Memory and imagination: toward discontinuist simulationism

Simulationism is a theory of memory frequently associated with continuism – the view that memory and imagination are not fundamentally different. A prominent argument advanced by simulationists in favor of continuism appeals to the hypothesis that memory and imagination are underpinned by the same episodic construction system. Drawing on empirical and philosophical work that challenges the explanatory power of this hypothesis and instead posits a specialized episodic memory system, I argue that simulationism should reject continuism in favor of discontinuism – the view that memory and imagination are fundamentally different. While some may be skeptical about the very possibility of discontinuist simulationism, I contend that this theory is worthy of serious consideration. Discontinuist simulationism offers a novel perspective on the relationship between memory and imagination and accounts for genuine remembering in terms of the reliability of an episodic memory system that prioritizes firsthand information to simulate events in the personal past, without requiring an appropriate causal connection to past events.