If not the soul, what else can transmit memories of past lives?
Maybe emotions and instincts are carried from one life to another. If that were the case, then their latent sentiments and intuitions would be the message. The love itself, not the object of the passion, is the content of what would be transmitted. Perhaps the emotion of love is forwarded. But it does not carry experiences and knowledge from a previous life.
In this regard, a surviving emotion that is reincarnated is similar to a soul leaving one body to occupy another.
WHETHER OR NOT THERE IS A SOUL, WHETHER OR NOT THE SOUL REINCARNATES IN ANOTHER BODY AFTER THE END OF AN EARTHLY LIFE, HOW ARE THESE MEMORIES TRANSMITTED?
ALTERNATIVE EXPLANATION OF RECALL OF PAST LIVES
Maybe the intellectual mind is freed up after death to rejoin a new life. This tantalizing concept should not be discounted. As noted above, there are people apparently born with innate understanding and skill. Think of child prodigies, math geniuses, and other examples of cognitively gifted individuals.
The dilemma is that exceptional persons are not those recalling past lives. Those that are recalling past lives do not note extraordinary proficiencies in their “former” lives or the continuance of these powers in their current lives. Transference of intellectual capability does complement another theory about recalling past events, that I will explore below. Moreover, the person recalling a past life does not have the extraordinary gift – such as virtuoso skill with a violin – that dominated the life of the earlier individual.
A problem with this theory of transference is the very different intellectual levels of the person recalled with the person recalling. Many reports of past lives are by an ignorant person of an accomplished individual. It’s rarely if ever the reverse: we don’t hear of a genius recalling a past life as a ditch digger in ancient Rome.
The current person who is remembering an exceptional previous life does not have the capability or inclination to suddenly know an extinct language or a remote history. When told they are recalling a past life, they are gratified to learn how wonderful they were. Anybody would be happy to know they were a person of noteworthy achievement. This satisfaction feeds the impression and belief that true reincarnation is being witnessed.
Humans are born with the potential to grasp knowledge for rational and intelligent thought. We are born with this capacity. It needs to be developed, trained, and fed. Previously downloaded facts, which are part of recalled past lives, are not apparent from birth.
But what about someone who is born a genius? They have a greater ability to analyze, visualize, and utilize various types of knowledge. They have certain mental skills. but these skills do not seem to reincarnate. Only the memory of these skills is brought to attention. Wherever the genius brain or extraordinary mastery originates, it is clear that it is not transmitted through reincarnation. No one who feels they have been reincarnated from a genius exhibits that genius themselves. Examples of reincarnation do not include linking any series of exceptionally brilliant or talented people. That is because they are not linked. Albert Einstein, Sir Isaac Newton, and Leonardo da Vinci never described reincarnation experiences bonding them to anyone in the past. The same is true for Frederic Chopin, Ludwig van Bethoven, and Franz Liszt.
If the mind, or intellect, is transferred from one life to another, then the receiver of that previous mind would exhibit all the knowledge from the earlier person. The mental capabilities, wisdom, and factual information from the previous life should be apparent. The person’s lifetime of accumulated learning would be known in the awareness of someone recalling a past life. But that is not the case. remembered past lives are movies of events and other stuff. Nobody has ever been born with a mind from another time. Brain activity is not reincarnated.
SUBJECTIVE MEMORY
What of memory itself? We definitely remember. Scientific studies show memory is associated with widely spaced anatomic areas of the brain. There is no localized brain structure that stores memories. There are several mental functions contributing to remembering.
Most people believe that their recall of events in their own lives approximates the reality that occurred. They are often wrong to some degree. Their subjective memories of their own lives add, exclude, and distort the actual event.
On the other hand, objective memory does exist. If we could go back in time, the realities of the past are stark and unchanged from the way they happened. Every detail is faithfully preserved in the past. Accessing these details with our minds is an unreliable endeavor.
This is because of “the subjective load.” It is almost impossible to turn off the subjective load when we create a record. Therefore, subjective coloring and wandering will always be somewhat of an obstacle to pure truth.
Studies have shown that memory is imperfect. Even some of the most vivid memories are often flawed. Subjectivity and uninhibited mental activity constantly modify brain function, including remembering. There is nothing wrong with this process of recall. It is a positive trait, ensuring our growth and survival. The human brain enables us to control our interactions with the environment, a fortuitous contribution to continuity and durability. By adding to the brain’s database, learning adjusts the substance and gist of all cerebral content.
For better or worse, the mind’s never-ending waterfall of thoughts impacts recollection. A true memory, though literally frozen in its own time, interacts with the ever-changing cerebral environment.
Mental power and capacity are fed and lost every day. Brain function is constantly being repaired and distorted. The nature of thinking includes evaluating, judging, and assigning priority. Our personalities, knowledge bases, decision-making capabilities, hopes, desires, and preferences evolve.
We store random pieces of our personal past, learned knowledge, and encounters in the brain. Many areas of the human mind hold memories. These are interwoven in the cerebrum with all our anxieties, fears, dreams, angers, biases, desires, hopes, preferences, loves, hatreds, and other thoughts and emotions. All of these brain activities swirl around with memories. Each inserts a thread of subjectivity into the objective memory as it surfaces from its depths to awareness.
Memories and emotions interact with each other and all the other mental processes active in the brain. The result is to produce slightly different memories and emotions. From true and rigid objective personal experiences, we add personal preferences and walk away with subjective memories. And we become different. That is called personal growth.
When someone recalls his or her own past, the content has been altered. The perceived reality includes all the influences that the brain introduces. An individual who is under hypnosis, in a deep sleep, or any of the ego-suppressed states associated with remembering past lives would describe an inaccurate scenario. Actual languages – verifiable by experts – would contain errors.
Other inconsistencies and factual mistakes would be prominent. It would be as if the person’s subconscious was manufacturing the entire tale. Such a story would be outrageous enough to defy belief. Thus, these subjective memories cannot be the episodes of “recalled past lives, or reincarnation,” that are said to give credence to this theory.
Another possibility deserves consideration and description. Further explanation of how people experience a past life in Part 4.
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