Cross posted from: http://bearlamp.com.au/an-inquiry-into-memory-of-humans/

In trying to understand how my memory for people works, I am trying to investigate in what order my people semantic network is arranged.

For each exercise that follows you will need to think of a different person to avoid priming yourself with the people you have already thought of.

Think of a person you know.  What comes to mind to represent them?  Is it their name?  Is it their face?  Is it some other sensory or other detail?

Think of a face of a person you know.  What else comes to mind?  Can you think of a person’s face without other details like names coming up.  How about without their hair.  Try this for 3 or more people you know.

Think of a person who has a characteristic voice.  Can you represent the idea of this person without linking to other details of this person?  without their face?  Without their name?  What about a radio presenter who’s face you have never seen?  Can you represent their voice without their face? Without their name?

Think of a person who you can recognise by a characteristic touch.  Think of someone’s handshake that you remember.  Can you represent the concept of the person via handshake alone?  Can you hold off from recalling their name?

Think of a person you can recall that has worn black clothing.  Someone who has worn white clothing.  Are they an idea alone?  Or is it hard to describe without their name?

Think of someone who you can remember singing.  Can you remember their singing selves without the face?  Without the name?

Think of a person’s name.  Do you know who this person is without their face?  Do you know what they sound like without knowing what they look like?  How do you navigate from one detail to another?

Think of a person who is particularly spiritual.  Can you represent who they are without bringing their name to mind?

I could go on but I leave the rest as an exercise to the reader to make up and experiment with a few more examples.  In smells, and in any other sensory experiences, in methods of dividing people.  Tall, short, grumpy…

So What?

Memory is this weird thing.  If you want to know how to take the most advantage of it, you need to know how it works.  This exercise hopefully makes you ask and wonder about how it works.

What do you remember easily.  What details come straight to mind, what details are hard.  Each person would be different in subtle ways, and with knowledge of that difference you can better ask the questions:

Am I going to naturally remember this?

How am I going to format this information in such a way that I can remember it?

In the book Peak, Anders suggests that to tap into the power of deliberate practice you need to add new knowledge to the foundation of old knowledge.

I can’t honestly tell you how to use your memory but I hope this exercise is a step in the right direction.

Meta: I spend a few days this week introspecting and wondering.  I apologise for not being able to deliver an insight.  Only questions.

This took 50mins to write and is the first piece I typed in Colemak not Qwerty after relearning how to type (story coming soon).