Memories

Memories

In Today's Issue

Shredder
Memory
Random Joke
That's Amaaaaaaaazing

Shredder

I really need to shred my

Past

To erase its influence

Memories amassed

To burn away

Self-doubt and hate

To remove the ever

Depressive weight

To start renew

Begin again

To wipe and clean

My dirty brain

But like a ghost

In the dark

A repetitive, black

Story arc

How long before

I’m clean and clear

Try wash it off

With drugs and beer

But memory rises

From mental grave

To remind me that

I’m still a slave

But I’ll try again

You never know

This time I might win

Re-set and go!

Memory

There is virtually no limit to the amount of information you can remember

Given how much we seem to forget on a daily basis, it may seem strange but it’s completely true that our brains have an essentially unlimited ‘storage capacity’ for learning. A rough calculation suggests that the brain can store 2.5 PETABYTES of data – that’s 2,500,000 Gigabytes, or 300 years worth of TV !!!!

But we can only remember a handful of things in our ‘short term’ memory

A large part of the reason we seem to forget so much may well be that, whilst our long term memory is virtually limitless, our short term, or ‘working’ memory has a much, much smaller capacity. The original research into short term memory says we can only remember 5 to 9 pieces of information there at any given time, though more recent experiments suggest it may even be as low as 4!

Learning new things produces physical changes in your brain structure

It’s easy to think of the brain as a ‘magical box’ where your thoughts, memories and emotions are kept, but when it comes down to it, the brain is a part of your body just like the heart and your muscles. As such, ‘exercising’ your brain in specific ways – whether that’s learning a new skill such as a musical instrument or a new language, or simply learning new things from a book – produces physical changes in its structure.

Being able to access information quickly (i.e. on the Internet) makes you less likely to remember it

It’s great being able to access almost any piece of information in a few seconds, and resources such as Google, Wikipedia and YouTube have clearly been major parts of a revolution in how we find information. But studies suggest there is an interesting flip-side to being able to access information so conveniently: if the brain knows it can just access it again so easily, it’s less likely to bother remembering the information itself!

We can remember things that didn’t even happen

As time goes on, it can be difficult to know how accurate our memories of an event are – indeed for many of our childhood memories, it can be hard to know for certain whether we’re remembering the firsthand event itself, or are simply recalling a story as told by our parents and from photos or home videos from the time.

But this concept has a far scarier implication which has been studied by psychologists. In an experiment, interviewers were able convince 70% of people they had committed a crime, when in reality they had not.

Testing yourself on information is better than simply rehearsing or re-reading it

The word ‘test’ is probably up there with ‘public speaking’ in terms of it’s ability to absolutely terrify people. No-one likes tests, and even education professionals are arguing that we are tested too much, and it’s getting in the way of ‘real’ education. Indeed, there’s an often-cited quote in education circles:

Memories start forming in the womb – as early as 4 months into a pregnancy!

Known as prenatal or foetal memory, experiments have shown that foetuses can in fact remember sounds that are played to them, supporting many anecdotal claims by mothers that their newly-born children are calmed by certain sounds playing in their environment. In fact, scientists now believe that prenatal memory is crucial in the development of attachment for an infant to it’s mother.

Random Joke of the DayWhen I was little, there was no internet. So people would sometimes have to walk for miles just to call me names.

That's Amaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaazing 

You cannot snore and dream at the same time.