Human memory is flawed. But a new book says that’s OK

Memory Lane
Ciara Greene and Gillian Murphy
Princeton Univ., $29.95

There are countless metaphors for memory. It’s a leaky bucket, a steel trap, a file cabinet, words written in sand.

But one of the most evocative — and neuroscientifically descriptive — invokes Lego bricks. A memory is like a Lego tower. It’s built from the ground up, then broken down, put away in bins and rebuilt in a slightly different form each time it’s taken out. This metaphor is beautifully articulated by psychologists Ciara Greene and Gillian Murphy in their new book, Memory Lane.

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