Memories

Today in class we were talking about memories. I found this a very interesting subject. After listening to the Podcast and hearing about how to block out a memory, I wondered about if blocking out a memory is really the way to go, no matter how bad the memory is. I came to the conclusion that I think if someone has gone through a lot of trauma in their lives, I think it would be okay for them to get this treatment as a form of recovery. That way, they would still have the memory, but would not feel as much pain from thinking about it.
Another thing I found interesting is the thought of almost "conditioning" rats to dislike a sound or pitch by playing that tone and then shocking them. I related this to the novel Brave New World because in that book, they condition infants to dislike certain objects or emotions to make them become equal. For example, in one scene in the book, they bring out flowers in front of the babies, and the babies start crawling near them. As they get closer, a loud siren sounds and the babies start crying. They do this everyday for about a month, and after that month, every time they see flowers, they start crying.
I think that this part of conditioning the memory is not useful, but the getting rid of traumatizing memories is more useful, because it lets people feel less pain.