Nietzsche on Pain & Memory

Eddie Ejjbair
Oct 28, 2022

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I recently came across this clip of Andrew Huberman discussing the effect of adrenaline on memory:

In general, we tend to remember negative moments over positive ones. This makes sense from an evolutionary standpoint, since our survival depends on not repeating hazardous actions.

Nietzsche made a similar observation in his Genealogy of Morals:

Man could never do without blood, torture, and sacrifices when he felt the need to create a memory for himself; the most dreadful sacrifices and pledges (sacrifices of the first-born among them), the most repulsive mutilations (castration, for example), the crudest rites of all the religious cults (and all religions are at the deepest level systems of cruelties) — all this has its origin in the instinct that realized that pain is the most powerful aid to mnemonics

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Eddie Ejjbair
Eddie Ejjbair

Written by Eddie Ejjbair

My essay collection, 'Extractions', is now available in paperback: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0DC216BXG

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