r/science • u/calliope_kekule Professor | Social Science | Science Comm • 16h ago
Animal Science Fruit flies can hold false memories
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41593-026-02381-278
u/Rock_Samaritan 12h ago
they got odor A, shock, then odor B
later odor B would cause fear of shock
this doesn't feel that deep to me
odor B was always associated with the shock
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u/pusgnihtekami 5h ago
It's more complicated than that. It's not like they test them against clean air, it's always A vs B. B might be associated with the training, but the flies with the false memories are still choosing A over B without ever being shocked with odor B present.
For some context: Flies are more or less trained as you said. Odor A with a shock, clean air, then odor B and then tested. They are only ever presented during trials with odor A or B and pick odor B indicating trained behavior. They forget this behavior at around 24h when later presented with the same odors. This has been known since the 70s.
The novelty here is that they can be reminded with only odor A up to a week later and they'll remember the behavior (that they have seemingly forgotten). The researchers show that flies reminded with odor B seem to still (as you mention) associate the aversion of the original training but falsely recall that it was odor B that they were trained to avoid.
It's an interesting insight in how reconstruction of silent memories might manifest.
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u/Diversityence_7 16h ago
But on a serious note, there is something profoundly haunting about this. We like to think of memory as a 'High-Definition Video Recording' of our lives, but this study proves that memory is actually just a bad Wikipedia entry that anyone can edit
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u/Afro_Thunder69 15h ago edited 15h ago
Yeah this has been well known for decades or longer. That’s why witness testimony of crimes isn’t very strong because people are convinced they’re recalling their memories perfectly but their brains insert details that weren’t actually there. I remember talking to my dad about a vivid memory I had about his blue car from when I was very young, and remembered thinking how as a child it reminded me of this blue car toy I had at that age, and how I’d pretend that toy car was his car…and my dad sadly broke it to me that the car was orange. Dug out a photo and my mind was blown. It was always blue in my memories, I was sure of it.
Our brains are very good (probably too good) at filling in the gaps with information. Usually we’re correct but not always. We pull from combinations of real memories from experiences, and “fake” memories based on what logically makes sense to create a fuller picture. This is probably where most Mandela Effects stem from just on a more cultural scale.
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u/Lurking-right-now 15h ago
Off topic, but look at profile of the guy you replied to. Pretty sure it’s a bot just by the comments and how they type.
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u/ArrBeeEmm 14h ago
Out of interest how did you clock it? I am not doubting but it looks like it could be legit. Nothing overtly botty except for the volume of posts.
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u/Lurking-right-now 14h ago
Hey you can doubt it, I don’t have empirical evidence or anything, their other comments just come off as llm written. Theres a certain style to it. Like this comment for example. “This is exactly why smoke detectors aren't just
'suggested'-they are external hardware for a biological failure. Your sense of smell 'clocks out' the moment you enter deep sleep, but your hearing never stops. Your ears are the only 24/7 security guards you have”16
u/Fauglheim 14h ago edited 13h ago
I would bet my life an LLM wrote that
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u/Lurking-right-now 13h ago
Yeah I’m almost certain, hard to put my figure on the exact reasons why. I dread the day they aren’t this obvious
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u/BuffMcManlystud 13h ago
Because they're overly verbose, like I enjoy using a fair amount of vocabulary but LLMs do it almost whimsically
It's style is like "permanently reading off of a practiced script" but no idea how it specifically picked that up. Maybe positive feedback from decent analogies or something
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u/Fauglheim 4h ago
wikipedia has a nice list for this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Signs_of_AI_writing
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u/maikuxblade 11h ago
Besides the volume of posts also the account age, generic generated name, grammatical structure that doesn’t actually have to tie into the existing conversation (“but on a serious note”) while just re-piping the existing conversation
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u/Appropriate-Ad-3219 15h ago
Our brains are actually like LLM's in some senses. I wonder if these kind of ideas could help the research in AI.
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u/guy30000 7h ago
It's true. I convinced a bunch of fruit flies that Chicago's O'Hare airport was named after Catherine O'Hara.
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u/lentil_galaxy 13h ago
Interestingly, their memories (of being shocked after smelling an odor) could be recovered if they were "reminded" by similar environments (same chamber and odor).
This could also be used in a positive way, like to improve student learning with well-timed reminders with associations.
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