posted
My memory is a bizarre and amazing thing. I don't understand how it can be at once so clear and precise and also so unreliable.
Exhibit the first: I recently performed at a talent show the song Nations of the World from Animaniacs. I memorized all the lyrics with my roommate a couple summers ago and it's now our favorite parlor trick. If you were to ask me, though, what nation comes after Suriname, I would have to sing the entire song. It's all up there, but not very index-able.
Exhibit the second: Driving back from our morning hike today, my mother and sister and I were listening to old tapes we found, including Billy Joel's Storm Front album. I remember having made a point of memorizing "We Didn't Start the Fire" in fourth grade, and though I haven't listened to it in years, I still sang along with it, and didn't miss a single word.
Exhibit the third: A while back, Kama mentioned an upcoming film called Goodbye Lenin. I followed her link, I read about it, I posted a reply. Not two months later, Fugu posted something on the exact same movie, and I had a genuinely new reaction to it. Wow! That looks really cool! Kama had to link to my original post to prove that I had not only heard of it before, but commented on hearing about it.
Exhibit the fourth: I like to tell funny anecdotes. I think myself a pretty entertaining conversationalist. One of the funniest is a story about my friend Scott, who tells the same camping story about Sphinx peak every time we drive past it, a tendency for which we routinely tease him. I told my roommate Susan about Scott and his funny camping story and she stopped me mid-sentence. "I usually humor you when you do this, Annie, but this is the fourth time in the past six weeks that you've told me the story about Scott always telling the same story."
Exhibit the fifth: I often embarrassed myself in college by knowing everyone's phone number. All I had to do was call someone once and I'd know their phone number. I frequently filled in my girlfriends as to their boyfriends' phone numbers. I remember phone numbers of my friends from first grade. I don't remember telling you about knowing my friends' phone numbers from first grade a mere two weeks ago, but I remember the numbers.
Exhibit the sixth: I recently re-read Speaker for the Dead. I hate re-reading books; I rarely do it. The first two chapters were hard to get through because I was so bored by the lack of novelty, but I made myself persist. When I got to the chapter introduced with the weird re-tellings of the parable of Jesus and the woman taken in adultery, I was shocked. I remember having read that very passage in high school and being disturbed and confused by the fact that OSC warped the story and made the Rabbi conclude by smashing the woman's head with a rock. I did not remember there being another version of the parable immediately preceding it, or the fact that the two of them were then described as being two extreme versions of a familiar story. This misunderstanding, which I reflected on often over the years, made me miss the very obvious point of the passage which had been spelled out there afterwards the entire time.
Why is my memory so impressive and yet so flawed? Why can I memorize huge passages of literature and song and numbers and yet tell the same stories to the same people enough times that it becomes a nuisance? Is my memory as I perceive it really radically different from the realities I lived through? It's really all quite disconcerting.
What are your memory quirks? What do you think are the causes of them?
Posts: 8504 | Registered: Aug 1999
| IP: Logged |
posted
My dad says our brains are like computers, and all of us have our little programming flaws, but they're all unique. Posts: 21182 | Registered: Sep 2004
| IP: Logged |
I also know all the words to "One Week" by the Barenaked Ladies. There's something about long, random, complex songs that makes me want to sing them.
Posts: 8504 | Registered: Aug 1999
| IP: Logged |
posted
I often go upstairs to get something, forget what it was, return downstairs, remember what I need, go back upstairs, forget what I want.... etc.
And yet, I don't know how to use the speed dial on my phone because I have everyone's phone number in my head. I know more details including dates about my husband's life than he does. This scares people.
Personal oddity: I remember and keep track of the birthdays of all my family and friends I met before I was 25 in my head. Anyone I met after 25... I guess they don't fit in my mental database cause I just don't remember their dates.
Posts: 251 | Registered: Apr 2005
| IP: Logged |
posted
Hmm... Haven't you told us this before?! o_O
Anyway, about the lyrics: the thing is, you memorize those words in an order, in a context, and getting out information from a specific point in the song would be very difficult, because you're not IN the context. You're trying to make a shortcut, but your brain has to take that specific road to the info that it has taken when storing that particular information. What makes song lyrics so special? Well, you might say "d'uh" after this but... it's the music! It gives you something nice to tie those words to, and as with everything that's pleasant, I think the learning process is facilitated by this.
quote: while back, Kama mentioned an upcoming film called Goodbye Lenin.
Hey, that's nothing! My mother frequently doesn't remember seeing movies before! We (my brother, my father and I) always have a fun time when we realize that we've already seen the movie and then try to convince her that she was there with us the previous time!
quote: I hate re-reading books; I rarely do it.
Hmmm... I don't (Edit: hate; I don't hate, that is!), and it's not because I don't remember what's happening in the book. It's that everytime I reread a book I find out things I haven't seen before. It's like the first time I concentrate on the overall action but the details don't stick. And then the second time I pick up all the little things that make even more sense now that I know what's going to happen. Huh, I've read the Dune series a lot of times and still find "hidden" stuff in it from time to time. Or in Ender's Game for that matter.
And I think all the memory stuff is very much about training. I mean, put someone who doesn't usually listen to music to remember the lyrics of a song and he probably wouldn't be able to do it even after you'd have gotten bored and could sing it all backwards... Anyway, all of this is just my opinion, but you really got me interested in this, Annie, I'll try to look up stuff about memory. Hope I don't forget...
posted
I suppose the music part makes sense. When I think about it, I have most songs I own memorized, and that includes the instrumental sounds I can't even reproduce when I sing them. But I still hear them in my head.
I also memorize really long poems and scripture verses and things like that, though; things that have no context.
In high school agriculture class, we could memorize the FFA Creed for extra credit. The teacher said we had all week to do so, and we could pass off the paragraphs one at a time. I memorized the entire thing before the one-hour class period was over, and I still remember it.
Posts: 8504 | Registered: Aug 1999
| IP: Logged |
posted
Well, I have no theory about the poems & stuff, except that you've probably formed special "connections" for that type of things. Like if you'd shown me something linked to computers I'd pick it up really fast, seeing that this is what I study. But give me a cooking recipe and I wouldn't remember it even after the thousandth time.
As to why "exhibit 4" is there, well, I have no idea... That happens to a lot of people, though. It happened to me too, when, for example, I told a story to several people then wouldn't remember to which ones of them I told it and which ones I didn't.
And I just remembered ( ) something about my memory. Back when my English or French weren't good enough to understand song lyrics, I somehow managed to "save" them into my brain phonetically. And when I started to understand, I'd sing along as if I'd always known them. In a way, I did, but when and how the connection was made between the sounds and the actual words, I have no idea... I think this is just further evidence supporting my "context memory" theory.
Posts: 4519 | Registered: Sep 2003
| IP: Logged |
posted
Ooh. That last bit makes a lot of sense. Actually, listening to music is one of my best language-learning skills. Even though I've taken years of University French, when I'm speaking and need to do a quick check of my grammar, I think of the way things are phrased in a song like "J'entends siffler le train." I learned a lot of Spanish songs by auditory memory before I knew what it meant, and now every time I learn one of the words I already know, my brain clicks a connection between it and the song.
Posts: 8504 | Registered: Aug 1999
| IP: Logged |
posted
I have always had odd lapses of memory. In fact I am relatively famed for it.
A perfect example would be earlier this semester I attended a Friday lecture (as I oft do) and when I came to lecture the following Monday I had no recollection of the previous lecture. Now, I want to make sure this is clear, this was not a simple "Huh, I don't remember Friday's lecture" type of thing, this is a "I would make a sworn statement that I slept through Friday's lecture" thing. But when I asked some friends what we had done Friday they looked at me a little strangely and mentioned that I had been there. I of course denied this fact saying that I had slept through all of my morning lectures. The friends in question continued to pull out some notes and work from Friday that I had assisted with and had my handwriting on them. They then described what we had done in no little detail, including specific things I had said a mere three days ago. None of this was familiar, the evidence was right there in front of me but there was nothing in my memory to support it. What is even more frustrating is that I could recited to you exactly what we had learned in that lecture in detail, Z-Buffer equations and how they interacted with the Phong shading model. But the lecture itself, in fact the entire morning of that recent day was completely absent.
Much like exhibit 2 in the original post I often remember various small details from years ago while at the same time forgetting what day it is. I could recite to you details of several key battles in the 2nd Punic war, including names, dates, and numbers. The last time I read anything on this war was when I was researching the Carthaginian Empire about 8 years ago. I can remember names of people I have only read about 8 years ago, but it takes me months to learn the names of new people I meet.
Clearly my memory is trying to drive me insane.
Posts: 38 | Registered: Apr 2005
| IP: Logged |
posted
I'm in the curious position of having no long-term OR short-term memory. I can't remember most of my childhood, I can't remember what I was doing last week, and I don't know where my wallet is every morning. I can't remember dates or equations or facts.
Yet I consider myself a reasonably intelligent person.
Basically, I think I must have a really powerful processor and about one byte of RAM, and I'm just swapping things in and out constantly without every writing to the hard drive
Or it's like I just go through life in a fog, never really paying close attention to anything.
I don't know. But there's one thing I CAN remember. The current project I'm working on. Ask me anything about the design, and I'll tell you. Well, no I won't because most of it is secret. But you get what I mean Posts: 1539 | Registered: Jul 2004
| IP: Logged |
posted
Goldfish have about 5 seconds of memory, I'm told. I don't remember who told me that, or when, but it's information that's somehow floating around in my brain. Because goldfish only remember the last five seconds, that's why you shouldn't over feed them - they'll forget that they already fed, so they'll eat again to the point of exploding from excess food if there's too much available to them.
That's my memory.
If I don't write something down, I forget it. And if I write it down, I'll forget to look at the piece of paper where I wrote it. I have equally no long-term memory either. For the most part. But oddly, some things have remained.
A little bit of history. Back when I was sixteen, I was asked if I was ever suicidal. I said no, and I honestly believed that answer. Coincidentally, a couple of weeks later, I reread my journals (I started writing them when I was twelve), and I discovered that in fact, I had spent most of the last four years feeling suicidal. There was a lot of stuff written down that I had no idea had ever happened to me. If I'd been asked point blank about it before reading the journals, I would have vehemently denied all of it. After reading the journals, I realized that, well, since it's all in my handwriting, it must have happened, and some of it, I started remembering.
And that was when I realized that my entire memory consisted of the last few days. Everything else - no exceptions - was gone. My brain was so scrambled that I had to have a digital watch that showed time in 24 hours (the only way I could tell whether the 7 was morning or evening), and it also showed day, month, year, which was the only way I could keep that straight. (Is it 1979 or 1981? I had no idea. September or April? Again, no clue. Sunday - do I go to school? Not a clue.)
Years later, I found out it was caused by childhood trauma. Recurring chronic incremental amnesia, or something like that. Automatic dumping of memories as they happen.
Now, I no longer automatically dump everything, but I think because my brain was so trained to do that from such a young age, that it never really learned how to hang on to memories. And yet, I do remember things from my childhood now. Well, they add up to a sum total of about an hour's worth of experiences, but still, at least there's something. But even with no longer automatically dumping everything, my memory is terrible. I meet someone, I talk to them for hours, and the next day, I may or may not remember that I had a conversation at all. I may not remember ever meeting them. I may remember nothing at all.
Posts: 8355 | Registered: Apr 2003
| IP: Logged |
posted
Geoff, you sure it's top secret, or are you just misremembering..? Maybe if you send me an email describing the design, I can give you a definitive answer.
posted
I have problems like that, too, Annie. I can't remember numbers for crap. I'll get an ID number or phone number looked up for work, and then between the phone list and the phone I will completely forget it. Which would be less pathetic if there wasn't a grand total of twelve inches between them.
Numbers just slip out of my mind if I let another thought replace them. But if I memorize them, they will never ever leave. I still remember my old house's phone number and we moved out of it five years ago.
Posts: 4816 | Registered: Apr 2003
| IP: Logged |
posted
A lot of it depends on how you remember stuff as well. I don;t memorize well, at least not most things....but I can still play every note of every solo I have played in bands, and most of the ones I played for solo performances, even though the last time I performed in public was at my grandma's funeral almost 10 years ago.
I am a Gestalt thinker, and I draw conclusions from large amounts of facts very well, often skipping the logical progression of facts used by most people to come to a decision. I see relationships between thing very well, often times better than a lot of my teachers.
But I can't pass Algebra to save my life, or I couldn't 15 years ago when I was in college anyway. I just don;t get it, and it is amazingly boring to me to have to plod through all these logical progression of steps to get to an answer I don't really care about in the first place.
I would rather write a 15 page paper then do an hours worth of math problems.
Some people are logial porgressional thinkers...and I have trained myself to think that way about some things, because it is so important. However, I really shine when I am allowed free reign over a topic I care about. I usually come to teh correct answers long before most people do in most of the soft sciences, because it all seems so obvious to me.
Then I will forget to send a credit card payment in...I will have it in my hand, check all written out....and forget to send it, accruing late fees.
quote:Exhibit the second: Driving back from our morning hike today, my mother and sister and I were listening to old tapes we found, including Billy Joel's Storm Front album. I remember having made a point of memorizing "We Didn't Start the Fire" in fourth grade, and though I haven't listened to it in years, I still sang along with it, and didn't miss a single word.
Well, yeah. It constantly amazes me that I can hear a song after not hearing it, not even thinking about it, for years and still know all the words.
I can also, if I think about it for just a little while, remember the layout of every single motel room I've ever stayed in, in my life (and that adds up to quite a few). Well, there's one exception. I can't recall the room in the Motel 6 I stayed at in Oklahoma City in August of 1976, but I do remember that the motel had the most nasty looking, algae-infested swimming pool I've ever seen in my life.
And I can remember dreams I had when I was as young as five years old. Sometimes I'll remember a dream and it takes me awhile to remember if it was a dream or something that really happened to me.
I also have a few memories from before the time I was a year old, which I've read isn't possible. Nevertheless, I know by the context of those memories that they have to have happened before I turned one year old. And I can remember a lot of stuff from the time before I was five or six, which I've had a lot of people tell me they have no memory of at all.
posted
Yup. I know chemists will roll their eyes, but one of my favorite tricks is reciting the periodic table of the elements, except I can only do about 60% of it. It's the 60% I memorized one day on a field trip. Never forgot it.
Posts: 1813 | Registered: Apr 2001
| IP: Logged |
quote: Exhibit the first: I recently performed at a talent show the song Nations of the World from Animaniacs. I memorized all the lyrics with my roommate a couple summers ago and it's now our favorite parlor trick.
I'm impressed! I tried to memorize it too, but I only got as far as the first verse. Even having the words in front of me and trying to sing along is difficult because he sings so fast!
quote: There's something about long, random, complex songs that makes me want to sing them.
Have you heard "Albuquerque" by Weird Al? I have that one memorized. It's 11 minutes long, mostly in story format with some refrains thrown in. I highly recommend it. Posts: 486 | Registered: Feb 2005
| IP: Logged |
quote: I'm in the curious position of having no long-term OR short-term memory. I can't remember most of my childhood, I can't remember what I was doing last week, and I don't know where my wallet is every morning. I can't remember dates or equations or facts.
I knew those ancient emails would come in handy someday. *whistles innocently*
Posts: 32919 | Registered: Mar 2003
| IP: Logged |
posted
Tstorm, I get that sometimes, I memorize something and never seem to forget it but only know the part I memorized. For instance I, for some reason or another, memorized the first few pages of The Fall of the House of Usher about 6 years ago and I stil remember it, but every time I read the book I am as suprised about the rest of it as I was the first time I read it.
Also strange is the fact that while I can recite the first few pages almost word for word, I have a hard time remembering what book it is that I have memorized the first few pages of. When your post reminded me about this fact I had to actually go to my bookcase and browse through to jog my memory. Once I saw the collected works of E.A. Poe I remembered what book it was and only then I could recall the actual passage.
Posts: 38 | Registered: Apr 2005
| IP: Logged |
posted
I have a terrible memory. Like Geoff most of my childhood, leading up to but a few months ago, is bathed in a murky fog. I sometimes remember things, a few images, a few general outlines. Most of the time when my parents or my sister mention something we did I'm left completely in the dark. My memory of what I did even today is already fading, I have to think hard before it comes back to me. The only way I can remember what day it is is because my school schedule is unique for each day, and I have to prepare myself differently each time.
Yet sometimes my memory kicks in. No where near as impressive as Annie's, but I'll find my self knowing almost all the lines to shows or movies (less true with books). Not that I can recite them from memory, but I can stay one or two sentences ahead of the characters.
My memory isn't totally lost though, if I get specific enough question, the right questions, a lot of it comes back. This is my only hope on tests. I can't even remember what the material was we covered only a week ago, much less any details of it, but if the question is asked right then the whole conceptual framework comes back to me. It has to be the right question though. For instance, the question "what is a way of increasing the strength of a concrete elements?" would never elicit anything to my mind, even if we had covered pre-stressing in my previous class. But the question: "how does pre-stressing work and how can it be applied?" would engender from my mind a thorough run-down of the concept of pre-stressing and when and how it's used, as well as images conjured up from lectures months past.
I don't get it.
I've mentioned this before, and certainly I've told Annie darling on several occasions, but I think the weirdest part of my memory is that I have most of it in the third person. When I'm remember something specific I saw, like a power-point slide in class, I'll remember it in a normal fashion, the image I saw, first person. But any time I remember myself doing anything, or am playing any role in what it is I'm remembering, I remember it in third-person, viewing myself from the outside like there was a camera there. And after getting into a big Stanley Kubrick kick, my memory began to include what would have to be described as long, smooth, tracking shots, right out of a Kubrick movie.
posted
Puppy - you really don't remember your childhood?
Then what the !@#$ did we spend so darn much time trying to keep you happy during your growing-up years? If you were just going to forget it, I could have blown you off for YEARS!
Posts: 2005 | Registered: Jul 1999
| IP: Logged |
posted
My memory is also selectively amazing and horrible at the same time.
I spend minutes(if i'm lucky) every morning before I walk out of the house looking for my phone/wallet/keys. Which all somehow manage to end up in new and exciting places each day, like they get together and have a big game of hide and seek every night.
I'll say or do something, and immediately forget what I just said or did. IMMEDIATELY.
I'm also horrible at remembering names. Yet though I may not remember your name after meeting you once, I'll remember what we talked about, who else was there, how we were standing, what you were wearing(most notably accesories), and even exact quotes from our conversation, possibly even years later.
If I drive somewhere even once, I'll be able to get there again without directions. I couldn't for the life of me tell someone else how to get there or even picture how to get there in advance. But once I'm driving I'll figure it out along the way.
posted
I was gonna write a book about the bizarre workings of my memory, but now I'm not so sure. I have decided that information follows several routes to my memory. It can bounce (or slide) right off. Sometimes it just comes for a vacation. Sometimes a sabbatical. Certain things hunker down for the long haul. I haven't worked in a grocery store for 5 years, but I still know several produce code numbers. I could draw a floor plan of my grade school and label the rooms by teacher, but I have trouble remembering the names of kids who were in my class from kindergarten through graduation. I routinely lose memories of conversations. I've had this particular conversation many times: (me) "I have no idea what you're talking about." (them) "I asked you about it yesterday!" (me) "Did I answer?" (frustrated scream from friend) One really annoying thing I do is, when I know there's something I have to do at some particular point in time at some particular location, if I remember it before I get to the time and place where I can take care of it, I will forget. Always. And I also forget to look at the pieces of paper I write things down on. I just discovered that my phone has a voice recorder, so I may start talking to myself.
Posts: 226 | Registered: Mar 2005
| IP: Logged |
quote: Exhibit the first: I recently performed at a talent show the song Nations of the World from Animaniacs. I memorized all the lyrics with my roommate a couple summers ago and it's now our favorite parlor trick. If you were to ask me, though, what nation comes after Suriname, I would have to sing the entire song. It's all up there, but not very index-able.
I do the same thing with Tom Lehrer's "The Elements." I have the whole thing memorized (and I did, really fast... I heard the thing about three or four times, and I could sing it), and I often crack people up at family events by singing the whole thing. But again, if you ask me what's after tungsten, or something, I may just have to sing the verse, but I have to sing something to find it, I can't just whip it out of nowhere!
Posts: 7877 | Registered: Feb 2003
| IP: Logged |
posted
It just happened again. This is an email conversation from a few minutes ago:
(Friend sends lyrics to Snoopy suppertime song)
my response: "ooookaaaay..."
Friend: "lol...come on,,,,it's funny. I am always going to have that image in my head of you dancing around like Snoopy....lol"
Me: "Did I actually do that, or are you just imagining it?"
Friend: "no, you didn't "actually" do it...remember one night you were down in the ED and you emailed me about how it was Friday and you were getting ready to leave and you felt like Snoopy at Suppertime? Then you went into this whole thing about his song and little dance...with his head in the air, etc. So now I just picture that when I hear "snoopy" or see him I thought it would make you laugh, but everytime I bring that up you always forget about it and it isn't funny to you :0(
Me: "I'm sorry. That is my trapdoor brain. I suppose it won't help that, while I do now recall that night, I don't remember you bringing it up before."
posted
Orson Scott Card Administrator Member # 209
quote:Puppy - you really don't remember your childhood?
Then what the !@#$ did we spend so darn much time trying to keep you happy during your growing-up years? If you were just going to forget it, I could have blown you off for YEARS!
How does he know you didn't? Posts: 15082 | Registered: Jul 2001
| IP: Logged |
I will fight to the death claiming that I've never had such and such conversation with someone. They'll be reciting the conversation word for word, and finally they'll say something that clicks. Even then, all I'll really be able to remember is that at the time of the conversation, I was sitting in the passenger's seat of their car, driving on X Ave, passing a building with 7 windows and a red door.
In the same way, when my family discusses memories, it will take a minute for me to locate the info, at which point I will begin spewing random facts like what shoes everyone was wearing and exactly what was going on in the background. For this, I have earned a reputation as having a good memory, which makes me giggle. They have no idea that's all I remember.
Integrating my personal experience with memory theory leads me to wonder if perhaps our primary method of learning (visual, auditory, kenaesthetic, etc) also lays the strongest long-term memory bridges. I'd be interested in knowing if some of you auditory learners out there can remember songs you heard in childhood. All I remember is what the album cover looked like. Perhaps a kinaesthetic learner, instead of remembering what they were wearing and what the guy looked like, remembers how their first kiss felt.
posted
I learned The Elements before I ever took chemistry, so that was always my preferred order. The periodic table just doesn't scan as well.
Lyrics are what my memory seems best at. I also used to memorize formulas that I used in physics. Haven't done any physics in a while, but I'm pretty sure I can still bust out the equations. I memorized 50 digits of pi in 7th grade, and later extended it to 100. The last 20 digits didn't stick. I find it very difficult to remember names if I have no context of the person, but once I've seen how someone walks or what their personality is like it's easy. Sadly that is usually after introductions have taken place.
I'm like Strider with directions. If I've navigated somewhere once I'll (almost) never forget how to get there. But you could drive me somewhere unfamiliar 20 times and I'd have no clue. Well, unless I'm paying really close attention.
I started keeping a journal in high school because I felt I was forgetting too much about what had happened to me. It actually helped quite a bit, while it lasted, and now I feel like I've mostly come to terms with the passage of time. I've also decided it's ok to forget some things, even the good stuff.
Posts: 1810 | Registered: Jan 1999
| IP: Logged |
posted
Oh, and: somewhat apropos Annie's exhibit the fourth, a year and a half ago we were just getting our circus performing group together and we were taking videos of our rehearsals. I was going over one of our videos with suneun/dabbler, making comments about what we could change, what looked good, what we could do better, and so on. And on the video my voice came through with the same comments, word for word, usually a second or two after my real-life comment. It happened again and again. I didn't remember making these comments earlier, but there it was in 0's and 1's. Pretty creepy. Posts: 1810 | Registered: Jan 1999
| IP: Logged |
Even though there was tremendous applause, I found out later a few people didn't like it. So of course I focused on those few instead of the hundreds, and am to this day horribly embarrased.
(I have acquired a life since then, by the way.)
Posts: 454 | Registered: Mar 2005
| IP: Logged |
quote:I've mentioned this before, and certainly I've told Annie darling on several occasions, but I think the weirdest part of my memory is that I have most of it in the third person.
I do this too. I've heard that it's not that uncommon.
If I try to remember something from my childhood, it's like watching a video of the event rather than seeing it through my own eyes. Sometimes it seems more like I remember remembering the event.
For instance, one of the earliest memories I have is riding the log flume at 6 Flags over Georgia. At this point, I can't remember it at all, but I remember that I use to remember it. Up til a few years ago, I could picture what the flume looked like even though it was like picturing myself sitting there. Now, I know that I did it, but I don't have any details left.
Posts: 4625 | Registered: Jul 2002
| IP: Logged |
posted
When I was younger, in grade school and high school, I could memorize anything. I would memorize 15 to 20 page pieces of music for a piano solo for state contest, etc.
Now, at 44, I'm really struggling with simple memory verses from the Bible (as part of our study group). I'm trying to work toward setting them to music, to help make it easier to remember, since I can remember lyrics - it uses a different part of the brain. But I still can memorize numbers (like phone numbers) fairly easily -- although sometimes a little dyslexic in my memory (I will turn them around when trying to recall them).
Some of this is probably due to the years I struggled with alcoholism and burned brain cells. The rest is just due to age.
quid -- yeah, whenever my daughter has a moment when she can't remember something important, she calls it a "goldfish moment" in her description of what happened. (i.e. "I was taking this test at school and had a goldfish moment -- had no idea what the answer was all the sudden")
Really though, that's interesting, I'd never heard anyone else say that their memory works that way as well before. Not that it's a common topic of conversation with me, but it certainly hasn't been completely absent from my discussions with my peers.
posted
I've been told that if you ask someone to imagine themselves driving a car, they will generally see an image of themselves in a car driving. Not an image as they would see it through their own eyes driving. I've never really asked around to see if that was true. That's not really memory, though.
I'm curious if how we (Hobbes and I) remember our childhood is more common than we think.
To other Hatrackers, if you really think about childhood memories, are you seeing things through your own eyes as a child or are you seeing something more like a home movie?
BTW, in high school, we got extra credit in history for reciting the Preamble to the Constitution. Every person that got up did it by singing it. We had all memorized it from Schoolhouse Rocks.
Posts: 4625 | Registered: Jul 2002
| IP: Logged |
edit: Weird! It's like it's tainted now that I'm consciously thinking about it. If I try and remember lunch yesterday, I can see it both ways. I'm not sure which one is the natural one. I'll have to try and sneak up on myself.
posted
Haven't read them all, but I have thre things to say, regarding Annie's [first] post:
1) "Goodbye Lenin" rules. 2) I also hated the beginning of SFTD, even though it's possibly my favourite book, and what made me join Hatrack, ultimately. 3) We know so little about our brains, that assumptions are all in the air. It's cool to look at BBC medical experiments, though....
Posts: 2978 | Registered: Oct 2004
| IP: Logged |
Printer-friendly view of this topic
![[Smile]](smile.gif)
![[Big Grin]](biggrin.gif)
![[Wall Bash]](graemlins/wallbash.gif)
![[Dont Know]](graemlins/dontknow.gif)
![[Wink]](wink.gif)
) something about my memory. Back when my English or French weren't good enough to understand song lyrics, I somehow managed to "save" them into my brain phonetically. And when I started to understand, I'd sing along as if I'd always known them. In a way, I did, but when and how the connection was made between the sounds and the actual words, I have no idea... I think this is just further evidence supporting my "context memory" theory.
![[Blushing]](graemlins/blushing.gif)
![[ROFL]](graemlins/rofl.gif)
![[Razz]](tongue.gif)
![[Confused]](confused.gif)
![[Eek!]](eek.gif)
