= 27d567bc2d48d9f40e9ccc20ea370b15)
Jonathan_Graehl comments on Open Thread, August 2010-- part 2 - Less Wrong
You are viewing a comment permalink. View the original post to see all comments and the full post content.
= 783df68a0f980790206b9ea87794c5b6)
Loading…= b715d02e85f7b3b4ae65ca3d3e450868)
Subscribe to RSS Feed
Powered by Reddit
= f037147d6e6c911a85753b9abdedda8d)
You are viewing a comment permalink. View the original post to see all comments and the full post content.
Comments (369)
I wish my long-term memory were better.
Am I losing out on opportunities to hold onto certain facts because I often rely on convenient electronic lookup? For instance, when programming I'll search for documentation on the web instead of first taking my best recollection as a guess (which, if wrong, will almost certainly be caught by the type checker). What's worse, I find myself relying on multi-monitor/window so I don't even need to temporarily remember anything :)
I'd like to hear any evidence/anecdotes in favor of:
habits that might improve my general ability to remember and/or recall (I'd guess that having enough sleep (and low enough stress) matters, for example.)
tricks for ensuring that particular bits of info are preferentially stored (As I mentioned, I imagine using a memory
consolation - perhaps being more forgetful than many other smart people is a trade-off with different advantages (I doubt it, although I've heard that we do some useful selective forgetting when we sleep, and I'm glad I don't remember every malformed thought I have while asleep)
You have two of the big ones. Add in exercise and diet. And add exercise again just in case you skipped it. With all the basics handled you can consider things like cognitive enhancers (ie. Aniracetam and choline supplementation).
Spaced Repetition .
People spend an awful lot of time trying to forget things. A particularly strong memory exacerbates the effects of trauma. (If something particularly bad happens to you some day then smoke some weed to prevent memory consolidation.)
Thanks. I guess I'm just lazy and hope to remember things better without any explicit drilling.
I do exercise (but I'm nearly completely sedentary every other day; it's probably better to even out the activity).
I remember reading in the past week that the way exercise improves brain function is not merely by improving oxygen supply to the brain, but in some other interesting, measurable ways (unfortunately, that's as much as I can remember, but it seems like this from Wikipedia at least covers the category:
Exactly. Exercise is great stuff, particularly with the boost to neurogenesis!
Incidentally, the best forms of exercise (for this purpose) is activities which not only provide an intense cardiovascular workout but also rely on extensive motor coordination.
But if the increased neurogenesis is only for implementing motor skill learning, then it's not going to help me get better at Starcraft 2 (I mean, my research) - so what's the point? :)
I play piano for 10-60 min daily and imagine there's some benefit as well (surprisingly, it's also a mild cardiovascular workout once you can play hard enough repertoire).
Also, I read a little about choline; it seems likely that unless I'm dieting heavily, I'll get enough already. That is, there's no hard evidence of any benefit to taking more than necessary to maintain liver health - although it seems like up to 7x that dose also has no notable side effects).
Aniracetam looks interesting (but moderately expensive). Do you have any personal experience with it?
I don't think I expressed myself clearly. The effect I refer to is influence of a coordination based component to exercise on neurogenesis and not particularly on the benefits of such to motor skills. Crudely speaking, of the neurons formed from the BDNF released during exercise a greater fraction of them will stably integrate into the brain if extensive coordination is involved than if the exercise is 'boring'. I suspect, however, that a cardio workout combined with (ie. on the same day as) your piano practice will be at least as effective. That stuff does wonders!
I included choline only because I mentioned Aniracetam. While the effects are hardly miraculous, Aniracetam (and the more basic Piracetam) do seem to have a positive effect on cognition and learning. Because the *racetams work by (among other things) boosting Acetylcholine people usually find that their choline reserves are strained. The effects of such depletion tends to be reported as 'head fog' or at least as a neutralisation of the positive benefits of the cognitive enhancement.
Supplementing choline in proportion to racetam use is more or less standard practice. Using choline alone seems, as you noted, largely pointless.
I have used it and my experiences were positive. I found it particularly useful in social situations, with improved verbal fluency. Unfortunately I cannot give much insight into how well it works for improving memory retention. Basically because my memory has always been far more powerful than I've ever required. It just isn't a bottle neck in my performance so my self report is largely useless.