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So it's like a built-in protection to prevent us from recalling traumatic experiences ? Could make sense. But then why also block the overwhelmingly good memories like getting xmas presents ?

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I don’t think you can put logic on what you do and don’t remember from an event. Biology would have to mate that with some contextual reasoning somehow which seems a bit to complex for something so inherently subconscious. For example when I think of some family vacations from childhood I can remember deep details about staring out the car window at some place, but as for the fun things we actually did there I am at a loss and have to be reminded by family.

I guess all that is to say you can’t seem to be in control of when the tape player starts recording and you can’t reliably find your old tapes.

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