And when we do slow life down, we find the present is the only place in the timescape we get reliable data anyway. Our memories of the past are unstable and constantly subject to revision—like a picture-book honeymoon overwritten by a bitter divorce. “[M]emory distortions are basic14 and widespread in humans,” acknowledges cognitive psychologist Elizabeth Loftus, “and it may be unlikely that anyone is immune.” The past is less an archived library of what really happened, and more a fluid director’s commentary we’re constantly updating.
