To forget is to fail. This appears self-evident. The world is so full of absentmindedness, tuned-out teenagers, misplaced keys, and fear of creeping dementia that forgetting feels dysfunctional, or ominous. If learning is building up skills and knowledge, then forgetting is losing some of what was gained. It seems like the enemy of learning. It’s not. The truth is nearly the opposite. Of course it can be a disaster to space out on a daughter’s birthday, to forget which trail leads back to the cabin, or to draw a blank at test time. Yet there are large upsides to forgetting, too. One is that it
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