Pop-Sci Core77 Design Challenge/ Description MEMORY 7/16/03

Description of Design

Heavy boots pound across a dry lakebed, the staccato of heel-toe punctuated with the rattling of machinegun fire. Breaths come shallow and fast, dry air rasping against a throat parched with dust. To drift into memories is to bring back the taste of watermelon on a 4th of July weekend at the lake, to feel the cool juice running down your chin. Or seeing again the deep orange of a sunset shimmering across the water from a beach of liquid gold. It is the roar of the engine first kicking to life after rebuilding your first car, or the sound of your newborn’s first cry. It is seeing Neil Armstrong’s ghostly form descend the steps to the dust of the Sea of Tranquility on a tiny flickering black and white television screen, or watching helplessly as one column of smoke splits into two bringing the Challenger to its fiery end. There is power in recollection, in bringing old emotions to the surface. But what memories possess the power to change a nation? What memories should be shared in order to avoid old mistakes? Is history not something to tap, to relive, to learn from? The smell of cordite mixes with the metallic taste of blood and the musky sweat of bodies strained to their limits. The last whiffs of teargas settle in the stagnant air. Then the shriek of air split by hot metal, a desperate cry and a body pitches into a shell crater with a crunch of bone and muscle against earth and stone… "A nation that forgets its past is doomed to repeat it". Sir Winston Churchill When a country goes to war it first fuels the public relations machinery that brings powerful images and powerful memories of heroism and self-sacrifice to its citizens. Perhaps the men of power should smell the stink of war, feel their adrenaline surge into pounding chests and trembling legs, surrounded by the sounds of dying and anguish. Perhaps they should hear the screams of bullets about their heads and remember despair. Perhaps there is something to be learned from the raw memory of battle. The Memory Tag Hanging about the neck of a soldier, this dog-tag monitors heart rate to trigger its recording chip. By picking up the sounds of the heart, the lungs, the voice and coupling them to the odors of sweat, blood and the environment, a powerful moment can be captured. The technology to play back scents already exists, and the sensors to detect and record these same molecules can’t be too far off. Sound and scent are home to some of the most powerful memories, and the lessons they contain. "The world will little note nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. …we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain." Abraham Lincoln