that kind of daydreaming type
0:03:52of thing where you can go back
0:03:54in your mind i think about right where you know where was i when i
0:03:57saw
0:03:58this person within a black and white was in colour you know which you older
0:04:02was younger
0:04:03and then sometimes you might come to the answer and another time you might nine
0:04:07you probably just forget about it
0:04:09okay and we should also mention that you had help from jenny lose university wisconsin
0:04:12madison and data when you're harvard university but betsy spare the lead author a psychologist
0:04:18from columbia university thank selected only s and this is a rundown o'hara srinivasan stay
0:04:22with us