… Yes, we now have an automatic filtering system which can recognize illegal use of the original content. It works with all the possible media: text, audio and video.

That filtering system, how does it do it?

It works this way. You provide us with your original content and we put it through our content indexing system. The system recognizes all the original patterns in your content and stores those patterns in our global index. After the indexing is done, every time someone tries to upload any piece of your content to the Internet, the system recognizes it and sets off an alarm.

Our following actions depend on how you want us to treat such attempts. We can either simply notify you or we can block the upload. We can also provide you with all the necessary information about the illegal posters. Such information would be used in case you decide to initiate some legal action against them.

I don’t give a damn about the posters. The people who drive me nuts are those who mimic my tunes, my lyrics, my ring-tones, my ideas, every move I make. I’m sick of those impotent bastards incapable of making anything original. Can your system reveal them?

Yes, the system is designed to do just that: recognize the original patterns and build a global index of them. Once we have your content scanned, we provide you with the detailed report of all the use of your original ideas. Please upload your content through our uploading web service.

OK! With pleasure!

Now, wait a minute, until we finish the indexing. Oops…

What?

I am sorry, we cannot index your content. Unfortunately it does not contain any original patterns. We can provide you with the detailed list of all the original sources used in it. Would you like me to e-mail you the list?

… No.

Our memory is always used in the service of some interest; we remember things which we care for or which are associated with things we care for. When we wish to fix a new thing our conscious effort should not be so much to impress and retain it as to connect it with something already there. The connecting is thinking. I would say that the art of remembering is the art of thinking.

The human brain is a very powerful and adaptive system. A curious example of the brain’s ability to adapt is our bad visual memory. As you all know it is quite difficult to hold a mental picture in mind of what you have just seen. The reason for that is simple, it is not necessary for the brain to memorize the image while you can actually see that image with your eyes. In a sense, the brain uses sight as the external memory, so it adapted to not spend effort on memorizing what it is seeing.

Professor, may I ask a question?

Certainly.

Are you saying that the fact that we can see things all the time frees the brain from necessity to remember the scene around us?

Pretty much so.

Professor, what if someone has a magic vision, so he is able to see any information that he needs. Will it cause his brain to stop remembering things completely?

I don’t understand. How could that be possible?

Just as a thought experiment, professor. Any moment he needs any information he can just see it. What the weather is in Boson at this moment, what year his wife’s nephew was born, what the distance from the earth to the moon is, where the nearest coffee shop is located, what thirteen times seventeen is, what professor William James said on his lecture yesterday. Just – everything.

What an absurd idea. How about his interests?

Same thing. He can immediately see anything that he is interested in and anything in the world that is related to his interests.

OK, I don’t think it has any practical sense, but I hope this individual never loses his magic sight; otherwise, one day he might not remember who he actually is.