Memory is a vital characteristic of the human species. Organisms evolve to adapt to their environment in many different ways. There are, however, two broad classes of adaptation. The first of these involves preprogramming the organism to cope with its environment so that it is born with all the necessary instincts and equipment to operate efficiently and effectively with virtually no learning. This is clearly a very successful means of adaptation and has enabled an enormous range of organisms, from plants, bacteria, and insects to “simple” vertebrates, to continue to flourish for millions of years. Such organisms have their mode of adaptation “wired in” and, as such, have minimal need for learning or memory.The second involves the production of an organism which is adaptable. Here, there is much less preprogramming, and the organism is left to modify its behavior in response to its environment. This allows for considerably greater complexity and variability of behavior. It also demands a larger brain and is heavily dependent on the capacity to learn and remember. The human race is the obvious example of this form of evolution – our ability to learn and remember has allowed us to develop tools and language, technologies which in turn vastly increased our ability to store and communicate yet more information through writing, and subsequently films, videos, and computers, all of which can be regarded as an extension of the memory. However, without the individual’s memory, the vast storage of information in the libraries all over the world would be incomprehensible.Accordingly, the ability to learn and remember, allowing as it does for the development of language, is perhaps our most crucial characteristic.
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