The Boy Who Can't Forget | Extreme Memory Documentary | Only Human

[Music] fifteen of August 1996 okay the very first thing I see is this furry banana which I bought on holiday with my family 20 year old aurelion is remembering a specific day when he was just four years old he claims to have a power that scientists didn't believe humans could possess I've never met anyone who's being able to do what I do put simply aurelion is the first British man to say that he doesn't forget his past because I remember the 25th being the day where it snowed in the morning and I think it was the day that George best died seventh of July 2008 it's a Monday it just seems like there's just no gaps at all I can just see it all around the world other people have come forward some claim to remember every day of their life Bing Bing Bing Bing Bing Lee if you could stick a camera in my head then I think everybody would freak out this summer we met the people who say they have this unbelievable ability and the scientists putting them to the test I always claimed that actually this was not possible because normal memory does not work like that could the amazing power they claim to have possibly turn out to be real I can tell within you know 30 seconds to a minute if someone's genuine or not 13 Monday how do you know it's a Monday cuz I just do sorry I don't want to answer that question can you stop filming sorry [Music] aurelion is a university student we first filmed with him on Saturday the 19th of May skeptical about his unbelievable talent and curious to see how he could prove it how could you demonstrate for me what it is the your memory does that maybe mine doesn't I suppose if someone said what happened you know tell me something that happened in like June 2008 and I I could instantly think of things whereas most people would not be even able to remember you know what they were doing in that year what about the 17th of you them know yeah I can tell you that was a Tuesday and it was the first day after I finished my GCSE exams and my room was an absolute tip so I had to just clear it all out and I spend the whole day doing that I could tell you it was it quite a nice day we've got Sonia and we went for a curry in the evening and I remember watching these swimming with my mum and Jennifer's got thrown off for swearing on life - yeah I checked the date of Joan Rivers daytime television outburst he was right it did occur on Tuesday the 17th of June 2008 aurelion said he couldn't tell me how he did this but he let me come back and test him on more random dates [Music] 19th of September 2008 there's a Friday I remember my dad was like selling his car and I was the last time that we saw his car before it were taken 30th of May 2007 it was a Wednesday the weather was quite good that day but which was quite unusual because it rained pretty much for the whole of that me when you tell me all this stuff yeah how am I supposed to know it's right how much best to know that you remember this stuff you claim it's true but how do I know I suppose the thing is you don't so I could be making up right now but are you making it up no I don't see why I would bother what do you think about it I think it's a little unusual mm-hmm and I'm rather curious about how you're doing it [Music] Lillian told me he remembered days way back into his childhood but he had absolutely no idea how they stuck in his head I wanted his parents to confirm the truth of his memories and see what they thought of their son's strange skill we were talking sometimes at the table when we were having a meal and then we used I used to say for instance Oh remember when we went to Bangkok three years ago whatever I used to say no it was not three years ago was four years ago and he was actually on the blah blah blah you know when he gave me the day the month and so forth and I used to say really and then I used to run to look in my diary to see you know just to check and I think that's why I started to think oh she know your memories walk around do you remember what we did on the 30th of August 2004 30th of August 2004 I think that I know it was a Monday holiday I think it could be I know that we went to the Cadbury Factory around that I didn't know if I don't know for certain that it was that day that day I I know that it was around that time yeah that's correct that's exactly what we did we went at Cadbury World we stopped in ross-on-wye on the day and we had a great day it's in chocolate and over the years we've learned to sort of accept that if everybody does say that there's a date that's correct it after a couple of years of saying ah no you got that wrong and realizing that he wasn't wrong we tend to accept it without challenging it what's your explanation for why our alien can do that because he's just like him he's right I don't know because as I said to you before I it's not something I you know I knew he had a good memory but that was the extent of it really I never knew he was you know something really special and different from most Paul it seemed or elion memories were surprisingly accurate but it was hard to know how much of his life he'd got stored in his head [Music] so I'll pick a month at random okay July 2009 [Music] [Music] the month I chose was three years ago 1080 days have passed since these events took place after a 20 of the days like that I remember all of those days I suppose there are three things that pop out instantly when I think of July I went to France when weekend tool in France Duke of Edinburgh and driving lesson in fact I can put that and I think around that time I started reading that's what the d'Urbervilles you know it's it's like I could get a diary for 2009 and write it if I wanted to retrospectively orillian said that his brain stored all this information automatically but I wondered if he was hiding some secret technique we went to meet a man who has trained his memory eight times world memory champion Dominic O'Brien I would be suspicious if someone said that they automatically know what they were doing on a specific day in their life the day of the week for any date without involving some sort of technique I can tell within you know 30 seconds to a minute if someone's genuine or not and most of the time they're not able to do what they claim no you must be already in' yes welcome I kiss you come inside we'll share some memories aurelion says he has no technique to help his extraordinary memory Dominic O'Brien does and he can memorize information at a world record-breaking speed two hearts for diamonds the Jack of Hearts Jack of Clubs similar clubs in two clubs I'd been sure to know what you do obviously so just idealist Legionnaire I'd begin I mean the Jack of Diamonds could be Johnny Depp right j-d Jack of Diamonds the queen of clubs wherever that is there they are cream puffs that could be Paris Hilton critics like to go clubbing she's the queen of nightclubs so now when I see the cards I automatically see people mental images are the key to Dominic's remarkable memory and he has a similar method to calculate dates the first of June 2004 Tuesday I think Kappas our own Eve third of October 2003 third of October I think that was a Friday I remember my sister had a friend over how about the 15th of April 2007 that was a Sunday and I went canoeing that was since I was in Zambia and me and my dad my sister went canoeing just remember that this straightaway 10th of August yeah 2007 my nearest point of reference is the 8th which was a Wednesday I'd rather actually the seventh remembered that night I'd eaten way too much and I'd threw up so for instance I that I've know instantly what the 8th of August or using a reference place yeah yeah that's right so then I think Friday must have been the 10th do you you're not making a point of I must remember this day because it's two days before my birthday I lost remember the future so you don't review this now that is fascinating yeah it is interesting I don't think I've ever met somebody quite like you without that's extruded I mean I could do what you do if I made a conscious effort to do it yeah but I would have to review every day at the end of the day and then think about it the following day next week next month etc until I've got it I think if it is it's almost like this is imaginary pen writing in events in a sort of mental calendar so you're convinced are you I am 99% sure aurélien is the genuine article I do think that people would meet me in things like he's got something funny yeah but we have no idea at all as soon as you suddenly said oh I've got this thing that's like what really it seemed or Elian had only just started to let others see his hidden talent I just I'd left in there what what I don't know what you think it's weird that I i think it's weird that i can say a day and you would know what day it was yeah well do you remember when you lost your dinner what day was that there are some things which are January 2006 so you lost it on a Thursday what is it I'm really cool really weird weird I wasn't the only person trying to make sense of or Williams extraordinary ability in masters of memory hairless people who can record exactly what happened on every day of their lives his boyfriend Henry had come across a story of people with a suspiciously similar skill so I just struggled to remember what you had for breakfast yesterday nicer than what you did last weekend yeah so this is basically why we read and then you watch the documentary Jill price was the first person in the world to come forward with disability she's been living with it for almost four decades I actually believe it should be like in a mental hospital because this is makes me crazy like I still feel bad about stuff that happened 30 years ago but we all do and I mean we can all remember one or two things about one or two things everything I mean hers is very extreme she can remember every single day as you get older and all I think you have to be able to remember more possibly time will tell like how far back you will be able to go hmm I mean short of a lobotomy I don't really think that there's anything that could be done for me Jill price seemed to be struggling with a memory even more powerful tool or elion maybe she had some explanation for why he remembered so much in the last year Jill hadn't granted a single interview but she had agreed to meet me we arranged to meet in a hotel in Los Angeles on the morning of Saturday the 24th of June could the troubled mind of this 46 year old school administrator hold the key to understanding this mysterious skill is there a way you can show me what it is you can do know if you could stick a camera in my head then I think everybody would freak out like I can see my memories you know starting in February of 1980 until now it's like every day every every day you can literally remember every day mm-hmm it's made life extremely emotionally difficult at times well there's a lot of complex emotions that go along with not being able to you know forget because everything in someone's life there's like a huge there's a line but everything is connected because you wouldn't be here if this didn't happen and I always I'm thinking about God if I had just not done this then this wouldn't have happened and that it's harder as your life as years have gone by because there's so much stuff you know everyone has baggage I got a freaking steamer trunk that's just like that I'm just dragging along I've suffered a few bouts of depression over the years and no psychologist and no doctors were able to give me any answers I mean I've asked therapists I've asked believe me it's not like I didn't talk about this and want to know like you know why nobody had an answer for me so I thought well go to a scientist the first thing that popped up was doctor McGraw [Music] dr. James L Magoo distinguished professor of Neurobiology has spent his career trying to understand how strong memories are made he's been carefully testing Joan's memory for several years I found him on June 5th 2000 which was a Monday and then on June 12th he called me and we set up a time to meet on June 24 it's more than a decade since Joel's first visit to the University but a recollection of events can easily be checked you see what year did we want the calendar for 2014 years dr. mcgaubey sistent has kept a faithful record of what he's done day by day and you're looking for June mm-hmm yeah 24th she was right about that June 24th no I don't but it was sometime later because you met with her maybe another time on a Saturday I think I think it was Saturday July 8th you know how I know that because it's written right here these are my memories these are my memories are all written down here and then I recall yes I remember it well oh my son and my son got married I'm the keeper of the book not of the memories and then I went to Stockholm I didn't know that when they met dr. McCord to verify Jill's memory so he asked about thinks she may have seen in the news so I knew how old she was so I had to find some time so I just randomly said well let's see what were the dates of the two OJ Simpson verdicts October 3rd 1995 and February 4th 1997 we had a Concorde plane crash July 5th and she was just remarkably accurate the first question he asked me was when the Iranian hostage situation started and I told him and then he told me I was wrong and I told him I was right and that wasn't back-and-forth and then we found out that of course I was right how certain were you you were right 100% why because I just was same thing happened when Diane Sawyer was interviewing me on 20/20 and she asked me when Princess Grace died September 14th 1982 went to a whole long thing it was the first day of 12th grade it was Tuesday September 14th that was the first day I started 12th grade I went into this whole long story and she looks at me she goes now boy in September 10th 1982 and I'm like yeah and she said no and I said yeah so September 10th well that night might not be right I don't know but in in this in the room you know we're all the key with the producers and everybody they're all scrambling back their BlackBerry's googling and then the door opens up and the producer sticks his head out in these screams the book is wrong what that is always worked my crap maybe you should check your facts first before you do that because you look like a dumb idiot sorry don't you draw for me your your representation of the years the months and the days of the week dr. Magoo was facing something no scientist had ever seen before we know almost nothing about the causes of forgetting that's a big black hole in scientific research we know an awful about the conditions which create memories we know very little about what happens when people forget what was that for is there some significance to the the length of the line that you draw across its just how I see it why did you draw those lines there just to show that it didn't go all the way to there and kind of came down here so here the first individual who is poor at forgetting was a Monday so I would just think of like that and on a Monday how do you know it's a Monday because I just do which is really unusual really unusual so that has to be motivating for a scientist we said let's see what we can find out about that that's all I care about as long as you know somebody in the science world took me seriously I was thrilled with that you have no idea today dr. Magoo is still trying to make sense of Jill's ability and now his research program has grown much larger than he could ever have imagined because after Jill appeared on worldwide television incredibly ten other people with disability appeared I'm at 62 year old television producer Bob Petrella who is letting the scientists test him the last date is March 5th March 5th was a Monday I've got some spaghetti and I got some rice I got some vegetables but I didn't get any gravy cheese a lot most people don't understand it they think it's photographic they think it's autistic savant they think it's absolute they think you remember everything well we don't we don't remember every single thing we make mistakes we forget where I keys are where we parked our car like anybody else but I think it's it's fairly complete and what I was doing on most days of my life all right and that's all I have how do you do it I don't know how I do it it's just there and it's been there you know since I was young I knew it was a little unusual for years and for them that but I didn't know why I remembered like I did I wasn't even sure how they said they didn't know how they did it dr. Magoo hadn't worked out how they did it but there was another scientist who thought that he could explain he met Jill and wrote an article in Wired magazine he said the truth was she was obsessed with her past I don't think that her memory is fundamentally different from other people's I think that in the same way that a child can be very interested in baseball cards she's interested in the facts of her own life and she she thinks about them she reflects on them crap I don't give a [ __ ] that it's in Wired magazine that means nothing it's crap we never claimed that she had a perfect memory Joe price who seems to remember everything she does not remember everything what she remembers she doesn't forget that's a difference many people have been trying to make sense of Jill prices memory but the first person to offer an explanation and it wasn't well received I was I will just say that I was greatly offended by his article and a lot of people read that articles so a lot of people are like you know this is who they think this is what this is and it is just some stupid simplistic OCD of the brain I had come across this article before I traveled to America I went to meet the author to learn how he thought Jill remembered so much well I think what drives Jill to have such a good memory he's not so much this memory circuits of her brain but the circuits that drive her to want to remember things and it's it's not a conscious wanting it's it's like I'm a drug addicts wanting they don't may not even want the heroin per se but they just they can't help it she's got a kind of compulsion about memory and I think it's that aspect of her personality if you will that drives her to remember things that they're reflect on them dr. Marcus drew attention to Jill's 50,000 pages of Diaries he believed she was just obsessively thinking about her past how much of this kind of subtle rehearsing you would have to do in order to have a strong memory of something that happened 20 years ago strong and readily readily available quickly available well that's a nature of science as you're skeptical if I wasn't doing this I'd be skeptical I mean what he did was totally minimized my life I guess that's the whole thing about it no that's what I'm saying I've had it's it is your life it's my life and I'm not I'm not like just a brain I have a heart and I have a soul and there's a lot of complexities that go along with it so to make it so simplistic like that totally offended I didn't she speak to him well he has do you don't need to speak to him because he doesn't know me and I find it interesting that anybody would call him to ask about me when he doesn't know me I suspected it was dr. Marcus's article that had made Jill reluctant to talk to the media but could there be some truth in what he'd had to say was there a link with obsessive behavior it was something Bob Petrella had talked about - you know I think it's okay to have an obsession as long as it's not a negative thing you know if you're stalking a woman then that's an obsession obviously that's that's bad Bob invited me to his home to see something he created from memory in 1999 so because I was turning 50 the next year and it was the end of the millennium I thought I should choose just for myself I should choose my most memorable days of each date of the year you know I didn't really hold back so there's stuff about drugs sex and rock is rolling and I just called it because it's an acronym for my name and I called it the book of Bob b.o.b although it's not really a book it's more of a journal like said today is June 29th so it's June 29 1999 I'm driving home and then I would just go through all of the June 29 that I remember in my life and then I would go oh 65 68 71 73 73 I remember because I was constipated and so I we were sitting at a restaurant I hadn't I was visiting and I hadn't gone for about four or five days and we were sitting in a restaurant and Richard Nixon was president at the time and I could do his voice and and I suddenly felt like I was able to go after being constipated I did it as Nixon and I said it's time I think it's time you know so that was June 29 73 it was early in the morning I put my did my rankings of the years you know best year the worst year 85 and 2004 are tied and then 2008 2009 the 2000s were pretty good do you miss cataloguing of your life like this is kind of a little bit unusual vault oh oh yeah definitely unusual but I think that this is what people with like me do they'd have a good memory cuz that's one of the common things they say they catalog stuff Bob's behavior did seem a little obsessive but remembering his history was clearly something he enjoyed I like having my memories you know I mean nobody else is gonna remember my life so why shouldn't I you know for Jill I never met Jill but I know for her that she is haunted by her memories and you know there so I think it varies with it with all of us it was certainly true that Jill was troubled by her memories and there was a limit to how much of her life she was prepared to share hi Jill how you doing okay what about what about driving could we do a little bit of driving with you do you mind talking a bit while we drive are the particular things that you're happy to talk about I just tell them to I have no problem talking about any of this stuff I just don't really feel like opening up my life you know that's I don't need to do that I don't want to do that but Jill had decided to bring something to show me the very thing the Wired magazine article had said was evidence of obsession with her past yeah now I don't really let people read these this is my journal I have I've gotten in arguments with people about wanting to read my journal I guess not going to happen it's got everything everything everything everybody everything it looks very densely written it is I don't like line paper though I feel constricted to the line paper so how many things like this do you have Jill I started writing in a journal in December of 1976 and this is the day and then it goes to the other side that's why I wrote really small how often do you reread something like have you ever done any of it I've only had to let go back and get all these because of you guys I don't I don't reread these I don't need to I don't want to I once it's down it's down and done and it's you know it's put away there's not possible to sit and memorize I mean this is just like a smidge of joy of what them kind of how many journals I have and that would mean that I would just be sitting and spending all my days reading my journals and that's the biggest bunch of [ __ ] that I've ever heard of my life it's I don't write this to remember I write it so that I don't go crazy [Music] I left without an explanation of how these people remembered but with an understanding of how their ability could complicate life [Music] when I returned to see aurelion I wondered how similar he was to the people I'd met he'd always said that his ability to remember so much didn't trouble him at all oh god that was I knew that was Mount Fuji day that was on your birthday 2008 being able to look at the photographs brings back memories of the places we used to go the things we used to do I placed a lot of importance on photos as well if there's some were not taking photos of something I instantly do it and I think that a photo is the closest thing you can get actually to sort of making a memory into an object actually it's a concrete memory I hear and it never goes away and it's it's infallible aurelion had surprised me by remembering the start dates of seven series of television show Big Brother the fourth series started on the 23rd of May 2003 which was a Friday the 5th Theory started on the 28th of May 2004 which was a Friday the 6th series started on the 27th of May Friday he even correctly recalled the date individual contestants were evicted from the house on seventh leah was a big tear on the 14th Niki was a bit did on the 21st Jane was evicted could this be evidence of some kind of obsession he didn't seem happy to be tested on it again the 27th of May 2005 I do anyone's you the Big Brother thing sorry sorry I don't want to answer that question it's odd to communicate that I can just remember these sorts of things without even trying without them having any importance I just I just remember them I think that would be alien to a lot of people I think it's also it's also kind of a bit like when you remember I don't know you remembered so my great aunt Margaret's birthday stuff like that and people might think oh you're really weird remembering like run in people's birthdays or you're really weird for remembering like what I wore like are you kind of some kind of stalker or something when like I said it's just it's you don't choose to remember it it just stays there yeah and I think you sometimes you you kind of have a warped opinion of what people think of it I think it's unlike with Big Brother you're worried that people think it's weird like you have your some avid fan of it but it's just it's it's complicated to put across how you can remember something like that even though it means nothing I think that's you know people always think you remember things which are important but I think it's an example of where I remember things which are completely unimportant and have absolutely no value at all but I just happen to remember them orillian seem to be interested in what was different about his memory before I met him he had contacted a memory research team at the University of Hull Julianna Matt Soni a professor of psychology had been scouring Europe to find someone with a raelians skill do you remember anything about the 20th of December 2009 yes it was Sunday the weather was quite good it was quite windy it was for me a sort of revelation that people can remember the weather on a specific date it is really really quite a remarkable thing to observe you know especially for a person like me who has a very poor memory do you have an idea which day of the week was the 2727 supposed to Saturday I always claimed that actually this was not possible because normal memory does not work like that I think that I've solved one question which is this real and the answer is yes it is real the questions that remain are how and why professor mansoni have been preparing a pioneering experiment that might unlock the secrets of our elion mind it is this in exceptional cases that actually give the first hint you know the first clue to something that we don't know yet something that really might change the way we look about memory retrieval so so it is really an exciting moment [Music] we traveled together to the professor's homeland Italy aurelion had an appointment at a hospital where the professor had assembled a trusted team they hope to brain scan would reveal what happens when aurelion is remembering and the tests they were about to do was one that had never been done before and I think that we should be almost ready to go now which is lovely which is exciting which is exciting or aliens brain had never been examined professor Matt Sony wanted to see if he was different to everyone else the very very clear picture of the corpus callosum which is this part that connects the two hemispheres of the brain that's great the first scans revealed the brain structure and how well different areas are connected but it was the second hour-long functional scan that the American team hadn't yet done [Music] we're close to the end of this run or aliens brain activity was recorded as he remembered what happened on a huge list of dates no no second response and immediately the other boom okay now good what what what look as suggesting that we need to open a bottle of Prosecco congratulations R&F you made it I'm so glad so what came out from your brain imaging data and in particular from the functional data from the type of activation that is was a current when you we're retrieving the memory initially okay is that you were using a lot of visual areas so it is as if both areas are particularly strong in you and they really help your memory in the first moments of retrieving a memory it appears that all relyon uses areas of the brain that the rest of us don't there is something real extraordinary in this data because we have been able to see that orally and really accesses memories very very quickly compared to the average person as if the memories are represented as a prepackaged fact that so become accent becomes accessible without much effort I really think that this might tell us about potentials in the brain that might not be exploited in more in quotes average people it is wonderful to to be able to be at that moment in which things might change there might be at this small revolution and how I think my brain caused a revolution the ultimate question is can we all be trained in a way that that allow us to allows us to function like orally and [Music] talk to McGaw and his team have a group of these people to study they've been comparing how the structure of their brains differ from ours but the truth is that neither of these scientists have yet made sense of this extraordinary skill it's a very rare ability so we're doing the Sherlock Holmes detective work and it's the answer is going to be complicated we know brains of these people differ in some ways from other people we know that there's some brain regions that are smaller some are larger and some are different in shape that's something at the beginning remember it's Sherlock Holmes the mystery is not solved on page one and we're still on page 123 after a summer spent with these remarkable people trying to find out the truth there's one question that's constantly played on my mind suppose it was possible to have a memory like this is it something the rest of us would want I feel like my memory has ruled my life I feel like no matter how no matter what my my memory has rolled my life it's like I remember all the warts to really think about remembering like 35 years ago right now and how you felt and how or what someone said to you and how that's never changed you know it can be very very tormenting there's not one day that I'm not like stressed out about something or thinking about something from 20 years ago that means absolutely nothing today but still bothers me or still upsets me or still pisses me off and it's ridiculous but you know it's like yesterday it really is it was as if it was yesterday but I know you said that you could remember every single time we've met since are you ever gonna get annoyed at me forget it no I really it doesn't bother me I you understand this flat immortals it might be something I can get quite jealous of because you know your good days that we have together like today for instance you'll remember forever kind of thing whereas I'll kind of feel slowly just sort of fade out of my memory there's nothing negative about being able to remember and hey I didn't think there is I think the more I think about it the more I think it's a really nice thing to have and I think what's nice is that now I know it's something special I think I'll sort of value it more you

Channel: Only Human

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Keywords: The Boy Who Can't Forget, endless memory docum, endless memory documentary, only human full documentary, only human extremely me, extreme memory, the boy who can't forget documentary, the boy who can't forget aurelien, real life rain man

Id: Kc7lQNIMNO8

Length: 46min 36sec (2796 seconds)

Published: Fri Dec 29 2017

Reddit Comments

[u/cuppyuppycake]

"I'm parched" They're so posh and English! That lady (forgot her name) seems really deffensive and aggressive.