Kenneth Norman, a psychologist at Princeton, studies how memories get distorted via “interactions between medial temporal structures and [the] prefrontal cortex.”... Norman likes to tell students about the time he was recounting to a friend something that had happened to him when he realized that it actually hadn’t happened to him. How did he know? Because it had happened to the friend he was talking to.... The memory Norman had appropriated was of seeing a famous actor in a particular restaurant. It was a restaurant he had actually been in, and the actor was someone he had seen—just not in person. So the key visual elements for the false memory were in place, ready for a little dramatic tweaking....
[Brian Williams] knew there were other witnesses to the original story. And, since he’s not stupid, that probably means his fabrications weren’t conscious and intentional, but, rather, were an illustration of human memory working as human memory often works.
Why would human brains be so fallible? The best guess is that, from the point of view of the brain’s creator, natural selection, unreliable memory is a feature, not a bug....
February 11, 2015
Is it ridiculous to think that Brian Williams "'conflated' the helicopter he rode in 12 years ago with a different helicopter he saw and reported about that day"?
You wouldn't think so if you have an informed and nuanced understanding of the human the human mind, says Bob Wright in The New Republic.
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He was told by NBC executives to stop telling helicopter story years ago....http://variety.com/2015/tv/news/brian-williams-tall-tale-raises-new-challenge-for-nbc-news-1201425033/
that probably means his fabrications weren’t conscious and intentional,
Wheeeewww.....I was hoping that was the case.
Did you know that he didn't *gulp* ever graduate from college...?!!
By orders of magnitude being shot at is a different thing than thinking you've seen someone eating in a restaurant. People tend to know and not forget when they've been shot at. And, when they've NOT been shot at, they tend to not confuse it being shot at, unless they are fabulists.
Don't network fact checkers check the facts of all news reports?
*cough*BULLSHIT*cough*
Sorry, had the truth caught in my throat...
The problem with all these desperate psychological theories,
is that when a celebrity fibs,
it's invariably in the direction of padding his resume.
These armchair psychologists keep dragging out more neutral examples: "Where were you at the moment that you heard about the 9-11 attack?"
And if Brian Williams had said that he heard about the 9-11 attack in the studio when he really was getting a haircut at the time, it wouldn't be so noteworthy.
But Brian Williams' "misremembering" is about factoids that embellish his resume.
And nearly all of these celebrities' lies and politicians' lies are all in that direction.
That's hard to explain neurologically.
But it's easy to explain career-wise.
Every time I applied for a job, the job application said that "Misrepresentation of information is grounds for termination."
I remember telling that very same thing to Bob Wright when we did a podcast together a few years ago. Or perhaps I'm conflating that with the time I listened to a podcast done by Bob Wright. Or a sermon by Jeremiah Wright. Yeah, that's the ticket!
Unreliable "Experts" is always the trouble these days. And that is political.
Memories can get mixed up in older people who are seldom cross examined so their stories are without challenge when improved for dramatic effect. After many tells all they can remember is the lie they heard themselves say so many times.
But a News Professional who creates a great story for airing the next news cycle after it happened cannot plead a normal memory mix up.
There's two chapters dedicated to conflation in the political combat handbook.
Doesn't explain how he can continue to deny the cucumber story.
I am Laslo.
Did I rape that woman, or did I just come upon her after the rape then 'conflated' my penis with the rapist's?
[Brian Williams] knew there were other witnesses to the original story. And, since he’s not stupid, that probably means his fabrications weren’t conscious and intentional, but, rather, were an illustration of human memory working as human memory often works.
Uh huh. Did Bob Wright say something similar when Paul Ryan mis-remembered his time running the marathon? Didn't think so.
Ha ha ha. I guess that means the corruption goes a lot deeper then into the organization that knew that Williams was "misremebering" and covered for him and even fabricated sound for his news report.
When the legend becomes the fact, go with the legend. The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance, Williams' favorite movie.
Good lord! It's pretty pathetic that certain people tying themselves is silly knots trying to absolve him of the sin of knowingly lying? Why is it so hard to accept that Brian Williams is a lying liar who lies?
I actually think there is something to this (but I think Williams is full of shit and the defense does not apply to him). I do think something like this goes on with people like the Columbia Mattress woman. She really "remembers" something that is completely different than what actually happened. Cognitive dissonance and memory distortion are scary bedfellows. That is why I some of us are a little reluctant to believe on a 100% basis sex assault claims made for the first time 18 months after the fact.
Fun fact, I was born in 1984. Yet, if you ask me, I will be able to vividly remember the Challenger explosion. That's, well, pretty much impossible since I was not even two yet and being a baby in Pennsylvania and neither of my parents remember it.
The difference is, I acknowledge that is a fake memory, and a persistent one.
The mind does crazy things, but you should be able -- if you want -- to catch yourself in false memories. I sometimes mix up whether I was in college or high school for some stories, until I stop for a second and remember who was with me.
Brian Williams COULD have prevented false memories from leading him to this mess. He was warned not to.
He didn't.
It's like the story Brian Williams tells of seeing the dead body floating by in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina.
What he saw was a premonition of the dead body of his own career after getting caught out on his helicopter ride story. The rest was just conflation. The mind pays funny tricks like that.
The explanation from Kenneth Norman is bullshit excuse making.
since he’s not stupid
Assumes facts not in evidence...
I do think some people make up lies and they tell them so hard they convince themselves they are true.
Don't network fact checkers
(laugh)
There is no persuasive charitable explanation for how a lying celebrity hound "conflated" his experience in that helicopter with the experience of those who were in the helicopter that landed an HOUR before his landed.
Really! This stolen valor bit isn't all that hard to explain.
- Krumhorn
A possible alternate theory is that at the time in question, he was in a drug addle haze and when the truck he was riding in, hit a pothole, he thought it was a RPG hit to the helicopter he rode in earlier.
Just as valid as any other reasons I have heard these last few days...
So, he remembered the story correctly, then later he misremembered the story, now he remembers it correctly, again?
I buy that memory is weird, and memories can (and do) change. But it's a stretch too far to explain Brian Williams' helicopter story. (Though it's a plausible explanation for Neil deGrasse Tyson's misquoting George W. Bush.)
Rather simpler explanation is that Williams, like Elwood Blues and Barack Obama, took the liberty of bullshitting us.
Have you ever been near a large explosion? Especially one set off by someone who wanted to kill you? You don't forget where you were when it happened.
And where all these memory experts when Scooter Libby was railroaded?
If you were in a helicopter that got hit by an RPG, you'd damn well remember it, assuming you survive. RPGs can play bloody hell with helicopters. Their shaped charge warhead is designed to punch through tank armor and have no trouble ripping into a helicopter.
Zeb Quinn said...
People tend to know and not forget when they've been shot at.
Winston Churchill had the definitive statement on the topic and calls BS on the Williams BS from his grave :)
There is nothing more exhilarating than to be shot at without result.
-- Sir Winston Churchill (1874-1965)
Funny how the conflation examples are always so petty. Only a fool could believe that Brian Williams accidently thought he was under fire because this person accidently thought he saw an actor. One misremembered event is a bit more dramatic than the other. That matters.
As someone pointed out, these "false memories" only go in one direction. Nobody hits the game winning home run and then misremembers himself sitting on the bench watching somebody else do it.
For phuck's sake...
...he claimed (at the 2:00 mark) to have looked down of the tube of the RPG he claimed was fired at his chopper. How do you mis..?!?!?
Wait, what, Katyusha rockets, too? Quick, somebody check with that chopper crew!
Credible witnesses are already calling his Katrina reportage.
Perhaps the latest tranche of Williams' excuse-makers are in the same position as Williams himself -- so many lies they can remember what he said the first time.
... already calling his Katrina reportage into question.
The first step in attaining sobriety is being honest with oneself.
The vicarious non-participatory Princeton psychologists and other enablers are not helping Mr. Williams surmount this dark period in his life.
Although it's surely true that human memory is unreliable (especially long-term), this "explanation" defies Occam's razor. Especially as short-term memory, especially for dramatic events, can be quite good.
We're asked to accept not that he doesn't remember what happened years ago, but that whatever he wrote or recorded at the time (and surely even the lamest "I'm-just-the-face-in-front-of-the-news" journalist would have made or dictated notes after being in a vehicle hit by an RPG?) was "mis-remembered."
So, how many Americans do you suppose "remember" being in the World Trade Center on 9/11 when the planes hit? I'd guess among those who were not there, the number is about zero.
Because, memory is not that bad.
Bob Wright is full of shit. It's pathetic the way these democrat party demagogues twist themselves into knots making excuses for one of their comrades caught in a lie. It almost makes me respect Althouse who will at least acknowledge the lie that she excuses for partisan reasons. Almost, but not really...
The professor got caught in a bald faced lie and he is trying to explain it with pseudo science? As they say on ESPN "aw c'mon, man!"
But we are all stuck in our own human minds, and we know that confusion over such a matter is not normal. Who the hell drives down the road and sees a bad crash and then ends up telling everyone he or she was in it?
This is ridiculous, we know it's ridiculous, and it deserves to be ridiculed.
Larry J said...
If you were in a helicopter that got hit by an RPG, you'd damn well remember it,
I hate CH-47's. Perhaps irrationally, but I hate to ride in a -47. They die so badly.
OK, first class.
When flying in a light plane, if you get engine warning lights on the console, the steps are effectively
1. get the plane in the best attitude for gliding
2. identify the nearest airfield or field, head there
3. try restart
4. make a Mayday.
When flying in a light Helo, if you get engine warning lights on the console, the steps are effectively:
1. Get on the ground
When you get warning lights in a helo, it seldom gets better and the failure cascade can be rapid, surprising and ugly
Back on topic. A CH-47 has two eggbeater (interlaced) rotors working in tandem with a shared transmission...
a Single engine Huey can take damage and auto-rotate fairly well.
A CH-47, in my experience just comes apart in mid air...
That would explain why people voted for Obama.
The challenge is to think that Brian Williams made it all up, that he lied from the start, that it's all a lie.
This challenge is tough.
I recently had the experience of realizing that I vividly remembered seeing something that I could not possibly have seen, so I know that such "flash pictures" are possible.
However, several versions of the picture? Or of a movie with sound effects and physical sensations?
I think someone else got it right, when he commented that Brian Williams really wanted to be a stand-up comedian and has got it conflated with his role as a network news anchor.
IMaybe later Williams was confused. That's a very very generous maybe.
But when did the confusion, if it existed, arrive?
When he started this horseshit he he had to know that he was lying. The experience was too recent and too intense. Perhaps eventually his mountainous ego trained itself to treat the lie as the truth. But not when he started down this path. He lied. He damn well had to know that he was lying.
Plus if he really was misremembering, wouldn't he have expressed some doubt when the actual truth was told? He did not express doubt, probably because he still knew it was a lie from the get go.
For people with an actual conscience, telling a lie is a memorable experience, especially when the lie is consequential. You can feel the lie. It burns. You can feel what the consequences could be.
I am not saying that Williams lacks a conscience. If he did its worse. He's a sociopath. Far better to be just a liar.
That would have been the right apology-defense. "Look, I told a lie. Then I got tangled up in it and did not have the courage to come clean. It was a inexcusable mistake. I wish I had not made it, and know I have to accept the consequences. I am well aware that the consequences are out of my control."
That I could respect. So could a lot of people. It's not hard to figure out why.
So does this mean Williams is going to be offered a job by The New Republic?
Ah, the "master criminal" defense. Would someone as smart as Brian Williams be so stupid as to tell an easily debunked lie?
Yes, yes he would. It happens all the time. When people don't routinely fact-check you to your face because you are a famous anchor it can happen a lot more frequently.
Liars often succeed because people enable them.
Virgil Hilts, Columbia Mattress Woman is a liar.
Matthew Sablan said...
Fun fact, I was born in 1984. Yet, if you ask me, I will be able to vividly remember the Challenger explosion. That's, well, pretty much impossible since I was not even two yet and being a baby in Pennsylvania and neither of my parents remember it.
The Challenger explosion was replayed many times on TV over the years. You probably saw it multiple times. So at least you were exposed to the reality even if you mistook the time. Williams does not have that excuse.
If libtards really believe that memory is that malleable, they're gonna have to throw out an awful lot of rape convictions. Is someone preparing charges against Bill Clinton again or something?
WV: idius
BS.
How does Professor Norman know that the his "corrected" memory about not seeing the famous actor was actually the result of distorted "interactions between medial temporal structures and the prefrontal cortex"?
Maybe he never had such a conversation with his friend and that he really did see that actor.
Ah, the conundrums that scientism leads us into.
I'm curious about the habits of mind that would lead otherwise intelligent people to grasp so assuredly to such a load crap just to save someone they like.
They're full of shit. I've been ambushed and shot at (South America) and you never forget the details of such things.
Just writing this I can hear the nearly half-second snap-to-bang, and once again give thanks that the bad guys lit up too soon.
You don't "mis-remember" this type of thing.
Without the internet and social media exaggerations said on TV and the radio disappear overnight.
Many celebrities are, I believe,are unaware of how much information is available and are not very adept at searching the internet.
I suspect Mr. Williams is amazed to find that video and audio of his tales are readily available.
Listening to his story about having a piece of the downed Osama helicopter it is fairly obvious he is making it up as he goes, and not doing a very good job of it.
He ends the story of having a piece shipped to him by Pentagon contacts(part of the team) by saying it is not on display because it is "still in the envelope it came in."
I have seen a thousand better lies in the comments on this blog. Even may have misremembered a thing or two myself, although I would never have chosen to do so, out of respect for the brave, elite commentarists aboard.
Brian Williams will be okay. In the next six months, he will volunteer for the Hillary Clinton "Take Back the White House" campaign. And, he will also audition for the Comedy Central events. After all, he wants to comedy gigs and the political shows.
If Williams were in a vacuum, I'd accept he misremembered. But he's not in a vacuum - he's in a news organization that is "committed" to truthful reporting. That means that reporters and preparers of the news challenge each other to get the facts right. If reports are correct, many people at NBC News this and other stories were bogus and either they challenged Williams and he did nothing and continued to repeat the bogus claims or he was never challenged. Both cases are damning to him because he either knowingly repeated many lies or he created an environment where he could not be challenged by his collegues.
I have no problem with the science of psychology (note climate-change dogwhistle), but I am skeptical of Princeton psychologists who might be prostituting their professional opinions for political reasons.
The example given is of mixing together two memories of things that happened to the person.
Williams mixed his memory with something that happened to a complete different group of people, that he heard about second-hand.
Remember, Brian Williams also stared down the barrel of a snub-nose .38 when he was robbed as a teenager. Somebody should show him a snub-nosed .38 and see if he can identify it. Hopefully he won't say it's an RPG or a Katyusha rocket.
All his stories sound the same. All overly dramatic and following a template. He didn't just cover Katrina, he saw a body floating in the street (on dry pavement in that location, by all accounts), was accosted by a gang in a fancy hotel (and made a lifelong "friend" of the policeman who "saved" him) and contracted dysentery. It was a busy time, I guess, but he checked all the boxes.
When he was a firefighter he didn't just saved buildings, he saved puppies. And mystery puppies, at that. He didn't know he had puppies until he got outside. Would you put something warm and furry in your coat if you didn't know what it was?
And in Iraq he had all the required war correspondent experiences to put on his resume, whether he actually experienced them or not.
Maybe he really should have been a comedian and not a newsman. They don't suspend comedians for six months for making up stories. Hey, they expect it. "So I was in the grocery one day..."
he should get some medication for all the misremembering he's been doing. Once, eh..I can give a guy a pass once, but how many memories of his are distorted? If so many are not reality, then he might have a serious medical condition. When he drives to the mall in his Honda, does he misremember and hop into the first Mercedes he sees?
A Nose For News
sinz52 said...
And nearly all of these celebrities' lies and politicians' lies are all in that direction.
That's hard to explain neurologically.
Not really.
Why would human brains be so fallible? The best guess is that, from the point of view of the brain’s creator, natural selection, unreliable memory is a feature, not a bug....
E.g.
Deceit and Self-Deception by Robert Trivers – review
"Biologist Robert Trivers has written a fascinating book about the survival value of self-deception"
Despite that, I think Williams is consciously lying; he works for a notoriously dishonest outfit.
RecChief said... [hush][hide comment]
he should get some medication for all the misremembering he's been doing.
Eventually he will remember taking medication that confused him into telling these stories.Ambien seems pretty popular as an excuse.
6 weeks in rehab and all is forgiven.
"...the survival value of self-deception"
Meaning, the best way to fool others is to fool yourself.
Yeah, he gets no pass on this. Human memory is notoriously unreliable, but it would be pretty incredible to remember a rocket attack that didn't happen. Maybe mistake a car backfire for a gunshot, or mistake which chopper the RPG was shooting at--but these lies don't fall into that category.
The thing that is odd though is why lie when it is so obvious that you'd get caught? Williams is a famous man who told the lies on national TV. Surely he knew that the people who knew the truth would get wind of it? Why tell an unnecessary lie here? That's the only mystery.
Maybe he convinced himself of the truth of his own lie, but that's scarier--it suggests a break with reality, and next stop, side of the road with a bunch of dead nurses and he doesn't know how they got there.
The curious thing is why liberals never object to being lied to. Can you name one liberal who bears a grudge against Bill Clinton for the lies that he told? Alger Hiss got standing ovations at Harvard.....My view is that lies told by liberals are not lies told to liberals but lies told to conservatives. If the lie furthers the cause or if the person telling the lie furthers the cause, then that lie or liar is forgiven........I lie all the time because the bleak reality of my life needs a little fluffing here and polishing there. I don't see where Brian Williams needed to lie. He had a glamorous job, a successful family, and fame, money, and good looks. I'd even say he showed a certain amount of courage in reporting from a combat zone. Why wasn't that life good enough for Brian Williams?
I am a real rather than armchair psychologist. After 35 years in the field, 26 as a Ph.D. Psychologist, I hope my opinion carries some weight.
It's not that complicated. IMO, Mr. Williams felt inadequate in his qualifications, so he inflated his resume. He kissed enough leftist ass to get away with it for a long time.
He is a sad, but very wealthy imposter.
He also has nice hair and looks sincere.
William said..."My view is that lies told by liberals are not lies told to liberals but lies told to conservatives. If the lie furthers the cause or if the person telling the lie furthers the cause, then that lie or liar is forgiven."
Look no further than the hostess of this blog and her earlier post on Obama's Same Sex Marriage lies for validation of your hypothesis.
"It's not that complicated. IMO, Mr. Williams felt inadequate in his qualifications, so he inflated his resume. He kissed enough leftist ass to get away with it for a long time."
I can understand why he'd lie, I suppose, but why would he think he couldn't get caught? It just seems so obvious someone would expose this sooner or later.
When Clinton lied about Lewinsky, it's understandable he thought he'd get away with it because he thought no one would believe her and he didn't know about the dress. When Obama lied about gay marriage, he knew his loyalists wouldn't call him out until after his reelection (and even today he could say Axelrod is the one lying just to sell books). But Williams? How could he think someone else from the chopper wouldn't find out what he said about it? It's insane.
There surely have been a lot of faulty memory explanations lately. You need to ask old Bob if JournoList is back in operation.
I have been thinking about the stories of being shot at. I wasn't shot at often when in VN, but I can describe to you each and every time I was, where I was, what I was doing, the results and how I felt. It is very hard for me to understand William's confusion.
Francisco D has it.
I read one blogger, a leftist prof who looks down on most Americans as dolts, who insists he still trusts Williams. Why? On what basis? What's the evidence? Only what he has seen on TV in fact: BW looks good, speaks well, projects sincerity. None of those prove he is trustworthy. And the blogger has nothing more to go on than that but team spirit and liberal solidarity.
Faulty memory is that we can pretend our sins never existed.
I am Laslo.
I find that a lot of people don't want to go to reunions or, if they do go, that they don't want to go up to someone they knew 50+ years ago because said person might say that he/she doesn't remember them.
I found that most such persons one goes up to are glad that I remember them because the only ones I go up are those whom I always have something nice to say about.
If they don't remember me, I can handle that,
Analyze that!
"You wouldn't think so if you have an informed and nuanced understanding of the human the human mind."
The nuance extends only to approve progressives. If it's a conservative mind, then the "misremembrance" is just a dirty lie.
Seriously, there are some people my age who "remember" like Kerry having been war heroes.
There is a guy who has written a book exposing many of them.
I have a cousin who was in Saigon reading combat reports. He could convince anyone that he was on those missions. He doesn't but some do.
Why? Because they feel that no one can challenge them at a party, whatever. None of you could challenge my cousin.
Then there was that up & coming GOP congressman in Westchester Co, NY who looked like he could defeat then Sen. Moynihan. He had gotten elected dog catcher up to congressman because no one challenged his claim that he'd been an officer in command in combat in 'Nam. When he ran for Senator, the challenges came: Not only was he never in 'Nam, he'd never been in command. In fact he'd never an army officer. In fact, he'd never been in the Army....
My un-psychological guess is that these people do it to get ahead & I don't need a shrink, amateur or pro, to tell me that. or worse to excuse such lies.
BTW, did I ever tell you how I got a soldier out of jail in some town for urinating on a jukebox?
"BTW, did I ever tell you how I got a soldier out of jail in some town for urinating on a jukebox?"
Being one that has urinated 'near' a jukebox, I would love to hear the story.
I am Laslo.
Evidently people could easily think that they have been raped when it never happened but if you have a nuanced understanding of the human mind you don't accept the story.
And also if you see that someone's statements need "nuanced understanding" to keep them from being lies, then you don't make that someone the anchor on your news channel. Unless you are incompetent.
"Is it ridiculous to think that Brian Williams "'conflated' the helicopter he rode in 12 years ago with a different helicopter he saw and reported about that day."
Of course not. Who would remember getting shot at 12 years ago? I can't even remember how many times it happened to me yesterday.
Obviously, the ability to tell a good story is a trait favored by evolution. So we're given the ability to embellish it with details that we can present with complete sincerity, even though they're bullshit.
I could buy it completely that Williams' mind mushed around with the details and genuinely misremembered.
But it still seems like it should disqualify him. Not everybody gets it so wrong. Our most prominent journalists should have the gift of being able to fix their memories on what actually happened, not what would make a more engaging story.
Please. Just another liar and ass-licker of the Usurper Hussein Obama.
Who cares.
"BTW, did I ever tell you how I got a soldier out of jail in some town for urinating on a jukebox?"
Being one that has urinated 'near' a jukebox, I would love to hear the story.
what a couple of amateurs. You're not a real man until you piss on a live band.
And so it begins...
Seriously, you have to look no further than his speeches to college classes to see that he puffed himself up to impress his liberal/leftist/Progressive tribe members. Also, in a group that views credentials as validation more than any other, he had a very good reason to inflate himself. He couldnt' talk about the time 'at the protest march that his professor of medieval women's studies stood up to some fascist tea partiers who want to take us back to the fifties..... ' blah blah blah. Or he was just lookin to score some college strange.
What's interesting is that somehow people give a shit about the 'why' as if that might excuse what he did.
Tom said...
he's in a news organization that is "committed" to truthful reporting. That means that reporters and preparers of the news challenge each other to get the facts right.
2/11/15, 5:10 PM
Hahahahahaaaahahahahahahaa, that right there is FUNNY!
The best guess is that, from the point of view of the brain’s creator, natural selection, unreliable memory is a feature, not a bug....
How can this make any sense? Since, using this logic, fallible memory is just another possible mutation/random chance mixed with selection. It could just as easily be an evolutionary dead end, couldn't it?
Today I would argue that it was a random attack on the jukebox....
Again seriously, when do the attacks begin on Fauxcahontas, a/k/a the Hon Senator from Mass or on the tired old hack who claimed that she had had to dodge gunfire when landing somewhere in the Middle East.
Oh, wait the WaPo has the story about Scott Walker having to leave the 4th grade because he pinched some female classmate's fanny, or as Sec Kerry would say derriere.
Potatoe...for those of you old enough,
BS. While such "misremembering" can happen, it does not happen to everyone, and to those effected not to every memory or even a majority of memories...
Further, Williams has a tendency to 'embellish' his own history and that is willful misremembering, aka, lying.
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