science

“We know this because if we put you in an MRI [magnetic resonance imaging] machine and you recall something from your childhood, we see a pattern of activity, and if we ask you to imagine a future scenario — going home tonight and having dinner, for example — the same areas are activated,” he explains.

Ignoring that when asked to remember Big Bird at Disneyland, most people are able to "remember" it.

It's very likely they're creating false memories than restoring forgotten ones.

It's insanely difficult to tell real/fake memories apart, and I just don't think we can do that with mice. Like, we can barely do it with people we can talk to ...

https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC2583150/