New chip solving murders and forgotten nights
*A fictional article by: Madeline Kenney*
A new chip being installed into people’s head is stirring up national headlines. This chip will help you remember those nights you once forgot and is helping police solve crimes like never before.
This ‘chip’, I keep referring to is not your average Lay’s Potato Chips — it is an external hard drive created by Microsoft for your brain which will give you impeccable memory. Microsoft named it “the Chip.”
How it works?
The Chip is about 1.5 cm by 1 cm and can be installed in the back of your head via brain surgery. Every hospital in the United States of America is now required by law to have at least one surgeon learn how to perform this surgery. The cost to implant your own personal external hard drive for your memories is roughly $50,000 before Insurance.
The Chip will connect to your two key physical senses: vision and hearing. Once the Chip is connected to those, it will record everything you experience. The Chip also records your sleeping habits, emotional feelings in certain situations and your stress/anxiety/irritability levels throughout the day. After recording those, the Chip will become a part of you and help you in future instances to be able to avoid the feelings of stress and aide you in having the most positive emotional health possible.
Whatever the Chip stores, it will automatically send everything it records to your computer for future playback. Once on your computer, you can re-watch and relive your past experiences. The folder is protected by your thumb print and a ten digit password ensuring the up-most privacy with your most precious memories.
Why was this created?
Have you ever totally forgotten a detail of a story and just cannot for the life of yourself remember something? Or have you ever wanted to relive a life experience? The Chip was designed for people who wanted the ability to record all their personal experiences and have the opportunity to review and analyze them.
Are there ethical issues with the invention of the Chip?
There are a few potential ethical issues in reference to this idea of an artificial memory. Some people might make the argument that we were not supposed to remember everything for a reason and perhaps it should stay that way. Is society ready to remember every detail of every situation? This impeccable memory could cause people to over-analyze their memories and create an OCD obsession with their experiences.
Also, how safe really are your memories on your computer? We saw in 2014 when North Korean hackers hacked into American celebrities’ iClouds and posted their nudes on the Internet. Can we really believe that a thumb print and a ten digit passwords will protect our personal and sometimes embarrassing memories?
What about users of the Chip under the age of 18? Do parents have the right to go through their own children’s memories and experiences? If so, let me just be the first to say, I am glad they did not have this when I was a teenager.
Microsoft has declined to comment on any of these questions.
How the Chip has affected different lives.
A senior at Arizona State University said she uses the Chip for amusement and entertainment.
“It’s kind of like a game,” she explained. “My friends and I re-watch our weekend nights the morning after if we can’t remember what happened. It’s so funny, but we also sometimes can’t believe the stuff we do. Sometimes, it’s best we don’t remember.”
Officer Jones said the Chip has changed the way his crew finds criminals.
“It helps us identify criminals,” Jones said. “We can see the actual pictures of the thieves or assaulters rather than having someone draw up a picture of a man or woman. It helps us identify the perpetrators easier and it also allows us to find these criminals faster too.”
Opinion/Conclusion.
Microsoft has created this very advanced technology to help us remember everything we experience. The real question to ask yourselves now is do the benefits really outweigh the ethical backlashes on this invention?
I cannot speak for all of society, but I do not necessarily want t remember everything. I do not want to remember the past pains I have experienced. I also don’t want to live in the past and relieve old memories through a computer screen.
