Memory

Possible advantages of "natural" forgetting (as opposed to a perfect memory)

 * 1) A perfect memory would have to manually remove memories to keep things more organized (and reducing e.g. search time), which requires energy and time itself.
 * 2) cache hierarchies → organization ⇒ if organization has to be regulated from higher cache hierarchies, it might require more resources (e.g. energy) due to a disproportional increase in resources → higher cache hierarchies usually have fewer slots

Flat vs. adaptive forgetting rate
If (in the future) one is able to choose one's forgetting rate, care must be taken to find the optimum between a standardized flat forgetting rate and an adaptive forgetting rate that's based on e.g. estimated future utilization. The latter, which might require more time and energy (trade-off).

The problem might be not one of storage, but of organization.

The mind has essentially infinite capacity for memories, but we have only a finite amount of time in which to search for them.

Size

 * 1) the more memories, the more difficult it becomes to retrieve some (usually)
 * 2) things that can speed it up (see also: Algorithms to Live By: The Computer Science of Human Decisions, p. 107):
 * 3) * myelination (via e.g. SRS)
 * 4) * organization (e.g. decreasing semantic distances)
 * 5) * compressing memories (e.g. decreasing complexity of synaptic patterns)

Procedural memory

 * 1) Suddenly forgetting something you do everyday is related to procedural memory.
 * 2) E.g. tying shoes
 * 3) It also means that when we do have a failure, we really don’t know how to deal with it. A conscious mental search is not going to retrieve the needed information, because the information we want is not in our accessible database.
 * 4) Procedural memory → subconscious (implicit memory)

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