At best you could say that such memories would not be normal, though, right? Just as the fact that the two times I was hypnotized I did not suffer post-hypnotic amnesia would also not be the normal experience, right?
It seems to my mind that your disbelief should be qualified with an understanding of how common the exceptions are. When you assume that everyone is the same, you are going to miss out on differences.
My earliest memory was, I think, from when I was 1. I think we were moving from California to Michigan and I remember looking out the window and seeing a bank of grass. However, I could be wrong. It could have been later.
What I can tell you though for certain is that I have precise, detailed memories of things from when I was 2 to 3 that are not details that people describe. I can tell you most of the details of the apartment we lived in there, including the flooring, how my mother cooked dinner, what she often cooked, and so forth (I don't know the name of what she cooked. All I know is it included both lamb and eggplant and was cooked on a hotplate).
I could probably draw for you the pattern on the linoleum in the bathroom.
What's really funny is that the level of detail I remember about the living spaces I lived after the age of about 4 drops off considerably. But then I won't claim to be normal in this regard. The next house we lived in, I remember mostly the yard. The house after that I hardly remember at all. The house after that we lived in for seven years, but I still remember the yard and to a less extent than the others.
Now I remember some things from those early years my parents don't, for example what motivated some of my temper tantrums at the age of about 2 (pinkeye medication meant I couldn't see the all-important train passing behind the house). And I couldn't tell you anything beyond probably what I could see from indoors. But I can describe in near perfect detail large parts of the apartment, and those details are not really ones people talk about, at least in my family.
It seems to my mind that your disbelief should be qualified with an understanding of how common the exceptions are. When you assume that everyone is the same, you are going to miss out on differences.
My earliest memory was, I think, from when I was 1. I think we were moving from California to Michigan and I remember looking out the window and seeing a bank of grass. However, I could be wrong. It could have been later.
What I can tell you though for certain is that I have precise, detailed memories of things from when I was 2 to 3 that are not details that people describe. I can tell you most of the details of the apartment we lived in there, including the flooring, how my mother cooked dinner, what she often cooked, and so forth (I don't know the name of what she cooked. All I know is it included both lamb and eggplant and was cooked on a hotplate).
I could probably draw for you the pattern on the linoleum in the bathroom.
What's really funny is that the level of detail I remember about the living spaces I lived after the age of about 4 drops off considerably. But then I won't claim to be normal in this regard. The next house we lived in, I remember mostly the yard. The house after that I hardly remember at all. The house after that we lived in for seven years, but I still remember the yard and to a less extent than the others.
Now I remember some things from those early years my parents don't, for example what motivated some of my temper tantrums at the age of about 2 (pinkeye medication meant I couldn't see the all-important train passing behind the house). And I couldn't tell you anything beyond probably what I could see from indoors. But I can describe in near perfect detail large parts of the apartment, and those details are not really ones people talk about, at least in my family.