Memory is one of the most important processes of the psyche. Any form of mental activity relies on memory.

Memory is a mental process that includes processes: memorization, preservation, subsequent reproduction by a person of his experience, as well as forgetting.

A person is able to keep in memory not only what he felt and perceived, but also what he thought, experienced and did. Human memory is closely connected with sensations and perception, with attention, thinking, emotions and feelings.

Memory is selective. It retains not everything that has passed through a person's consciousness or affected the brain, but what is connected with his needs, interests, and activities. Memory - like other mental. processes are a subjective reflection of the objective world. This means that the features and attitudes of a person's personality and his activities affect the content, completeness and strength of his memory.

The physiological basis of memory is the formation, preservation and renewal of neural connections in the cerebral cortex. The connections that arise in the brain reflect the objective connections that exist between objects and phenomena of reality. They can be spatial, temporal, structural, causal. To remember means to associate something with something, for example, the name of a person - with his appearance, the date of a historical event - with the content of the event. These connections are called associations.

memorization –the process of memory, as a result of which the new is consolidated by linking it with the previously acquired. Memorization is selective: not everything that affects the senses is stored in the memory. It is proved that any memorization is a natural product of the action of the subject with the object.

The memory process takes place in three forms:

Imprinting, - involuntary memorization, - arbitrary memorization.

imprinting- durable and accurate preservation of the memory of events in the CP and DP as a result of a single presentation of the material for several seconds. By imprinting, eidetic images arise. The phenomenon of eidetism is as follows: after looking at the picture, the subject can give an answer about its details, this is possible when the image of what he saw is stored in his mind in its entirety. This is common in children.

Involuntary memorization- storing events in the memory as a result of their repeated repetition. So, from a year the child memorizes the words of the language, being in a certain language environment. Involuntary memorization is facilitated by a strong feeling (joy, fear, disgust ...). This method of memorization has a certain, positive value; memory is built on it in the initial period of learning. Involuntary memorization is a product and condition for the implementation of cognitive and practical actions.

Arbitrary memorization- a product of special mnemonic actions, i.e. actions aimed at memorization itself. It arose in labor activity, in communication between people and is associated with the need to preserve the knowledge and skills necessary for labor activity. A characteristic feature of arbitrary memorization is a volitional act and the obligatory presence of a motive that solves a problem.

Preservation –more or less prolonged retention in memory of information obtained in the experiment. Saving has two forms:

Actually preservation and - forgetting.

There are two types of storage of material in memory:

1) short-term and 2) long-term.

short term memory - direct imprinting of a set of objects with a single perception of the situation, fixation of objects that have fallen into the field of perception. In short-term memory, information is stored from a few seconds to several hours (1-2 days). Volume - 5-6 items. Under the conditions of the CP, tasks are productive, for the solution of which automated methods of action can be used.

long term memory - memorization and preservation of information of greater importance for a long period of maintenance. The volume of DP depends on the importance of information for a person. DP is stored for many months and years. KP - has tactical significance, and DP - strategic.

The information used in the activity either disappears from memory or passes from the CP to the DP.

As an intermediate link between the KP and the DP, there is operative memory - serving the current actions of a person. The information necessary for servicing the corresponding activity is extracted from the DP.

Forgetting is a memory process associated with erasing from memory events that are not important for a person, are not repeated, are not reproduced by a person in his activity. What is not included in the activity is not repeated - it is forgotten. Forgetting is useful and is associated with the formation of an individual's experience.

Inclusion in activity is a means of connecting the material with human needs, therefore, the fight against forgetting. It is necessary to systematically repeat what has been stored in memory. It is necessary to repeat the material after a short time after its perception, for example, in the evening to read a lecture recorded in the morning. Forgetting is also selective. Significant activity-related material is forgotten slowly. And what was of vital importance is not forgotten at all. The preservation of the material is determined by the degree of its participation in the activities of the individual.

What is stored in the DP is not erased, but becomes unconscious. Preservation is not a passive process, but a dynamic one. Previously memorized knowledge interacts with newly acquired knowledge: they are associated, refined and differentiated. The experience stored in the mind is constantly changing and enriching. Only that which is memorized as an independent integral statement is preserved and reproduced in an unchanged form.

Playback - the process of memory, the reconstruction in activity and communication of the material stored in the DP and its transfer to the operational one.

There are 3 playback levels:

Recognition, - actually reproduction, - recollection.

Recognition- this is the reproduction of some object in conditions of repeated perception. It is of great importance in life. Without it, we would perceive things as new each time, and not as already familiar. Without recognition, meaningful perception is impossible: To learn means to include what is perceived in the system of our knowledge, our experience. Recognition is accompanied by a special emotional experience - a feeling of familiarity: "already heard, seen, tried." It is easier to learn than to reproduce in the absence of the original. Everyone had to experience a strange experience: you arrive in a city that is obviously new to you or find yourself in a new situation, but it seems that all this has already happened. Imaginary recognition is called "deja vu"(translated from French. “Already seen”). Here we are let down by associations - it looks like only something, but it seems that everything happened again.

If the recognition is complete, definite, it is carried out involuntarily(without effort) - imperceptibly for ourselves, we recognize in the process of perception things, objects that we previously perceived. But if recognition is incomplete and therefore indefinite, when, for example, after seeing a person, we experience a “feeling of the familiar”, but we cannot identify it with the one we knew before, or we recognize a person, but cannot remember the conditions in which we perceived the person, then in these cases recognition is arbitrary. Based on the perception of the object, we deliberately try to recall various circumstances in order to clarify its recognition. In this case, recognition passes into reproduction.

The actual playback carried out without re-perception of the object that is reproduced. It is caused by the content of the activity that a person is performing at the moment, although this activity is not specifically aimed at reproduction. This is reproduction involuntary. But it does not happen by itself, without a push. The impetus for it is the perception of objects, ideas, thoughts that are caused by external influences.

Random Play caused by reproductive tasks that a person sets for himself. When the material is fixed firmly, playback is easy. But sometimes it is not possible to remember what is needed, then you have to do an active search, overcoming difficulties. This reproduction is called recall.

Remembrance - reproduction, in which at the moment there is no way to remember the right thing, but there is confidence that it is remembered. Recall is characterized by active searches in the labyrinths of memory for the necessary information, this is a certain mental work, work. Willpower required. Recall, like memorization, is selective. A well-conscious and precisely formulated task directs the further course of recall, helps to select the necessary material in our memory and inhibits side associations. Two steps are recommended:

association and recognition. Reliance on recognition - the name of possible variants of numbers, words, facts that can be recognized and remembered.

All three levels of reproduction are woven into each other and interact in mnemonic activity.

Association- the connections between the individual links of what is perceived in life play an important role in memorization and recall.

What is learned is constantly interacting with what has been learned before..

Types of memory:

according to the nature of the mental activity that prevails in the activity, they distinguish motor, emotional, figurative and verbal-logical memory;

by the nature of the goals of the activity: arbitrary and involuntary;

according to the duration of consolidation and preservation of the material: KP, DP and operational.

Motor (motor)- memorization, preservation and reproduction of various movements and their systems. It serves as the basis for the formation of writing, walking, dancing, and labor skills.

emotional memory- on feelings, consists in remembering, reproducing and recognizing emotions and feelings. Underlies the formation of habits. Feelings experienced and stored in memory can prompt or inhibit action. The ability to empathize with another person is based on emotional memory.

figurative memory- visual, auditory, tactile, olfactory, gustatory.

Verbal-logical (semantic)- consists in memorizing and reproducing thoughts. Because Thoughts do not exist without language, then the memory for them is semantic.

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Memory- this is a general designation for a complex of cognitive abilities and higher mental functions for the accumulation, preservation and reproduction of knowledge and skills. Memory in various forms and types is inherent in all higher animals. The most developed level of memory is characteristic of a person.

The pioneer in the study of human memory is Hermann Ebbinghaus, who experimented on himself (the main technique was to memorize meaningless lists of words or syllables).

Memory in neurophysiology

Memory is one of the properties of the nervous system, which consists in the ability to store information about the events of the external world and the body's reactions to these events for some time, as well as repeatedly reproduce and change this information.

Memory is characteristic of animals that have a sufficiently developed central nervous system (CNS). The amount of memory, the duration and reliability of information storage, as well as the ability to perceive complex environmental signals and develop adequate responses, are proportional to the number of nerve cells involved in these processes.

According to modern concepts, memory is an integral part of such processes as

Memory and learning

Memory and learning are sides of the same process. Learning usually means the mechanisms for acquiring and fixing information, and memory means the mechanisms for storing and retrieving this information.

Learning processes can be divided into non-associative and associative. Non-associative learning is seen as evolutionarily older and does not imply a connection between what is remembered and any other stimuli. Associative is based on the formation of a connection between several stimuli. For example, the classic version of the development of a conditioned reflex according to Pavlov: establishing a connection between a neutral conditioned stimulus and an unconditioned stimulus that causes an unconditioned reflex response.

Unconditioned reflexes are not included in this classification, since they are carried out on the basis of inherited patterns of connections between nerve cells.

Non-associative learning is divided into summation, habituation, long-term potentiation, and imprinting.

Summation

Summation is a gradual increase in the response to repeated presentations of a previously indifferent stimulus. The result of summation is to ensure the response of the organism to weak, but long-acting stimuli, which can potentially have some consequences for the life of the individual.

In a normal situation, the reaction develops as follows: a strong stimulus causes a whole bunch of action potentials in the sensitive neuron, which leads to a large release of the mediator from the synaptic ending of the axon of the sensitive neuron on the motor neuron, and this is enough to generate an suprathreshold postsynaptic potential and trigger the action potential in the motor neuron .

A different situation is observed in the development of summation.

One scenario for the development of summation is the rhythmic use of a series of weak stimuli, each of which is insufficient to release a neurotransmitter into the synaptic cleft. At the same time, if the stimulation frequency is high enough, then calcium ions accumulate in the presynaptic ending, since ion pumps do not have time to pump them into the intercellular medium. As a result, the next action potential can cause the release of a mediator, which is enough to excite the postsynaptic motor neuron. If, at the same time, rhythmic stimulation with subthreshold stimuli is not interrupted earlier, then the incoming action potentials will continue to trigger the reflex, since the high content of Ca 2+ at the end of the sensitive neuron is preserved. If, however, a pause is made in stimulation, then Ca 2+ will be removed, and preliminary summation will again be required to trigger the reflex with weak stimuli.

Another scenario for the development of summation is observed with a single but strong stimulation, as a result of which a highly sensitive series of impulses arrives at the presynaptic ending on the motor neuron, leading to the entry of a large amount of Ca2+ ions into the ending, which is enough to excite the next neuron in the circuit with an earlier subthreshold stimulus. The duration of this effect can be seconds.

The ability to summation appears to underlie short-term neurological memory. Receiving any information through the system of analyzers (looking closely, listening, sniffing, carefully trying a new food seasoning for us), we provide rhythmic stimulation of the synapses through which the sensory signal passes. These synapses maintain an increased excitability for several minutes, facilitating the conduction of impulses, and thus retain a trace of the transmitted information. However, summation, being an evolutionarily early learning mechanism, quickly disappears and cannot withstand any strong external influences on the organism.

addictive

With repeated irritation of medium strength, the reaction to it is weakened or disappears altogether. This phenomenon is called "addiction" (or "habituation").

The reasons for addiction are varied and the first of them is the adaptation of receptors. The second reason is the accumulation of Ca2+ in presynaptic endings on inhibitory neurons. In this case, repeated signals, initially insignificant for inhibitory neurons, are gradually summed up, and then trigger inhibitory neurons, the activity of which blocks the passage of signals along the reflex arc. Habituation can be seen as the summation of inhibitory signals. It must be emphasized that summation and habituation, like other forms of synaptic plasticity, are simply a consequence of the structure of synapses and the organization of neurons.

Long term potentiation

Long-term potentiation occurs when an animal is presented with a stimulus that it recognizes but is too weak to elicit a response. After a long pause (1 - 2 hours), the animal is presented with a strong stimulus that causes the reaction under study. The next stimulation is carried out after another 1-2 hours with the help of a weak signal that did not previously lead to the triggering of the reflex. In animals in which the nervous system is capable of long-term potentiation, a reflex response occurs. In the future, the interval between strong and weak stimulation can be increased to 5 or even 10 hours, and the excitability of the nervous system will always remain elevated.

Long-term potentiation can be considered as a variant of "long" short-term memory, extending to the daytime period of a person's wakefulness - from morning to evening.

Imprinting

This phenomenon is defined as a stable individual selectivity in relation to external stimuli in certain periods of ontogeny. The following variants of imprinting are best known: memorization of the parent by the cub; memorization of the cub by the parent; imprinting of the future sexual partner.

Unlike a conditioned reflex, this connection, firstly, is formed only in a strictly defined period of the animal's life; secondly, it is formed without reinforcement; thirdly, in the future it turns out to be very stable, practically not subject to extinction and can persist throughout the life of the individual. Imprintin was shown to be accompanied by activation of neurons in the intermediate region of the medioventral hyperstriatum. Damage to this area disrupted both imprinting and other types of memory in chickens.

In the process of memorization/learning by the type of imprinting, contacts are established between groups of neurons of one nucleus with strictly defined groups of another nucleus. As learning progresses, the size of neurons, their number within the corresponding structures, the number of spines and synaptic contacts can either increase - or the number of neurons, synaptic connections and NMDA receptors in synapses can even decrease, but the affinity of the remaining receptors for a specific mediator will increase.

We can propose the following model for the development of imprinting.

Glutamic acid released from the end of the neuron acts on metabotropic receptors on the surface of the postsynaptic neuron and triggers the production of a secondary (intracellular) messenger (for example, cAMP). The second messenger through a cascade of regulatory reactions enhances the synthesis of proteins that form new synapses to glutamate, which are integrated into the neuron membrane in such a way as to capture signals from the most active presynaptic ending, which transmits information about the characteristics of the imprinting object. Embedding new receptors in the membrane increases the efficiency of synaptic transmission, and the sum of evoked postsynaptic potentials from incoming signals reaches a threshold level. Then PD will arise and the behavioral response will be triggered.

It should be emphasized that neurochemical and synaptic changes do not occur instantly, but take time. For successful imprinting, it is important to have a stable sensory "pressure" on the learning neuron, for example, the constant presence of the mother. If this condition is not met, then imprinting does not occur at all.

The trained neurons are able to maintain the concentration of receptors on the postsynaptic membrane of the "imprinted" synapse at a constant high level, which ensures the stability of imprinting, which makes it possible to consider it as a specific variant of long-term memory.

Associative learning

Associative learning is based on the formation of a connection (association) between two stimuli. As an example, we can consider the formation of a conditioned reflex, when a signal is simultaneously applied to one neuron both from some insignificant stimulus and from the center of positive reinforcement from the hypothalamus. At the same time, it is likely that different second messengers are generated at different postsynaptic sites, and a change in the expression of receptor genes for neurotransmitters acting on a given neuron will be due to the total effect of these second messengers.

memory and sleep

Work on the study of sleep deprivation (deprivation) on memory processes shows that sleep-deprived people reproduce many times less material compared to people who were not deprived of sleep. With a 36-hour deprivation, a deterioration in the ability to reproduce material by 40% is observed. An interesting pattern is revealed if we analyze separately the effect of sleep on the ability to reproduce material of different emotional coloring. First, the results indicate that emotionally charged material is remembered better than emotionally neutral material, regardless of the amount of sleep. This is consistent with the notion that memory consolidation occurs with significant involvement of emotion-forming reinforcement systems. In addition, it turns out that although the deterioration of memorization during sleep deprivation is observed in all cases, the intensity of this effect depends significantly on the emotional coloring of the material. Most difficult is the reproduction of emotionally neutral and especially emotionally positive material. While changes in the reproduction of emotionally negative material are few and statistically unreliable.

Research into the role of daytime naps in the formation of procedural memory shows that with instrumental learning, people show improvement in skills only after sleeping for at least a few hours, regardless of whether they slept during the day or at night.

There is no unambiguous answer to the question about all the mechanisms of connection between the processes of sleep and memory, just as there is no answer to the question about possible compensatory mechanisms that develop after some impact on the brain structures usually involved in the processes of sleep and memory. Some researchers criticize the assumptions about the relationship between sleep mechanisms and memory mechanisms, arguing either that sleep generally plays only a passive (albeit positive) role in memorization, reducing the negative interference of memory traces, or that REM sleep is not involved in memory processes. In favor of the latter position, the following groups of arguments are given:

• Behavioral: all experiments on the study of deprivation of REM sleep by the “islet method” (an experimental animal is placed in conditions where, when losing a posture - which is inevitable in the stage of REM sleep, it falls into the water and wakes up) cannot be considered convincing, due to the inadequacy of the technique.
• Pharmacological: All three main classes of antidepressants (MAO inhibitors, tricyclics, and serotonin reuptake inhibitors) completely or almost completely suppress REM sleep, but do not cause learning and memory impairment in either patients or experimental animals.
• Clinical: there are several reports of patients with bilateral destruction in the region of the bridge - in such patients, REM sleep completely and, apparently, forever disappeared, but no complaints of learning and memory impairment have been reported from such patients.

memory and stress

memory and morality

People tend to repeat immoral acts, as the brain suppresses memories of its own such behavior. However, the serious consequences of "bad" deeds limit the possibilities of immoral amnesia.

Memory and physical activity

Scientists from the University of California (USA) have proven the link between exercise and memory. Regular exercise contributes to an increase in the level of glutamic and gamma-aminobutyric acids in the brain, which are necessary for many processes of mental activity and mood. Exercising for 20 minutes is enough to increase the concentration of these compounds and improve memory processes.

The genetics of memory

Memory processes

• Memorization is a memory process through which traces are imprinted, new elements of sensations, perception, thinking or experience are introduced into the system of associative links. Memorization can be arbitrary and involuntary, the basis of arbitrary memorization is the establishment of semantic connections - the result of the work of thinking on the content of the memorized material.
• Storage - the process of accumulation of material in the structure of memory, including its processing and assimilation. The preservation of experience makes it possible for a person to learn, develop his perceptual (internal assessments, perception of the world) processes, thinking and speech.
• Reproduction and recognition is the process of updating the elements of past experience (images, thoughts, feelings, movements). A simple form of reproduction is recognition - the recognition of a perceived object or phenomenon as already known from past experience, the establishment of similarities between the object and its image in memory. Reproduction is voluntary and involuntary. With an involuntary image pops up in the mind without the efforts of a person.

If in the process of reproduction there are difficulties, then there is a process of recall. Selection of elements necessary in terms of the required task. The reproduced information is not an exact copy of what is imprinted in memory. Information is always being transformed, rearranged.

• Forgetting is the loss of the ability to reproduce, and sometimes even recognize, previously memorized. What is forgotten most often is that which is insignificant. Forgetting can be partial (reproduction is incomplete or with an error) and complete (impossibility of reproduction and recognition). Distinguish between temporary and long-term forgetting.

Theoretical models of memory in psychology

The sensory processes that form the visual-spatial sketch, as well as the phonological loop in the Baddley memory model, are considered within the processing levels model of Fergus Craik and Robert Lockhart as processing processes.

Classification of types of memory

There are different types of memory:

At the junction between episodic and semantic memory, autobiographical memory is distinguished, which includes features of both.

You can build another classification according to the content of memory:

procedural (memory for actions) and declarative (memory for names). Within the framework of the latter, episodic (memory for events and phenomena of a person's individual life) and semantic (knowledge of things that do not depend on a person's individual life) are distinguished.

sensory memory

Sensory memory stores stimulus information that occurs when stimuli are applied to the senses. Sensory memory retains sensory information after the stimulus has ceased.

iconic memory

Iconic memory is a type of sensory memory. Iconic memory is a discrete sensory recorder of visual stimuli. A feature of iconic memory is the fixation of information in a holistic, portrait form.

The experiments of George Spurling are connected with the study of iconic sensory memory, its volume. In his experiments, Sperling used both the Whole Report Procedure and his own development, the Partial Report Procedure. Due to the transience of iconic memory, the general reporting procedure did not allow an objective assessment of the amount of information recorded in the sensory memory, since during the reporting process itself, the portrait information was “forgotten”, it was erased from the sensory iconic memory. The partial reporting procedure showed that 75% of the visual field is registered in iconic memory. Sperling's experiments showed that information fades away in iconic memory quickly (within tenths of a second). It has also been found that the processes associated with iconic memory are not mentally controlled. Even when the subjects could not observe the symbols, they still reported that they continued to see them. Thus, the subject of the memorization process does not distinguish between the content of iconic memory and objects that are in the environment.

Erasing the information in the iconic memory with other information coming from the senses allows the visual sensation to be more receptive. This property of iconic memory - erasure - ensures the memorization of information in iconic memory, given its limited volume, even if the speed of sensory information incoming exceeds the rate of attenuation of sensory information in iconic memory. Studies have shown that if visual information arrives quickly enough (up to 100 milliseconds), then new information is superimposed on the previous one, which is still in memory, without having time to fade in it and move to another memory level - more long-term. This feature of iconic memory is called reverse masking effect . So, if you show a letter, and then for 100 milliseconds at the same position of the visual field - a ring, then the subject will perceive the letter in the ring.

echoic memory

Echoic memory stores stimulus information received through the organs of hearing.

Tactile memory

Tactile memory registers stimulus information coming through the somatosensory system.

Long-term and short-term memory

short term memory

a person will be able to remember much more letters because he is able to group (combine into chains) information about the semantic groups of letters (in the English original: FBIPHDTWAIBM and FBI PHD TWA IBM). Herbert Simon also showed that the ideal size for sequences of letters and numbers, whether meaningful or not, is three units. Perhaps in some countries this is reflected in the tendency to present a telephone number as several groups of 3 digits and a final group of 4 digits divided into 2 groups of two.

There are hypotheses that short-term memory relies primarily on an acoustic (verbal) code for storing information and, to a lesser extent, on a visual code. In his study (), Konrad showed that it is more difficult for subjects to recall sets of words that are acoustically similar.

Modern studies of ant communication have proven that ants are able to remember and transmit information up to 7 bits. Moreover, the influence of possible grouping of objects on the message length and transmission efficiency is shown. In this sense, the law "Magic number 7 ± 2" is also fulfilled for ants.

long term memory

Long-term memory is supported by more stable and unchanging changes in neural connections widely distributed throughout the brain. The hippocampus is important in consolidating information from short-term to long-term memory, although it does not appear to store information itself. Rather, the hippocampus is involved in changing neural connections after 3 months of initial learning.

Description of memory in mnemonics

Memory properties

• Accuracy
• Volume
• The speed of memorization processes
• The speed of forgetting processes

Patterns of memory revealed in mnemonics

Memory has a volume limited by the number of stable processes that are basic when creating associations (connections, relationships)

The success of recall depends on the ability to switch attention to the basic processes, to restore them. The main technique: a sufficient number and frequency of repetitions.

There is such a pattern as the forgetting curve.

Mnemotechnical "laws" of memory

Law of memory	Implementation Practices
Law of Interest	Interesting things are easier to remember.
Law of comprehension	The deeper you become aware of the memorized information, the better it will be remembered.
Installation Law	If a person gave himself the installation to remember information, then memorization will happen easier.
Law of action	The information involved in the activity (i.e., if knowledge is applied in practice) is remembered better.
Law of context	With the associative linking of information with already familiar concepts, the new is absorbed better.
Law of inhibition	When studying similar concepts, the effect of "overlapping" the old information with the new one is observed.
The Law of Optimal Row Length	The length of the memorized row for better memorization should not be much greater than the amount of short-term memory.
edge law	It is best to remember the information presented at the beginning and at the end.
Law of repetition	Information that is repeated several times is best remembered (see the forgetting curve).
Law of incompleteness (Zeigarnik effect)	Incomplete actions, tasks, unsaid phrases, etc. are best remembered.

Mnemonic memorization techniques

Mythology, religion, philosophy about memory

• In ancient Greek mythology, there is a myth about the river Lethe. Lethe means "oblivion" and is an integral part of the realm of the dead. The dead are those who have lost their memory. And on the contrary, some who were awarded preference - among them Tiresias or Amphiaraus - retained their memory even after their death.
• The opposite of the Lethe River is the Goddess Mnemosyne, personified Memory, sister of Kronos and Okeanos - the mother of all muses. She has Omniscience: according to Hesiod (Theogony, 32 38), she knows "everything that was, everything that is, and everything that will be." When the Muses take possession of the poet, he drinks from the source of knowledge of Mnemosyne, which means, first of all, that he touches the knowledge of the “origins”, “beginnings”.
• According to Plato's philosophy, Anamnesis is recollection, recollection is a concept that describes the basic procedure of the process of cognition.

see also

• Kim Peak, a man with a phenomenal memory, remembered up to 98% of the information he read
• Jill Price, a woman with a rare memory property - hyperthymesia

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Notes

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Literature

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• // Yeats F. The Art of Memory. "University Book", St. Petersburg, 1997, p. 6-167.
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Links

• Mechanisms of memory and forgetting. Transfer from the cycle "Night air". and .

An excerpt characterizing memory

After talking for some time in a general circle, Speransky got up and, going up to Prince Andrei, took him with him to the other end of the room. It was evident that he considered it necessary to deal with Bolkonsky.
“I didn’t have time to talk to you, prince, in the midst of that animated conversation in which this venerable old man was involved,” he said, smiling meekly contemptuously and with this smile, as if acknowledging that he, together with Prince Andrei, understands the insignificance of those people with whom he just spoke. This appeal flattered Prince Andrei. - I have known you for a long time: firstly, in your case about your peasants, this is our first example, to which it would be so desirable to have more followers; and secondly, because you are one of those chamberlains who did not consider themselves offended by the new decree on court ranks, causing such rumors and gossip.
- Yes, - said Prince Andrei, - my father did not want me to use this right; I started my service from the lower ranks.
- Your father, a man of the old age, obviously stands above our contemporaries, who so condemn this measure, which restores only natural justice.
“I think, however, that there is a basis in these condemnations ...” said Prince Andrei, trying to fight the influence of Speransky, which he began to feel. It was unpleasant for him to agree with him in everything: he wanted to contradict. Prince Andrei, who usually spoke easily and well, now felt difficulty in expressing himself when speaking with Speransky. He was too busy observing the personality of a famous person.
“There may be grounds for personal ambition,” Speransky quietly put in his word.
“Partly for the state,” said Prince Andrei.
- How do you understand? ... - Speransky said, quietly lowering his eyes.
“I am an admirer of Montesquieu,” said Prince Andrei. - And his idea that le principe des monarchies est l "honneur, me parait incontestable. Certains droits et privileges de la noblesse me paraissent etre des moyens de soutenir ce sentiment. [the basis of monarchies is honor, it seems to me undoubted. Some rights and the privileges of the nobility seem to me to be the means of sustaining this feeling.]
The smile disappeared from Speransky's white face, and his countenance benefited greatly from this. Probably the thought of Prince Andrei seemed entertaining to him.
“Si vous envisagez la question sous ce point de vue, [If you look at the subject like that],” he began, speaking French with obvious difficulty and speaking even more slowly than Russian, but perfectly calm. He said that honor, l "honneur, cannot be supported by advantages harmful to the course of service, that honor, l" honneur, is either: a negative concept of not doing reprehensible acts, or a well-known source of competition for obtaining approval and awards expressing it.
His arguments were concise, simple and clear.
The institution that maintains this honor, the source of competition, is an institution similar to the Legion d "honneur [Order of the Legion of Honor] of the great emperor Napoleon, which does not harm, but contributes to the success of the service, and not class or court advantage.
“I do not argue, but it cannot be denied that the advantage of the court achieved the same goal,” said Prince Andrei: “every courtier considers himself obliged to adequately bear his position.
“But you didn’t want to take advantage of it, prince,” said Speransky, showing with a smile that he, an awkward argument for his interlocutor, wants to end with courtesy. “If you do me the honor of welcoming me on Wednesday,” he added, “then I, after talking with Magnitsky, will tell you what may interest you, and besides, I will have the pleasure of talking with you in more detail. - He, closing his eyes, bowed, and a la francaise, [in the French manner,] without saying goodbye, trying to be unnoticed, left the hall.

During the first time of his stay in St. Petersburg, Prince Andrei felt his entire frame of mind, developed in his solitary life, completely obscured by those petty worries that seized him in St. Petersburg.
In the evening, returning home, he wrote down in his memory book 4 or 5 necessary visits or rendez vous [dates] at the appointed hours. The mechanism of life, the order of the day is such as to be in time everywhere, took away a large share of the very energy of life. He did nothing, did not even think about anything and did not have time to think, but only spoke and successfully said what he had managed to think over in the village before.
He sometimes noticed with displeasure that it happened to him on the same day, in different societies, to repeat the same thing. But he was so busy all day long that he did not have time to think that he did not think anything.
Speransky, both on the first meeting with him at Kochubey's, and then in the middle of the house, where Speransky, having received Bolkonsky, spoke with him privately and trustingly, made a strong impression on Prince Andrei.
Prince Andrei considered such a huge number of people to be contemptible and insignificant creatures, he so wanted to find in another a living ideal of that perfection to which he aspired, that he easily believed that in Speransky he found this ideal of a completely reasonable and virtuous person. If Speransky had been from the same society from which Prince Andrei was, of the same upbringing and moral habits, then Bolkonsky would soon have found his weak, human, non-heroic sides, but now this logical mindset, strange to him, inspired him all the more respect that he did not quite understand it. In addition, Speransky, whether because he appreciated the abilities of Prince Andrei, or because he found it necessary to acquire him for himself, Speransky flirted with Prince Andrei with his impartial, calm mind and flattered Prince Andrei with that subtle flattery, combined with arrogance, which consists in tacit recognition his interlocutor with himself, together with the only person capable of understanding all the stupidity of everyone else, and the rationality and depth of his thoughts.
During their long conversation on Wednesday evening, Speransky said more than once: “We look at everything that comes out of the general level of an inveterate habit ...” or with a smile: “But we want the wolves to be fed and the sheep safe ...” or : "They cannot understand this ..." and everything with such an expression that said: "We: you and I, we understand what they are and who we are."
This first, long conversation with Speransky only strengthened in Prince Andrei the feeling with which he saw Speransky for the first time. He saw in him a reasonable, strictly thinking, huge mind of a man who, with energy and perseverance, had achieved power and used it only for the good of Russia. Speransky, in the eyes of Prince Andrei, was precisely that person who rationally explains all the phenomena of life, recognizes as valid only that which is reasonable, and knows how to apply the measure of rationality to everything, which he himself so wanted to be. Everything seemed so simple, clear in Speransky's presentation that Prince Andrei involuntarily agreed with him in everything. If he objected and argued, it was only because he wanted to be independent on purpose and not completely obey the opinions of Speransky. Everything was like that, everything was fine, but one thing confused Prince Andrei: it was Speransky’s cold, mirror-like look, not letting in his soul, and his white, tender hand, which Prince Andrei involuntarily looked at, as they usually look at people’s hands, having power. For some reason, this mirror look and this gentle hand irritated Prince Andrei. Unpleasantly, Prince Andrei was also struck by the too great contempt for people that he noticed in Speransky, and the variety of methods in the evidence that he cited in support of his opinions. He used all possible tools of thought, excluding comparisons, and too boldly, as it seemed to Prince Andrei, he moved from one to another. Now he took to the ground of a practical figure and condemned the dreamers, then to the ground of a satirist and ironically laughed at his opponents, then he became strictly logical, then he suddenly rose into the realm of metaphysics. (He used this last instrument of proof with particular frequency.) He carried the question to metaphysical heights, passed into the definitions of space, time, thought, and, bringing refutations from there, again descended to the ground of the dispute.
In general, the main feature of Speransky's mind, which struck Prince Andrei, was an undoubted, unshakable faith in the strength and legitimacy of the mind. It was evident that Speransky had never been able to come into the head of that ordinary thought for Prince Andrei that it is impossible to express everything that you think, and there never came a doubt that everything that I think and everything that I think is not nonsense. What do I believe? And this particular mindset of Speransky most of all attracted Prince Andrei to himself.
At the first time of his acquaintance with Speransky, Prince Andrei had a passionate feeling of admiration for him, similar to the one he once felt for Bonaparte. The fact that Speransky was the son of a priest, whom stupid people could, as many did, began to be despised as a goofball and priest, forced Prince Andrei to be especially careful with his feeling for Speransky, and unconsciously strengthen it in himself.
On that first evening that Bolkonsky spent with him, talking about the commission for drafting laws, Speransky ironically told Prince Andrei that the commission of laws had existed for 150 years, cost millions and had done nothing, that Rosenkampf had pasted labels on all articles of comparative legislation. - And that's all for which the state paid millions! - he said.
“We want to give a new judicial power to the Senate, and we don't have laws. Therefore, it is a sin not to serve people like you, prince, now.
Prince Andrei said that this required a legal education, which he did not have.
- Yes, no one has it, so what do you want? This is the circulus viciosus, [the vicious circle] from which one must get out of the effort.

A week later, Prince Andrei was a member of the commission for drafting the military regulations, and, which he did not expect, the head of the department of the commission for compiling wagons. At the request of Speransky, he took the first part of the civil code being compiled and, with the help of the Code Napoleon and Justiniani, [the Code of Napoleon and Justinian,] worked on compiling the department: Rights of Persons.

About two years ago, in 1808, returning to St. Petersburg from his trip to the estates, Pierre involuntarily became the head of St. Petersburg Freemasonry. He set up dining and funeral lodges, recruited new members, took care of uniting various lodges and acquiring genuine acts. He gave his money for the construction of temples and replenished, as far as he could, almsgiving, for which most of the members were stingy and sloppy. He almost alone at his own expense supported the house of the poor, arranged by the order in St. Petersburg. Meanwhile, his life went on as before, with the same hobbies and licentiousness. He liked to dine and drink well, and although he considered it immoral and humiliating, he could not refrain from the amusements of bachelor societies in which he participated.
In the wake of his studies and hobbies, Pierre, however, after a year, began to feel how the soil of Freemasonry on which he stood, the more he left under his feet, the more firmly he tried to stand on it. At the same time, he felt that the deeper the soil on which he stood went under his feet, the more involuntarily he was connected with it. When he began Freemasonry, he experienced the feeling of a man trustingly placing his foot on the flat surface of a swamp. Putting his foot down, he fell. In order to fully assure himself of the firmness of the ground on which he stood, he put his other foot on and sank even more, got stuck and already involuntarily walked knee-deep in the swamp.
Iosif Alekseevich was not in Petersburg. (He has recently retired from the affairs of St. Petersburg lodges and lived without a break in Moscow.) All the brothers, members of the lodges, were people familiar to Pierre in life, and it was difficult for him to see in them only brothers in stoneworking, and not Prince B., not Ivan Vasilyevich D., whom he knew in life for the most part as weak and insignificant people. From under the Masonic aprons and signs, he saw on them uniforms and crosses, which they had achieved in life. Often, collecting alms and counting 20-30 rubles written down for the parish, and mostly in debt from ten members, of whom half were as rich as he was, Pierre recalled the Masonic oath that each brother promises to give everything property for a neighbor; and doubts arose in his soul, on which he tried not to dwell.
He divided all the brothers he knew into four categories. In the first category, he ranked brothers who do not take an active part either in the affairs of lodges or in human affairs, but are exclusively occupied with the sacraments of the science of the order, occupied with questions about the triple name of God, or about the three principles of things, sulfur, mercury and salt, or about the meaning square and all the figures of Solomon's temple. Pierre respected this category of Masonic brothers, to which the old brothers mostly belonged, and Joseph Alekseevich himself, according to Pierre, did not share their interests. His heart did not lie to the mystical side of Freemasonry.
In the second category, Pierre included himself and brothers like himself, who are searching, hesitating, who have not yet found a direct and understandable path in Freemasonry, but hoping to find it.
In the third category, he ranked the brothers (there were the largest number of them), who did not see anything in Freemasonry except for the external form and rituals and valued the strict execution of this external form, not caring about its content and meaning. Such were Vilarsky and even the great master of the main lodge.
Finally, a large number of brothers were included in the fourth category, especially those who had recently joined the brotherhood. These were people, according to Pierre's observations, who did not believe in anything, who did not want anything, and who entered Freemasonry only to get closer to young rich and strong brothers in connections and nobility, of whom there were a lot in the box.
Pierre began to feel dissatisfied with his activities. Freemasonry, at least the Freemasonry he knew here, sometimes seemed to him to be based on appearance alone. He did not even think of doubting Freemasonry itself, but he suspected that Russian Freemasonry had taken the wrong path and deviated from its source. And therefore, at the end of the year, Pierre went abroad to initiate himself into the highest secrets of the order.

In the summer back in 1809, Pierre returned to St. Petersburg. According to the correspondence of our Freemasons with foreign ones, it was known that Bezuhiy managed to gain the trust of many high-ranking officials abroad, penetrated many secrets, was elevated to the highest degree, and was carrying with him a lot for the common good of the masonry business in Russia. Petersburg Freemasons all came to him, currying favor with him, and it seemed to everyone that he was hiding something and preparing something.
A solemn meeting of the lodge of the 2nd degree was appointed, in which Pierre promised to inform what he had to convey to the St. Petersburg brothers from the highest leaders of the order. The meeting was full. After the usual rituals, Pierre got up and began his speech.
“Dear brothers,” he began, blushing and stammering, and holding a written speech in his hand. – It is not enough to observe our sacraments in the quiet of the lodge – we must act… act. We are in stupor, and we need to act. Pierre took his notebook and began to read.
“In order to spread pure truth and bring the triumph of virtue,” he read, we must cleanse people of prejudices, spread rules that are consistent with the spirit of the times, take upon ourselves the education of youth, unite with inseparable ties with the most intelligent people, boldly and together prudently overcome superstition, unbelief and stupidity, to form from people devoted to us, connected with each other by a unity of purpose and having power and strength.
“To achieve this goal, virtue must be given a preponderance over vice, one must strive so that an honest person gains an eternal reward for his virtues in this world. But in these great intentions we are hindered by quite a lot - the current political institutions. What to do in such a state of affairs? Shall we favor revolutions, overthrow everything, expel force by force?... No, we are very far from that. Every violent reform is reprehensible, because it will do nothing to correct evil as long as people remain as they are, and because wisdom has no need for violence.
“The entire plan of the order should be based on educating people who are firm, virtuous and bound by the unity of conviction, a conviction consisting in pursuing vice and stupidity everywhere and with all your might and patronizing talents and virtue: to extract worthy people from the dust, joining them to our brotherhood. Then only our order will have the power to insensitively bind the hands of the patrons of disorder and control them so that they do not notice it. In a word, it is necessary to establish a universal dominating form of government, which would extend over the whole world without destroying civil bonds, and under which all other governments could continue in their usual order and do everything except that only that hinders the great goal of our order, then is the delivery of virtue triumph over vice. Christianity itself presupposed this goal. It taught people to be wise and kind, and for their own benefit to follow the example and instructions of the best and wisest people.
“Then, when everything was immersed in darkness, of course, one sermon was enough: the news of the truth gave it special power, but now much stronger means are needed for us. Now it is necessary that a person, guided by his feelings, find sensual charms in virtue. It is impossible to eradicate passions; we must only try to direct them to a noble goal, and therefore it is necessary that everyone be able to satisfy his passions within the limits of virtue, and that our order should provide means for this.
“As soon as we have a certain number of worthy people in each state, each of them again forms two others, and they all closely unite with each other - then everything will be possible for the order, which has already secretly managed to do a lot for the good of mankind.”
This speech made not only a strong impression, but also excitement in the box. The majority of the brothers, who saw in this speech the dangerous plans of the Illuminati, accepted his speech with coldness that surprised Pierre. The great master began to object to Pierre. Pierre began to develop his thoughts with great and great fervor. There hasn't been such a stormy meeting for a long time. Parties were formed: some accused Pierre, condemning him for the Illuminati; others supported him. For the first time at this meeting, Pierre was struck by the infinite diversity of human minds, which makes it so that no truth is equally presented to two people. Even those of the members who seemed to be on his side understood him in their own way, with limitations, changes that he could not agree to, since Pierre's main need was precisely to convey his thought to another exactly as he himself understood her.
At the end of the meeting, the great master, with hostility and irony, made a remark to Bezukhoi about his ardor and that not only love for virtue, but also the enthusiasm for the struggle led him in the dispute. Pierre did not answer him and briefly asked if his proposal would be accepted. He was told that no, and Pierre, without waiting for the usual formalities, left the box and went home.

Pierre again found that longing that he was so afraid of. For three days after delivering his speech in the box, he lay at home on the sofa, receiving no one and not leaving anywhere.
At this time, he received a letter from his wife, who begged him for a date, wrote about her sadness for him and about her desire to devote her whole life to him.
At the end of the letter, she informed him that one of these days she would come to St. Petersburg from abroad.
Following the letter, one of the Masonic brothers, less respected by him, burst into Pierre’s solitude and, having brought the conversation to Pierre’s marital relations, in the form of fraternal advice, expressed to him the idea that his strictness towards his wife was unfair, and that Pierre deviates from the first rules of the Mason. not forgiving the penitent.
At the same time, his mother-in-law, the wife of Prince Vasily, sent for him, begging him to visit her at least for a few minutes to negotiate a very important matter. Pierre saw that there was a conspiracy against him, that they wanted to unite him with his wife, and this was not even unpleasant for him in the state in which he was. He did not care: Pierre did not consider anything in life a matter of great importance, and under the influence of the longing that now took possession of him, he did not value either his freedom or his persistence in punishing his wife.
"No one is right, no one is to blame, so she is not to blame either," he thought. - If Pierre did not immediately express his consent to union with his wife, it was only because, in the state of anguish in which he was, he was not able to do anything. If his wife came to him, he would not drive her away now. Was it not all the same, in comparison with what occupied Pierre, to live or not to live with his wife?
Without answering anything to either his wife or mother-in-law, Pierre once got ready for the road late in the evening and left for Moscow to see Iosif Alekseevich. Here is what Pierre wrote in his diary.
Moscow, November 17th.
I have just arrived from a benefactor, and I hasten to write down everything that I experienced at the same time. Iosif Alekseevich lives in poverty and suffers for the third year from a painful bladder disease. No one ever heard from him a groan, or a word of grumbling. From morning until late at night, with the exception of the hours in which he eats the simplest food, he works on science. He received me graciously and sat me down on the bed on which he was lying; I made him the sign of the knights of the East and Jerusalem, he answered me the same, and with a meek smile asked me about what I had learned and acquired in the Prussian and Scottish lodges. I told him everything as well as I could, conveying the grounds that I offered in our St. Petersburg box and reported on the bad reception that had been given to me, and about the rupture that had occurred between me and the brothers. Iosif Alekseevich, after a considerable pause and thought, presented to me his view of all this, which instantly illuminated for me everything that had passed and the whole future path that lay before me. He surprised me by asking me if I remember what the threefold purpose of the order is: 1) to keep and know the sacrament; 2) in the purification and correction of oneself for the perception of it, and 3) in the correction of the human race through the desire for such purification. What is the main and first goal of these three? Certainly own correction and purification. Only towards this goal can we always strive, regardless of all circumstances. But at the same time, this goal requires the most labor from us, and therefore, deluded by pride, we, missing this goal, either take on the sacrament that we are unworthy to receive because of our impurity, or take on the correction of the human race, when we ourselves are an example of abomination and depravity. Illuminism is not a pure doctrine precisely because it is carried away by social activities and is full of pride. On this basis, Iosif Alekseevich condemned my speech and all my activities. I agreed with him in the depths of my soul. On the occasion of our conversation about my family affairs, he said to me: - The main duty of a true Mason, as I told you, is to perfect himself. But often we think that by removing all the difficulties of our life from ourselves, we will more quickly achieve this goal; on the contrary, my lord, he told me, only in the midst of secular unrest can we achieve three main goals: 1) self-knowledge, for a person can know himself only through comparison, 2) improvement, only by struggle is it achieved, and 3) achieve the main virtue - love for death. Only the vicissitudes of life can show us the futility of it and can contribute to our innate love for death or rebirth into a new life. These words are all the more remarkable because Iosif Alekseevich, despite his severe physical suffering, is never burdened by life, but loves death, for which, despite all the purity and loftiness of his inner man, he still does not feel himself sufficiently prepared. Then the benefactor fully explained to me the meaning of the great square of the universe and pointed out that the triple and the seventh number are the foundation of everything. He advised me not to distance myself from communication with the St. Petersburg brothers and, occupying only positions of the 2nd degree in the lodge, to try, distracting the brothers from the hobbies of pride, to turn them to the true path of self-knowledge and improvement. In addition, for himself personally, he advised me first of all to take care of myself, and for this purpose he gave me a notebook, the same one in which I write and will continue to enter all my actions.
Petersburg, November 23rd.
“I live with my wife again. My mother-in-law came to me in tears and said that Helen was here and that she begged me to listen to her, that she was innocent, that she was unhappy at my abandonment, and much more. I knew that if I only allowed myself to see her, I would no longer be able to refuse her desire. In my doubt, I did not know whose help and advice to resort to. If the benefactor were here, he would tell me. I retired to my room, reread the letters of Joseph Alekseevich, remembered my conversations with him, and from everything I deduced that I should not refuse the one who asks and should give a helping hand to anyone, especially a person so connected with me, and should bear my cross. But if I forgave her for the sake of virtue, then let my union with her have one spiritual purpose. So I decided and so I wrote to Joseph Alekseevich. I told my wife that I ask her to forget everything old, I ask her to forgive me for what I could be guilty of before her, and that I have nothing to forgive her. I was glad to tell her this. Let her not know how hard it was for me to see her again. Settled in a large house in the upper chambers and experiencing a happy feeling of renewal.

As always, even then, high society, uniting together at court and at big balls, was divided into several circles, each with its own shade. Among them, the most extensive was the French circle, the Napoleonic Union - Count Rumyantsev and Caulaincourt "a. In this circle, Helen occupied one of the most prominent places as soon as she and her husband settled in St. Petersburg. She visited the gentlemen of the French embassy and a large number of people, known for their intelligence and courtesy, who belonged to this direction.
Helen was in Erfurt during the famous meeting of the emperors, and from there she brought these connections with all the Napoleonic sights of Europe. In Erfurt, she had a brilliant success. Napoleon himself, noticing her in the theater, said about her: "C" est un superbe animal. "[This is a beautiful animal.] Her success as a beautiful and elegant woman did not surprise Pierre, because over the years she became even more beautiful than before But what surprised him was that in these two years his wife managed to acquire a reputation for herself
"d" une femme charmante, aussi spirituelle, que belle. "[A charming woman, as smart as beautiful.] The famous Prince de Ligne [Prince de Ligne] wrote letters to her on eight pages. Bilibin saved his mots [words], to say them for the first time in the presence of Countess Bezukhova.To be received in the salon of Countess Bezukhova was considered a diploma of the mind; young people read books before Helen's evening, so that there was something to talk about in her salon, and the secretaries of the embassy, ​​and even envoys, confided diplomatic secrets to her, so that Helene was a force in some way. Pierre, who knew that she was very stupid, with a strange feeling of bewilderment and fear, sometimes attended her parties and dinners, where politics, poetry and philosophy were discussed. At these evenings he experienced a similar feeling which the conjurer must experience, expecting every time that his deceit is about to be revealed. not in this deceit, the deceit was not revealed, and the reputation of d "une femme charmante et spirituelle was so unshakably established for Elena Vasilyevna Bezukhova that she could speak the biggest vulgarities and stupidities, and yet everyone admired her every word and looked for deep meaning in it which she herself did not suspect.
Pierre was exactly the husband that was needed for this brilliant, secular woman. He was that absent-minded eccentric, the husband of a grand seigneur [great gentleman], who does not interfere with anyone and not only does not spoil the general impression of the high tone of the living room, but, by his opposite to the grace and tact of his wife, serves as an advantageous background for her. Pierre, in these two years, as a result of his constant concentrated occupation with immaterial interests and sincere contempt for everything else, learned in his wife’s company that did not interest him that tone of indifference, carelessness and favor to everyone, which is not acquired artificially and which therefore inspires involuntary respect . He entered his wife's drawing room as if into a theatre, knew everyone, was equally happy with everyone, and was equally indifferent to everyone. Sometimes he entered into a conversation that interested him, and then, without thinking about whether or not there were les messieurs de l "ambassade [employees at the embassy], mumbled his opinions, which were sometimes completely out of tune with the present moment. But the opinion about the eccentric husband de la femme la plus distinguee de Petersbourg [the most remarkable woman in Petersburg] was already so established that no one took au serux [seriously] his antics.
Among the many young people who daily visited Helen's house, Boris Drubetskoy, who had already been very successful in the service, was, after Helen's return from Erfurt, the closest person in the Bezukhovs' house. Helen called him mon page [my page] and treated him like a child. Her smile towards him was the same as towards everyone, but sometimes it was unpleasant for Pierre to see this smile. Boris treated Pierre with special, dignified and sad respect. This shade of deference also bothered Pierre. Pierre suffered so painfully three years ago from the insult inflicted on him by his wife that now he saved himself from the possibility of such an insult, firstly by the fact that he was not the husband of his wife, and secondly by the fact that he did not allow himself to suspect.
“No, now having become a bas bleu [blue stocking], she forever abandoned her former hobbies,” he said to himself. “There was no example of bas bleu having passions of the heart,” he repeated to himself, from no one knew where, a rule he had undeniably believed. But, strangely, the presence of Boris in his wife's living room (and he was almost constantly) had a physical effect on Pierre: it bound all his members, destroyed his unconsciousness and freedom of movement.
“Such a strange antipathy,” thought Pierre, “and before that I even liked him very much.
In the eyes of the world, Pierre was a great gentleman, a somewhat blind and ridiculous husband of a famous wife, an intelligent eccentric, doing nothing, but not harming anyone, a nice and kind fellow. In the soul of Pierre, during all this time, a complex and difficult work of inner development took place, which revealed a lot to him and led him to many spiritual doubts and joys.

He continued his diary, and this is what he wrote in it during this time:
“November 24th.
“I got up at eight o’clock, read Holy Scripture, then went to the office (Pierre, on the advice of a benefactor, entered the service of one of the committees), returned to dinner, dined alone (the countess has many guests, unpleasant to me), ate and drank moderately and after dinner he copied plays for the brothers. In the evening he went down to the countess and told a funny story about B., and only then remembered that he should not have done this, when everyone was already laughing out loud.
“I go to bed with a happy and peaceful spirit. Great Lord, help me to walk in Your paths, 1) overcome the part of the wrath - quietness, slowness, 2) lust - abstinence and disgust, 3) move away from the hustle and bustle, but not excommunicate myself from a) state affairs of service, b) from family worries , c) from friendly relations and d) economic pursuits.
“November 27th.
“I got up late and woke up for a long time lying on the bed, indulging in laziness. My God! help me and strengthen me so that I may walk in Your ways. I read Holy Scripture, but without the proper feeling. Brother Urusov came and talked about the vanities of the world. He spoke about the new plans of the sovereign. I began to condemn, but I remembered my rules and the words of our benefactor that a true Freemason should be an assiduous worker in the state when his participation is required, and a calm contemplator of what he is not called to. My tongue is my enemy. Brothers G. V. and O. visited me, there was a preparatory conversation for the acceptance of a new brother. They make me the speaker. I feel weak and unworthy. Then the discussion turned to the explanation of the seven pillars and steps of the temple. 7 sciences, 7 virtues, 7 vices, 7 gifts of the Holy Spirit. Brother O. was very eloquent. In the evening, the acceptance took place. The new arrangement of the premises greatly contributed to the splendor of the spectacle. Boris Drubetskoy was accepted. I proposed it, I was the rhetorician. A strange feeling agitated me throughout my stay with him in the dark temple. I found in myself a feeling of hatred for him, which I vainly strive to overcome. And therefore I would have wished to truly save him from evil and lead him on the path of truth, but bad thoughts about him did not leave me. It seemed to me that his purpose in joining the fraternity was only a desire to get close to people, to be in favor with those in our lodge. Apart from the fact that he asked several times if N. and S. were in our box (to which I could not answer him), except that, according to my observations, he was not able to feel respect for our holy Order and was too busy and pleased with the outward man, in order to desire spiritual improvement, I had no reason to doubt him; but he seemed insincere to me, and all the time when I stood with him eye to eye in the dark temple, it seemed to me that he smiled contemptuously at my words, and I really wanted to prick his bare chest with the sword that I held, put to it . I could not be eloquent and could not sincerely convey my doubt to the brothers and the great master. Great Architect of nature, help me to find the true paths leading out of the labyrinth of lies.
After that, three sheets were omitted from the diary, and then the following was written:
“I had an instructive and long conversation alone with brother B., who advised me to stick to brother A. Much, although unworthy, was revealed to me. Adonai is the name of the creator of the world. Elohim is the name of the ruler of all. The third name, the name of the utterance, having the meaning of the All. Conversations with Brother V. reinforce, refresh, and establish me on the path of virtue. With him there is no room for doubt. It is clear to me the difference between the poor teaching of the social sciences and our holy, all-embracing teaching. Human sciences subdivide everything - in order to understand, they kill everything - in order to consider. In the holy science of the Order, everything is one, everything is known in its totality and life. Trinity - the three principles of things - sulfur, mercury and salt. Sulfur of unctuous and fiery properties; in conjunction with salt, its fieryness arouses hunger in it, by means of which it attracts mercury, seizes it, holds it, and jointly produces separate bodies. Mercury is a liquid and volatile spiritual essence - Christ, the Holy Spirit, He.
“December 3rd.
“Woke up late, read the Holy Scriptures, but was insensible. Then he got out and walked around the room. I wanted to think, but instead my imagination presented an incident that happened four years ago. Mr. Dolokhov, meeting with me in Moscow after my duel, told me that he hoped that I now enjoyed complete peace of mind, despite the absence of my wife. I didn't answer then. Now I recalled all the details of this meeting, and in my soul spoke to him the most spiteful words and sharp replies. He came to his senses and gave up this thought only when he saw himself inflamed with anger; but did not repent of it enough. After that, Boris Drubetskoy came and began to tell various adventures; but from the very moment of his arrival I became dissatisfied with his visit and told him something nasty. He objected. I flared up and said a lot of unpleasant and even rude things to him. He fell silent and I caught myself only when it was already too late. My God, I can't deal with him at all. This is due to my ego. I put myself above him and therefore become much worse than him, for he is indulgent towards my rudeness, and on the contrary, I have contempt for him. My God, grant me in his presence to see more of my abomination and act in such a way that it would be useful to him. After dinner I fell asleep, and while I was falling asleep, I distinctly heard a voice saying in my left ear: “Your day.”
“I saw in a dream that I was walking in the dark, and suddenly surrounded by dogs, but I was walking without fear; suddenly one small one grabbed me by the left stegono with her teeth and did not let go. I started pushing her with my hands. And as soon as I tore it off, another, even larger one, began to gnaw at me. I began to lift it and the more I lifted it, the bigger and heavier it became. And suddenly brother A. came and, taking me by the arm, led me with him and led me to the building, to enter which I had to go along a narrow plank. I stepped on it and the board buckled and fell, and I began to climb the fence, which I could hardly reach with my hands. After a lot of effort, I dragged my body so that my legs hung on one side and my torso on the other side. I looked around and saw that Brother A. was standing on the fence and was pointing me to a large avenue and a garden, and a large and beautiful building in the garden. I woke up. Lord, Great Architecton of nature! help me tear off the dogs from me - my passions and the last of them, integrating the strength of all the former ones, and help me enter that temple of virtue, which I have achieved in a dream.
“December 7th.
“I had a dream that Iosif Alekseevich was sitting in my house, I am very happy, and I want to treat him. It’s as if I’m chatting with strangers incessantly and suddenly remembered that he can’t like it, and I want to get closer to him and hug him. But as soon as I approached, I see that his face has changed, it has become young, and he quietly says something to me from the teachings of the Order, so quietly that I cannot hear. Then, as if, we all left the room, and something strange happened here. We sat or lay on the floor. He told me something. And it was as if I wanted to show him my sensitivity, and without listening to his speech, I began to imagine the state of my inner man and the grace of God that overshadowed me. And there were tears in my eyes, and I was pleased that he noticed it. But he looked at me with annoyance and jumped up, cutting off his conversation. I became embittered and asked if what had been said referred to me; but he did not answer, showed me an affectionate look, and after that we suddenly found ourselves in my bedroom, where there is a double bed. He lay down on her on the edge, and I seemed to burn with a desire to caress him and lie down right there. And he seemed to ask me: “Tell me, what is your main passion? Did you recognize him? I think you already know him." I, embarrassed by this question, answered that laziness was my main passion. He shook his head in disbelief. And I answered him, even more embarrassed, that although I live with my wife, according to his advice, but not as the husband of my wife. To this he objected that he should not deprive his wife of his affection, he made me feel that this was my duty. But I answered that I was ashamed of it, and suddenly everything disappeared. And I woke up and found in my thoughts the text of the Holy Scriptures: The belly was the light of a man, and the light shines in the darkness and the darkness does not embrace it. Iosif Alekseevich's face was youthful and bright. On this day I received a letter from a benefactor in which he writes about the obligations of marriage.
“December 9th.
“I had a dream from which I woke up with a trembling heart. He saw that I was in Moscow, in my house, in a large sofa room, and Iosif Alekseevich was coming out of the living room. It was as if I immediately knew that the process of rebirth had already taken place with him, and I rushed to meet him. It’s like I’m kissing him, and his hands, and he says: “Have you noticed that my face is different?” I looked at him, continuing to hold him in my arms, and as if I see that his face is young, but the hair on his head no, and the features are completely different. And it’s as if I’m saying to him: “I would recognize you if I met you by chance,” and meanwhile I think: “Did I tell the truth?” And suddenly I see that he lies like a dead corpse; then, little by little, he came to his senses and entered with me into a large study, holding a large book, written in Alexandrian leaf. And it’s like I’m saying: “I wrote this.” And he answered me with a nod of his head. I opened the book, and in this book all the pages are beautifully drawn. And I seem to know that these pictures represent the love affairs of the soul with her lover. And on the pages, as if I see a beautiful image of a girl in transparent clothes and with a transparent body, flying up to the clouds. And as if I know that this girl is nothing but the image of the Song of Songs. And it’s as if I, looking at these drawings, feel that I’m doing badly, and I can’t tear myself away from them. God help me! My God, if this abandonment of me by You is Your action, then may Your will be done; but if I myself caused this, then teach me what to do. I will perish from my depravity if You leave me altogether.”

The Rostovs' money affairs did not improve during the two years they spent in the countryside.
Despite the fact that Nikolai Rostov, firmly holding on to his intention, continued to serve darkly in a remote regiment, spending relatively little money, the course of life in Otradnoye was such, and especially Mitenka did business in such a way that debts grew irresistibly every year. The only help that the old count obviously had was the service, and he came to Petersburg to look for places; look for places and at the same time, as he said, amuse the girls for the last time.
Shortly after the Rostovs' arrival in Petersburg, Berg proposed to Vera, and his proposal was accepted.
Despite the fact that in Moscow the Rostovs belonged to high society, without knowing it themselves and without thinking about what society they belonged to, in St. Petersburg their society was mixed and indefinite. In St. Petersburg they were provincials, to whom the very people who, without asking what society they belonged to, were fed by the Rostovs in Moscow did not descend.
The Rostovs in St. Petersburg lived as hospitably as in Moscow, and the most diverse people converged at their dinners: neighbors in Otradnoye, old, poor landowners with their daughters and the maid of honor Peronskaya, Pierre Bezukhov and the son of the county postmaster, who served in St. Petersburg. Of the men, Boris, Pierre, who, having met on the street, was dragged to his place by the old count, and Berg, who spent whole days with the Rostovs and showed the elder Countess Vera such attention that a young man can intending to propose.
It was not for nothing that Berg showed everyone his right hand, wounded in the battle of Austerlitz, and held a completely unnecessary sword in his left. He told everyone this event so stubbornly and with such significance that everyone believed in the expediency and dignity of this act, and Berg received two awards for Austerlitz.
In the Finnish War, he also managed to distinguish himself. He picked up a fragment of a grenade, which killed the adjutant near the commander-in-chief, and brought this fragment to the commander. Just like after Austerlitz, he told everyone about this event for so long and stubbornly that everyone also believed that it had to be done, and Berg received two awards for the Finnish War. In 1919, he was a captain of the guard with orders and occupied some special advantageous places in St. Petersburg.
Although some freethinkers smiled when they were told about Berg's merits, one could not but agree that Berg was a serviceable, brave officer, in excellent standing with his superiors, and a moral young man with a brilliant career ahead and even a strong position in society.
Four years ago, having met in the stalls of the Moscow theater with a German comrade, Berg pointed out Vera Rostova to him and said in German: “Das soll mein Weib werden”, [She must be my wife,] and from that moment decided to marry her. Now, in Petersburg, realizing the position of the Rostovs and his own, he decided that the time had come, and made an offer.
Berg's proposal was accepted at first with unflattering bewilderment for him. At first it seemed strange that the son of a dark, Livonian nobleman would propose to Countess Rostova; but the main feature of Berg's character was such a naive and good-natured egoism that the Rostovs involuntarily thought that it would be good if he himself was so firmly convinced that it was good and even very good. Moreover, the affairs of the Rostovs were very upset, which the groom could not help but know, and most importantly, Vera was 24 years old, she went everywhere, and, despite the fact that she was undoubtedly good and reasonable, so far no one has ever made her an offer . Consent was given.
“You see,” Berg said to his comrade, whom he called a friend only because he knew that all people have friends. “You see, I figured it all out, and I wouldn’t get married if I didn’t think it all over, and for some reason it would be inconvenient. And now, on the contrary, my papa and mama are now provided for, I arranged this lease for them in the Ostsee region, and I can live in Petersburg with my salary, with her condition and with my accuracy. You can live well. I don’t marry for money, I think it’s ignoble, but it’s necessary that the wife bring her own, and the husband his. I have a service - it has connections and small means. That means something to us these days, doesn't it? And most importantly, she is a beautiful, respectable girl and loves me ...
Berg blushed and smiled.
“And I love her because she has a sensible personality—very good. Here is her other sister - of the same surname, but completely different, and an unpleasant character, and there is no mind, and such, you know? ... Unpleasant ... And my bride ... You will come to us ... - continued Berg, he wanted to say dine, but changed his mind and said: “drink tea”, and, quickly piercing it with his tongue, he released a round, small ring of tobacco smoke, which fully personified his dreams of happiness.
Next to the first feeling of bewilderment aroused in the parents by Berg's proposal, the usual festivity and joy in such cases settled in the family, but the joy was not sincere, but external. In the feelings of relatives regarding this wedding, confusion and shame were noticeable. As if they were ashamed now for the fact that they had little love for Vera, and now they were so willing to sell her off their hands. Most embarrassed was the old count. He probably would not have been able to name what was the cause of his embarrassment, and this reason was his money matters. He absolutely did not know what he had, how much debt he had, and what he would be able to give as a dowry to Vera. When the daughters were born, each was assigned 300 souls as a dowry; but one of these villages had already been sold, the other was mortgaged and so overdue that it had to be sold, so it was impossible to give the estate. There was no money either.
Berg had been the bridegroom for more than a month and only a week remained before the wedding, and the count had not yet decided with himself the question of dowry and did not talk about it with his wife. The count either wanted to separate Vera from the Ryazan estate, then he wanted to sell the forest, then he wanted to borrow money against a bill. A few days before the wedding, Berg entered the count's office early in the morning and, with a pleasant smile, respectfully asked the future father-in-law to tell him what would be given for Countess Vera. The count was so embarrassed at this long-anticipated question that he said without thinking the first thing that came into his head.
- I love that I took care, I love you, you will be satisfied ...
And he patted Berg on the shoulder and stood up, wanting to end the conversation. But Berg, smiling pleasantly, explained that if he did not know correctly what would be given for Vera, and did not receive in advance at least a part of what was assigned to her, then he would be forced to refuse.
“Because judge, Count, if I now allowed myself to marry, without having certain means to support my wife, I would act vilely ...
The conversation ended with the count, wishing to be generous and not be subjected to new requests, said that he was issuing a bill of 80 thousand. Berg smiled meekly, kissed the count on the shoulder and said that he was very grateful, but now he could not get settled in his new life without receiving 30 thousand in clean money. “At least 20 thousand, Count,” he added; - And then the bill was only 60 thousand.
- Yes, yes, good, - the count spoke quickly, - just excuse me, my friend, I will give 20 thousand, and the bill is also for 80 thousand ladies. So, kiss me.

Natasha was 16 years old, and it was 1809, the same year until which, four years ago, she counted on her fingers with Boris after she kissed him. Since then, she has never seen Boris. In front of Sonya and with her mother, when the conversation turned to Boris, she spoke quite freely, as if it were a settled matter, that everything that had happened before was childish, about which it was not worth even talking about, and which had long been forgotten. But in the most secret depths of her soul, the question of whether the commitment to Boris was a joke or an important, binding promise tormented her.
Ever since Boris left Moscow for the army in 1805, he had not seen the Rostovs. Several times he visited Moscow, passing not far from Otradnoye, but he never visited the Rostovs.
It sometimes occurred to Natasha that he did not want to see her, and her guesses were confirmed by the sad tone in which the elders used to say about him:
“In this century, old friends are not remembered,” the countess said after the mention of Boris.
Anna Mikhailovna, who had lately visited the Rostovs less frequently, also behaved herself in a particularly dignified manner, and each time spoke enthusiastically and gratefully about the merits of her son and about the brilliant career in which he was. When the Rostovs arrived in St. Petersburg, Boris came to visit them.
He rode towards them not without emotion. The memory of Natasha was the most poetic memory of Boris. But at the same time, he rode with the firm intention of making it clear to her and her family that the childish relationship between him and Natasha could not be an obligation either for her or for him. He had a brilliant position in society, thanks to intimacy with Countess Bezukhova, a brilliant position in the service, thanks to the patronage of an important person, whose trust he fully enjoyed, and he had nascent plans for marrying one of the richest brides in St. Petersburg, which could very easily come true. . When Boris entered the Rostovs' living room, Natasha was in her room. Upon learning of his arrival, she flushed almost ran into the living room, beaming with more than an affectionate smile.
Boris remembered that Natasha in a short dress, with black eyes shining from under her curls and with a desperate, childish laugh, whom he knew 4 years ago, and therefore, when a completely different Natasha entered, he was embarrassed, and his face expressed enthusiastic surprise. This expression on his face delighted Natasha.
“What, do you recognize your little friend as a minx?” said the Countess. Boris kissed Natasha's hand and said that he was surprised at the change that had taken place in her.
- How you have improved!
“Sure!” answered Natasha's laughing eyes.
- Is your father old? she asked. Natasha sat down and, without entering into a conversation between Boris and the countess, silently examined her children's fiancé to the smallest detail. He felt the weight of that stubborn, affectionate look on himself, and from time to time glanced at her.
Uniform, spurs, tie, Boris's hairstyle, all this was the most fashionable and comme il faut [quite decently]. Natasha noticed this now. He was sitting a little sideways on an armchair near the countess, adjusting with his right hand the cleanest, drenched glove on his left, he spoke with a special, refined pursing of his lips about the amusements of the highest Petersburg society and with gentle mockery recalled the old Moscow times and Moscow acquaintances. Not accidentally, as Natasha felt it, he mentioned, naming the highest aristocracy, about the ball of the envoy, which he was at, about invitations to NN and to SS.
Natasha sat all the time in silence, looking at him from under her brows. This look more and more disturbed and embarrassed Boris. He often looked back at Natasha and interrupted his stories. He sat for no more than 10 minutes and stood up, bowing. All the same curious, defiant and somewhat mocking eyes looked at him. After his first visit, Boris told himself that Natasha was just as attractive to him as before, but that he should not give in to this feeling, because marrying her - a girl with almost no fortune - would be the death of his career, and resuming the old relationship without the purpose of marriage would be an ignoble act. Boris decided on his own to avoid meeting Natasha, but, despite this decision, he arrived a few days later and began to travel often and spend whole days with the Rostovs. It seemed to him that he needed to explain himself to Natasha, to tell her that everything old should be forgotten, that, despite everything ... she cannot be his wife, that he has no fortune, and she will never be given for him. But he did not succeed in everything and it was embarrassing to start this explanation. Every day he became more and more confused. Natasha, according to the remark of her mother and Sonya, seemed to be in love with Boris in the old way. She sang his favorite songs to him, showed him her album, forced him to write in it, did not allow him to remember the old, letting him know how wonderful the new was; and every day he left in a fog, without saying what he intended to say, not knowing himself what he was doing and why he came, and how it would end. Boris stopped visiting Helen, received daily reproachful notes from her, and yet spent whole days with the Rostovs.

- an integrated mental reflection of a person's past interaction with reality, the information fund of his life.

The ability to store information and selectively update it, use it to regulate behavior is the main property of the brain that ensures the interaction of the individual with the environment. Memory integrates life experience, ensures the continuous development of human culture and individual life. Based on memory, a person is oriented in the present and foresees the future.

The beginning of the experimental study of memory was laid at the end of the 19th century. studies of the German psychologist G. Ebbinghaus (1850-1909), summarized in his work "On Memory" (1885). This was the first exit of a psychological experiment beyond sensory processes. G. Ebbinghaus deduced the "forgetting curve", graphically illustrating the highest percentage of forgetting in the period immediately following the memorization of new material. At present, in connection with the actualization of the problem of machine accumulation and information retrieval, memory becomes the object of interdisciplinary research. But human memory differs from machine, electronic memory in the active-reconstructive preservation of material. Human memory is influenced by socio-cultural factors.

In the process of development, the individual increasingly focuses on the semantic, semantic connections of memorized structures. The same material is stored in memory in different ways depending on the structure of the personality, its need-motivational features. Machine memory is mechanical memory. Human memory is a value-integrated storage of information. The accumulation of material in memory (archiving) is carried out in two blocks: in the block episodic and in block semantic(semantic) memory. Episodic memory is autobiographical - it stores various episodes from the life of an individual. Semantic memory is aimed at categorical structures formed in the cultural and historical environment. It also stores all the historically formed rules for the logic of mental actions and the construction of a language.

Features of human memory

Depending on the characteristics of the memorized material, there are special ways of codifying, archiving and extracting it. The spatial organization of the environment is encoded in the form of schematic formations from semantic reference points that characterize our physical and social environment.

Sequential phenomena are imprinted in linear memory structures. Formally organized structures are imprinted associative mechanisms of memory, providing a grouping of phenomena and objects according to certain characteristics (household items, labor, etc.). All semantic meanings are categorized - they refer to different groups of concepts that are in hierarchical interdependence.

The possibility of its rapid updating and retrieval depends on the organization of the material in memory. Information is reproduced in the connection in which it was originally formed.

Many complain of a bad memory, but do not complain of a bad mind. Meanwhile, the mind, the ability to establish relationships, is the basis of memory.

The extraction of learned material from memory in order to use it in recognition, recall, and recollection is called updating(from lat. actualis - real, real). We look for the necessary material in memory in the same way as we look for the necessary thing in the pantry: by objects located in the neighborhood. Figuratively speaking, in the fund of our memory everything is hung "on hooks" of associations. The secret of a good memory is to establish strong associations. That is why people remember best what is connected with their worldly concerns, professional interests. Encyclopedic erudition in one area of ​​life can be combined with ignorance in other areas. Some facts are retained in our minds by the force of other facts well known to us. Mechanical “scratching”, “cramming” is the most inefficient way of memorizing.

The possibilities of actualization in a person are much wider than it seems to him. Difficulties in memory, rather, difficulties in reproduction than difficulties in preservation. Absolute oblivion of impressions does not exist.

The fund of human memory is plastic - with the development of personality, changes occur in the structural formations of his memory. Memory is inextricably linked with the activity of the individual - that is firmly remembered that is included in the active activity of a person, corresponds to his life strategy.

Operating System Behavior and human activity, i.e., his skills and abilities are images of optimal, adequate actions imprinted in memory. With repeated repetition of the necessary actions, unnecessary, unnecessary movements are eliminated from them, and the memory is fixed image of the optimal action, individual operations are integrated into a single functional complex.

Memory, intellect, feelings and the operational sphere of an individual are a single systemic formation.

Memory- the mental mechanism of a person's orientation both in the external and in the internal, subjective world, the mechanism of localization of events in time and space, the mechanism of structural self-preservation of the personality and its consciousness. Memory disorders mean personality disorders.

Classification of memory phenomena

Differ memory processes- memorization, preservation, reproduction and forgetting and forms of memory - involuntary (unintentional) and arbitrary (intentional).

Depending on the type of analyzers, the signaling system, or the participation of subcortical formations of the brain, there are types of memory:figurative, logical and emotional.

Figurative memory - representations - is classified by types of analyzers: visual, auditory, motor, etc.

According to the method of memorization, direct (direct) and indirect (indirect) memory are distinguished.

Relationship between memory and recall

The trace of each impression is associated with many traces of accompanying impressions. Indirect memorization and reproduction is the memorization and reproduction of a given image according to the system of connections into which the image is included - by associations. Indirect, associative emergence of images is psychologically much more meaningful than direct memorization; it brings the phenomena of memory closer to the phenomena of thinking. The main work of human memory consists of remembering and reproducing traces by associations.

There are three types of associations.

Association by adjacency. This is an elementary type of communication without significant processing of information.

Association by contrast. It is a connection between two opposite phenomena. This type of connection is already based on the logical device of opposition.

Association by similarity. Perceiving one situation, a person by association recalls another similar situation. Similarity associations require complex processing of the information received, highlighting the essential features of the perceived object, generalization and comparison with what is stored in memory. The objects of association by similarity can be not only visual images, but also concepts, judgments, and conclusions. Similarity associations are one of the essential mechanisms of thinking, the basis of logical memory.

Thus, according to the method of memorization, memory can be mechanical and associative (semantic).

Human memory systems

Consider memory systems. In any kind of activity, all memory processes are involved. But different levels of activity are associated with the functioning of various mechanisms, memory systems.

The following four interconnected memory systems are distinguished: 1) sensory; 2) short-term; 3) operational; 4) long-term.

sensory memory- a direct sensory imprint of an influencing object, a direct imprint of sensory influences, that is, the preservation of visual images in the form of a clear, complete imprint of the object's sensory influences for a very short period of time (0.25 sec). These are the so-called afterimages. They are not associated with the fixation of traces and quickly disappear. This type of memory ensures the continuity, integrity of the perception of dynamic, rapidly changing phenomena.

short term memory- direct imprinting of a set of objects in a one-act perception of the situation, fixation of objects that have fallen into the field of perception. Short-term memory provides primary orientation in a one-time perception of the situation.

The operating time of short-term memory is no more than 30 seconds. Its scope is limited to five to seven objects. However, when reproducing short-term memory images, additional information can be extracted from them.

RAM- selective preservation and updating of information necessary only to achieve the goal of this activity. The duration of working memory is limited by the time of the corresponding activity. So, we memorize the elements of a phrase in order to comprehend it as a whole, we remember certain conditions of the problem we are solving, we remember intermediate numbers in complex calculations.

The productivity of working memory is determined by the ability of a person to organize the memorized material, to create integral complexes - units of memory. Examples of the use of various blocks of operational units can be spelling, syllables, whole words or word complexes. Working memory functions at a high level if a person sees not particular, but general properties of various situations, combines similar elements into larger blocks, recodes the material into a single system. So, remembering the ABD125 number is easier in the form of 125125, i.e., recoding the letters into numbers according to the place of the letters in the alphabet.

The functioning of operative memory is associated with significant neuropsychic stress, since it requires the simultaneous interaction of a number of competing centers of excitation. When operating with objects whose state changes, no more than two variable factors can be kept in RAM.

long term memory- long-term memorization of content of great importance. The selection of information included in long-term memory is associated with a probabilistic assessment of its future applicability, foreseeing future events.

The amount of long-term memory depends on relevance information, that is, on what meaning the information has for a given individual, his leading activity.

Types of memory - individual typological features of memory

They differ in the following qualities, found in various combinations: the volume and accuracy of memorization; memorization speed; memory strength; the leading role of one or another analyzer (the predominance of visual, auditory or motor memory in a given person); peculiarities interactions of the first and second signal systems(figurative, logical and average types).

Various combinations of individual typological features give a variety of individual types of memory (Fig. 1).

There are large individual differences in the speed of memorization of material and the duration of its retention in memory. So, in the course of psychological experiments, it was found that to memorize 12 syllables, one person needs 49 repetitions, and another only 14.

An essential individual feature of memory is the focus on remembering certain material. The well-known criminologist G. Gross spoke about his father's extremely poor memory for people's names. The father could not accurately say the name of his only son, at the same time he memorized various statistical material very accurately and for a long time.

Some people memorize material directly, while others tend to use logical means. For some, memory is close to perception, for others, to thinking. The higher the level of mental development of a person, the more his memory approaches thinking. An intellectually developed person remembers mainly with the help of logical operations. But the development of memory is not directly related to intellectual development. Some people have a very developed figurative (eidetic) memory.

Rice. 1. Classification of memory phenomena

All living beings have memory, but it has reached the highest level of development in humans. Memory connects the past with the present. It is memory that allows a person to be aware of his "I", to act in the world around him, to be who he is. Human memory is a form of mental reflection, which consists in the accumulation, consolidation, preservation and subsequent reproduction by the individual of his experience. Ours is a functional education that does its job through the interaction of three main processes: memorization, storage and reproduction of information. These processes not only interact, there is a mutual conditionality between them. After all, you can save only what you remember, and reproduce - what you have saved.

Memorization. Human memory begins with the memorization of information: words, images, impressions. The main task of the memorization process is to remember accurately, quickly and a lot. Distinguish between involuntary and voluntary memory. Arbitrary memorization turns on when the goal is to remember not only what is itself imprinted in his memory, but also what is necessary. Arbitrary memorization is active, purposeful, and has a volitional beginning.

What is personally significant, connected with the activities of a person and his interests, is in the nature of involuntary memorization. With involuntary memorization, a person is passive. Involuntary memorization clearly demonstrates such a property of memory as selectivity. If you ask different people what they remember most at the same wedding, then some will easily talk about who and what gifts presented the newlyweds, others - what they ate and drank, others - what music they danced to, etc. However, at the same time, neither the first, nor the second, nor the third set themselves a clear goal of remembering something specific. Memory selectivity worked.

It is worth mentioning the “Zeigarnik effect” (it was first described in 1927 by the Soviet psychologist Bluma Vulfovna Zeigarnik (1900-1988): a person involuntarily remembers unfinished actions much better, situations that have not received a natural resolution.

If we were unable to finish something, finish eating, get what we wanted, while being close to the goal, then this is remembered thoroughly and for a long time, and successfully completed is forgotten quickly and easily. The reason is that an unfinished action is a source of strong negative ones, which are much more powerful than positive ones in terms of their impact.

Many scientists have studied memory techniques. In particular, the German psychologist G. Ebbinghaus formulated a number of patterns of memorization. He believed that repetition (indirect or direct) is the only relative guarantee of the reliability of memorization. Moreover, the result of memorization is in a certain dependence on the number of repetitions. Ebbinghaus' law states that the number of repeated presentations needed to memorize the entire series grows much faster than the object of the presented series. If the subject memorizes 8 digits from one presentation (display), then to memorize 9 digits he will need 3-4 presentations. The scientist also emphasizes the importance of the volitional factor. The higher the concentration of attention on any information, the faster memorization will occur.

However, it has been found that rote repetition is less effective than meaningful memorization. The direction of modern psychology - mnemonics - is developing numerous memorization techniques based on the principle of associative communication: the translation of information into images, graphics, pictures, diagrams.

Allocate four types of human memory in accordance with the type of memorized material.
1. Motor memory, i.e. the ability to memorize and reproduce a system of motor operations (driving a car, weaving a braid, tying a tie, etc.).
2. Figurative memory - the ability to save and further use the data of our perception. It can be (depending on the receiving analyzer) auditory, visual, tactile, olfactory and gustatory.
3. Emotional memory captures the feelings we experienced, the peculiarity of emotional states and affects. A child who was frightened by a big dog, most likely, even becoming an adult, will dislike these animals for a long time to come (fear memory).
4. Verbal memory (verbal-logical, semantic) - the highest type of memory, inherent only to man. With its help, most of the mental actions and operations (counting, reading, etc.) are carried out, the information base of the human is formed.

Different people have a more developed type of memory: athletes have a motor memory, artists have a figurative one, and so on.

Saving information. The main requirement for human memory is to store information reliably, for a long time and without loss. There are several levels of memory, differing in how long each of them can store information.

1. Sensory (immediate) type of memory. The systems of this memory hold accurate and complete data about how the world is perceived by our senses at the level of receptors. Data is stored within 0.1-0.5 seconds. The mechanism of action of sensory memory is easy to detect: close your eyes, then open them for a second and then close them again. The clear picture you see lasts for a while, and then slowly disappears.
2. Short-term memory allows you to process a huge amount of information without overloading the brain, due to the fact that it filters out everything unnecessary and leaves the useful, necessary for solving urgent (momentary) problems.
3. Long-term memory provides long-term storage and use of information. The capacity and duration of information storage in long-term memory can be unlimited. There are two types of long-term memory. The first is at the level of consciousness. A person in his own way can remember, extract the necessary information. The second type is closed long-term memory, in which information is stored at the subconscious level. Under normal conditions, a person does not have access to this information, only with the help of psychoanalytic procedures, in particular hypnosis, as well as irritations of various parts of the brain, one can access it and update images, thoughts, experiences in all details.
4. Intermediate memory is between short-term and long-term memory. It provides information storage for several hours. In the waking state during the day, a person accumulates information. So that the brain is not overloaded, it is necessary to free it from unnecessary information. The information accumulated over the past day is cleared, categorized and stored in long-term memory during a night's sleep. Scientists have found that this requires at least three hours of sleep a night.
5. Working memory is a type of human memory that manifests itself in the course of performing a certain activity and serving this one.

Playback. The requirements for the process of memory reproduction are accuracy and timeliness. In psychology, four forms of reproduction are distinguished:
1) recognition - occurs when the perception of objects and phenomena is repeated;
2) memory - is carried out in the real absence of perceived objects. Usually, memories are made through associations that provide automatic, involuntary reproduction;
3) recall - is carried out in the absence of a perceived object and is associated with active volitional activity to update information;
4) reminiscence - delayed reproduction of previously perceived and seemingly forgotten. With this form of memory reproduction, older events are remembered more easily and more accurately than those that occurred in the recent past.

Forgetting is the flip side of memory conservation. This is a process that leads to a loss of clarity and a decrease in the amount of data that can be updated in . Mostly forgetting is not an anomaly of memory, it is a natural process, which is due to a number of factors.
1. Time - in less than an hour a person forgets half of the information just received mechanically.
2. Active use of available information - first of all, what is not constantly needed is forgotten. However, childhood impressions and motor skills such as skating, playing a musical instrument, and being able to swim remain quite stable for many years without any exercise. It remains at the subconscious level, as if forgotten that disturbs the psychological balance, causes negative tension (traumatic impressions).

Information in our memory is not stored unchanged, like documents in an archive. In memory, the material undergoes change and qualitative reconstruction.

Human memory disorders. Various memory impairments are very common, although most people do not notice them in themselves or notice them too late. The very concept of "normal memory" is rather vague. Hyperfunction of memory is associated, as a rule, with strong excitement, feverish excitement, taking certain medications or hypnotic influence. A form of obsessive memories is called a violation of emotional balance, feelings of insecurity and anxiety, creating a thematic orientation of memory hyperfunction. So, for example, we constantly remember our extremely unpleasant, unseemly actions. It is almost impossible to expel such memories: they haunt us, cause a feeling of shame and pangs of conscience.

In practice, there is a weakening of the memory function, a partial loss of storing or reproducing the available information. The weakening of selective reduction, difficulties in reproducing the material needed at the moment (names, dates, names, terms, etc.) are among the earliest manifestations of memory impairment. Then the weakening of memory can take the form of progressive amnesia, the causes of which are alcoholism, trauma, age-related and negative personality changes, sclerosis, diseases.

In modern psychology, the facts of memory deceptions are known, which take the form of extremely one-sided selectivity of memories, false memories and distortions of memory. Usually they are caused by strong desires, passions, unsatisfied needs. For example, when a child is given a sweet, he quickly eats it, and then "forgets" about it and sincerely proves that he did not receive anything.

Memory distortion is often associated with a weakening of the ability to distinguish between one's own and someone else's, what a person experienced in reality, and what he heard, saw in a movie or read. In the case of multiple repetitions of such memories, their complete personification occurs, i.e. a person begins to consider other people's thoughts as his own. The presence of facts of deception of memory indicates how closely it is connected with the fantasy of a person.

Memory is the property of remembering, storing and reproducing information. It is a huge storage, but no more than 10% is actually used. This indicates that not only the processes of memory are important, but also the processes of forgetting.

All information that is perceived by a person tends to be forgotten over time. This manifests itself in the impossibility of recognizing someone, recalling something, or in the form of false recognition, recall. In some cases, forgetting becomes a great blessing, such as memory for unpleasant events. This is fully reflected in the wise oriental saying: "Happiness is the memory of joy, I burn oblivion, friend."

There is an interesting way to forget about troubles - in the truest sense of the word, just leave them at the door. This is explained by the fact that our memory is tied to the external environment and therefore, when moving from one room to another, many people forget where they went and what they wanted to do before. In order to remember what you wanted to do, you just need to go back to where you first thought about it. It's funny, but when we move from one room to another, the doorway also divides our memory, leaving behind the door thoughts about what we were going to do or say.

According to the form of manifestation, figurative, emotional and verbal-logical memory are distinguished.

Figurative memory is the ability to reproduce images based on such sense organs as sight, hearing, touch, smell and taste.

Emotional memory is the reproduction of a previously experienced emotional state. It is characterized by high memorization speed and stability. Emotionally colored information is more easily reproduced in memory. Gray, boring information is much more difficult to digest and quickly erased from memory.

Verbal-logical memory is a memory for information in verbal form. When combined, visual images and words used to improve memory are a more powerful memory aid.

Each of us, for sure, will have dates, names that we cannot remember. In this case, associations will help, but they must be carefully selected so as not to puzzle over the “horse name” later.

Of particular interest is mnemonics, from Greek - the art of memorization. Each of us can easily reproduce in memory all the colors of the rainbow, and all because every hunter wants to know where the pheasant is sitting ... This is mnemonic memory - a set of special techniques and methods that make it easier to remember the necessary information.

According to the duration, there are instant (iconic), short-term and long-term memory.

Instantaneous (iconic memory) - designed to store information only at the time of its perception by the senses. This type of memory has a large capacity, quickly fades in time, is not consciously controlled, and transfers information into short-term memory.

Short-term memory is characterized by a short storage time and is lost when new information is received. A good example is the students during the session... An interesting feature of the student's memory: did not know, but remembered.

Long-term memory stores all the information about what we know and can do, and it is very difficult to forget it.

Memory impairment can be confused with impaired concentration. If the head is full of "extraneous matters", it is often difficult to concentrate on the environment and on new, uninteresting information. Therefore, in this case we are talking about a violation of concentration, and not about memory.

In the event that you experience melancholy, apathy or are in a state of stress, memory can play a trick on you, as emotions negatively affect the memorization, storage and reproduction of information.

Older people do not have a good memory and this is quite natural. As we age, attention becomes more scattered, and there are difficulties in remembering names, titles, new information. But this is by no means an obstacle to everyday and social life, since all personal and social characteristics of a person remain unchanged. Mostly, details that relate to time and space disappear from memory, for example, grandmother forgot where she put her glasses, or the name of her old friend, who she was supposed to call back today, etc.

The decline in memory with age has absolutely nothing to do with the weakening of the mind. In fact, older people are not particularly enthusiastic about innovations, brushing aside and mentioning age. But just look at how famously forgetful old women learn how to handle cell phones when they need it!

There are a sufficient number of techniques and techniques to improve memory, for example, the best way to remember your wife's birthday is to forget it once ...

1. Constantly educate yourself.

2. Read, the more you read, the better. Learn by heart and retell.

3. Solve logical problems, solve crosswords and puzzles.

4. Eliminate nicotine and alcohol.

5. Widely use various types of reminders: timer, alarm clock, notes in a conspicuous place, leave at the entrance those things that you need to take with you when you leave.

6. Go in for sports and walk daily in the fresh air, the flow of oxygen to the brain has not hurt anyone yet.

And remember that a good memory is when you do not remember the bad!