One Mile Walk

More Consciousness

         Doing a bit of research I've found some stuff that supports my repeated memories observation. It's called the Hebbian Doctrine. From Wikipedia, discussing the brain at the neuron cell level, we have:
         The theory attempts to explain associative or Hebbian learning, in which simultaneous activation of cells leads to pronounced increases in synaptic strength between those cells. It also provides a biological basis for errorless learning methods for education and memory rehabilitation. In the study of neural networks in cognitive function, it is often regarded as the neuronal basis of unsupervised learning.

         Which suggests that unsupervised learning is not just the techniques used in AI development, but is the basis of human learning from sensory only experience as well. Observation after observation with associations lead to predictive results... that's learning!
         Then, digging farther, How Neurons That Wire Together Fire Together, by Yue Kris Wu and Friedemann Zenke, where they talk about crosstalk between neurons in a process they called nonlinear transient amplification (NTA).
         And boy do they use $10 words to say the same thing again:
         In summary, NTA provides a parsimonious explanation for how excitatory-inhibitory, co-tuning, and short-term plasticity collaborate in recurrent networks to achieve transient amplification.

         I interpret this to mean it's not just the electro-chemical sharing of adjacent neurons firing, but the association with similar qualia.
         So when does a memory become a speculation. I can guess at what I saw 76 years ago. But now, I know too much about P-38s to ignore the landing gear, the flap setting, the control surface fabric, the rivets on the wings, the sounds and blast of propwash from the uprated Allison engines, and the smell of burned 100 octane Avgas exhaust. That's four of the five senses. It's not a wonder that it had such an immense influence on me.
C.Don