I FIRST met KC when he was in his late thirties. He had lost his memory after sustaining serious brain damage in a motorcycle accident. I had signed up for a lab course in the psychology department at the University of Toronto with the memory expert Endel Tulving. Endel had showed us some taped footage of KC, whom he had studied extensively.
KC couldn’t remember anything autobiographical from before his accident, nor could he form new autobiographical memories, though his memory for factual information was better: he still knew how to play chess. I couldn’t believe that someone could live without memory, as if his life…
