ABSTRACT
Intuitively, we all probably think that the better our memories are, the more successful we will be in life. While there is no doubt that having a superior memory can be useful in certain situations, such as learning a language or remembering strings of unrelated facts, there is more to it than that. It is often overlooked, for example, that an efficient memory depends as much on the ability to forget unwanted information as it does on the capacity to remember useful information. This point is aptly illustrated in A.R. Luria’s (Luria and Solotaroff, 1987) famous account of “S”, a man with an apparently phenomenal memory. In his book, The Mind of a Mnemonist, Luria describes outstanding feats of memory carried out by “S”. In one case, for example, “S” was shown a blackboard full of rows of random numbers for a minute. Ten years later he was able to recite those numbers entirely accurately in any direction specified by the experimenter. This incredible memory stemmed from the fact that “S” had eidetic imagery—photographic memory—something that is rare in adults (see Chapter 9). He also experienced synaesthesia; his senses overlapped to the point where he could hear colours and see sounds, all of which contributed to the richness of his memory. One might suspect that a memory like this would lead to great things but it did not for two reasons. First, “S” had trouble forgetting what he had learned and, when attempting to remember something important, he would be overwhelmed by irrelevant details coming to mind. The second problem was that his memory was unstructured, resembling a pile of photographs that had not been catalogued in any way. Each memory was, in itself, rich but it did not relate to any other memory. The consequence of these problems was that “S” eventually became a “memory man” in the theatre. The random table of numbers learnt by S. https://s3-euw1-ap-pe-df-pch-content-public-p.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/9781315784854/f4c71875-4f19-42cb-a333-5898bcf0dfa2/content/page145_1_B.tif" xmlns:xlink="https://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"/>
