If any of you are familiar with the epic trilogy of the hero Jason Bourne you know that most of the violence and destruction is a result of Jason not knowing who the heck he is. The movies portray Jason a.k.a David Webb a.k.a Charles Briggs a.k.a Paul Kay as a secret agent who has no recollection of his past 5 or so years, and is struggling to find out. As many Hollywood writers do, they exaggerate amnesia for a more interesting story line. In psychological terms Jason suffers from severe retrograde amnesia. Jason's amnesia could be a result of erasing painful memories, brain damage, or someone else eliminating his memories but in any case the real life applicability is very rare. Having such large retrograde amnesia is quite uncommon among memory loss victims, usually they lose their ability to form new memories (anterograde amnesia) because of damage to the hippocampus or amygdala. Jason's ability to remember new information is still intact, and unfortunately for his foes Jason has just lost his explicit memory, not his procedural memory, thus allowing him to retain his deadly hand to hand combat skills along with an uncanny talent for turning ordinary objects into weapons, as seen in the clip. Jason not remembering his past life drives the plot and allows for the entertainment of many action hungry viewers. Link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uJ4dFcm4ML0
