Retaining Information and Just Brain-Dead

Off Topic
21

[quote]cstratton2 wrote:
I find that I have had quite the opposite happen, I use the internet to research and study new things and retain the information quite well. I suppose it depends how you use it as a tool. I would sit there for hours studying long pages of text in what I was learning. I suppose it would be different if I just google searched every question I had. To be honest a civilization that relies on a super computer database for all information is quite scary, almost like turning that type of technology into some sort of deity and also never questioning what they hear.
[/quote]

In general, it simply has to do with motivation and concentration.

I don’t feel compelled to memorize addresses anymore because I just have them written down on my phone/GPS device.

If I read random shit on the Mayoclinic website because I wanted to know something and such, I can remember general things quite well. Specifics take some time though.

But I think that’s how the human brain works in general- we are good with general stuff, but specifics take time to commit to memory.

I think it’s more of a social thing than any actual retardation in human society, really. We don’t bother getting motivated to commit something to memory, and so we look dumb when we can’t recall things well. Nevermind the fact that memorization always took time and effort and never really occurred on the first reading of anything.

I don’t know how the norm became that everyone who isn’t dumb should be able to commit things to memory quickly, but I don’t like it. Society seems to think more and more that genuine effort and exertion isn’t necessary, and so the norm is that people should be capable of things without a whole lot of effort.

But that’s bullshit. My dad has fantastic memory and remembers pretty much everything related to his particular field. He told me that he achieved it by writing things down in a notebook and reading it repeatedly.

Things take effort. Very few people are capable of learning things the first time they read/do it. I really don’t like how people now think those who can’t do something the first couple of tries are dumb.

22

[quote]Phoenix44e wrote:

[quote]SexMachine wrote:
Do you smoke pot?[/quote]

Occasionally. I’ve gone 1.5 years without at one point but it never changed anything.[/quote]

You may have a form of dementia. Large scale, peer reviewed studies conducted over the last 25 years have shown that even occasional users can suffer permanent brain damage. Short term memory problems are the most common symptom of marijuana dementia.

23

[quote]usmccds423 wrote:
I saw a TV show on Discovery Channel not too long ago that talked about how the availability of information via the internet is slowly changing how our minds work. The Dr. hypothesized we’d eventually retain almost no information instead relying on a collective (like the internet) for all knowledge.

FWIW I’ve noticed something similar has been happening to me over the past few years. Nootropics haven’t seemed to help; although, I feel sharper when I am using them.

My hypothesis (lol at me) is that the constant barrage of images & video we see online (think of Imgur/reddit/TheChive) has taught my brain to quickly forget something in order to absorb what’s coming next.

If I’m not mistake it takes something like 24 hours before information is transferred to long term memory. That’s probably why people that cram for exams rarely remember the material even a week later.

Interested to see how this thread goes. [/quote]
Well, that’s often how my job actually is. I can learn something well enough to be an expert in it, actually do expert-level stuff with it for a few days, then a week later be completely incompetent in the same thing.

There seems to be more value [economically, for me] in being able to quickly learn information than the value in retaining that information, and I think psychologically I’ve just internalized that.

Over the years, my actual memory for “normal” things has gone to shit. I notice it among my peers too. It’s not uncommon to completely forget something if you don’t do something with it the moment you remember. E.g., if you don’t literally stop what you’re doing when a 5 minute meeting reminder happens, you’ll just completely miss it… and then remember spontaneously several hours later.

Pattern recognition and problem solving, on the other hand, seem to be very valuable skills.

The real problem seems to be that there’s a gap in external memory. We have this shared “collective” memory (the Internet), but no great external way of tracking and searching for the things that happened in your own life.

An old quote:
“10Tb is an interesting number. That’s a megabit for every second in a year… enough to store a live DivX video stream… everything I look at for a year,… a heart monitor, say, a running GPS/Galileo location signal, everything I type and every mouse event I send – onto that chip, while I’m awake. All the time. It’s a life log; replay it and you’ve got a journal file for my life.”

  • Charlie Stross

I want that.

(You can get 10TB of cloud storage for pretty cheap these days.)

24

[quote]SexMachine wrote:

[quote]Phoenix44e wrote:

[quote]SexMachine wrote:
Do you smoke pot?[/quote]

Occasionally. I’ve gone 1.5 years without at one point but it never changed anything.[/quote]

You may have a form of dementia. Large scale, peer reviewed studies conducted over the last 25 years have shown that even occasional users can suffer permanent brain damage. Short term memory problems are the most common symptom of marijuana dementia.[/quote]

Care to site those studies?

25

you should try foam rolling.

26

When you ‘learn’ what do you actually mean?

Because there is a distinction between looking at data and ingesting and then understanding knowledge. If I want to learn something, I don’t just look at the words, but I think about it and look for flaws in it and find patterns, similarities and reference points. If everything you ingest has context then you would be far more likely to not only understand it but recall it too.

That said I do have a somewhat photographic memory and I am sure it is advantageous but I still find myself at times staring at words, going through the motions of reading them but not actually absorbing the concepts. If someone asked me what I just read, I could reiterate very closely but it wouldn’t last. If it’s particularly dry material I have to consciously tell myself to knock it off, THINK about it and visualize what I’m reading.

To test yourself, think about how you would explain what you just learned to someone else in different words and avoiding key words or try to find an analogy and see if it fits.

27

[quote]debraD wrote:
Because there is a distinction between looking at data and ingesting and then understanding knowledge. [/quote]

This is a good point and I call it the difference between just reading and studying.

28

[quote]LoRez wrote:
Over the years, my actual memory for “normal” things has gone to shit. I notice it among my peers too. It’s not uncommon to completely forget something if you don’t do something with it the moment you remember. E.g., if you don’t literally stop what you’re doing when a 5 minute meeting reminder happens, you’ll just completely miss it… and then remember spontaneously several hours later.
[/quote]

This happens to me all the time.

Wife: "I’m off to bed, in 20 minutes when the dryer goes off can you fold the clothes?

Me: “Sure, good night.”

Me: (3AM) “God damn it…”

29

[quote]Tyler23 wrote:

[quote]SexMachine wrote:

[quote]Phoenix44e wrote:

[quote]SexMachine wrote:
Do you smoke pot?[/quote]

Occasionally. I’ve gone 1.5 years without at one point but it never changed anything.[/quote]

You may have a form of dementia. Large scale, peer reviewed studies conducted over the last 25 years have shown that even occasional users can suffer permanent brain damage. Short term memory problems are the most common symptom of marijuana dementia.[/quote]

Care to site those studies?[/quote]

I’ve come across many of the last 15 years or so. I don’t have the details at hand so I’ve googled some recent examples:

http://www.bostonglobe.com/lifestyle/health-wellness/2014/04/15/casual-marijuana-use-creates-brain-changes-new-report-shows/X1cN8A7h5pOVJkeYkXTXlJ/story.html

^^Marijuana shrinks the brain

What they’ve shown is that pot actually “shrinks” the brain decreasing its volume. This is why I use the word “dementia”. Alzheimer’s disease does the same thing.

In the 1990’s the danger of marijuana was starting to be understood and it was starting to become broadly recognised in medicine that it was harmful and should remain illegal. However, a massive privately funded legalisation campaign was launched by George Soros and other radical moguls. This campaign has largely been successful at reshaping opinion. It started with “medical marijuana” and now moved on to complete legalisation.

30

Ritalin is a good drug for ADD, or anyone who plans to study and retain information. It indeed works.

With pot, I don’t think it’s a good thing for studying, but then again neither is alcohol.

I’ve been smoking pot since I was twelve or so, and I can still eat a bowl of alphabet soup and shit out better material than a lot of people who never touched the stuff.

31

[quote]Severiano wrote:
Ritalin is a good drug for ADD, or anyone who plans to study and retain information. It indeed works.

With pot, I don’t think it’s a good thing for studying, but then again neither is alcohol.

I’ve been smoking pot since I was twelve or so, and I can still eat a bowl of alphabet soup and shit out better material than a lot of people who never touched the stuff.

[/quote]

Ritalin is like using a hammer to do surgery. It will get the job done, but leaves a mess. Don’t use it if at all possible.

32

[quote]Severiano wrote:
Ritalin is a good drug for ADD, or anyone who plans to study and retain information. It indeed works.
[/quote]

It’s now accepted that the widespread use of amphetamines(like Ritalin) that began in the 90’s was a huge mistake. It’s accepted in the medical community that it was massively over prescribed and many are questioning its actual efficacy. The fact that kids with “ADD” - assuming such a malady even exists - behave objectively “better”, in the short term, when you pump them full of amphetamines, does not mean that it “works” in the sense of curing or the malady. It is a treatment for an obscure “disorder” - a blurry, ill defined malady, the “symptoms” being largely indistinguishable from what previous generations would call “laziness” and “disruptive behaviour” and so on. The idea that daily doses of amphetamines are a good way to “treat” children who are said to have this “disorder” is now out of favour. It really speaks volumes as to the fundamental flaws underlying psychiatry and the nebulous nature of many psychiatric “disorders”.

No, really?

Lol! If I had a penny for every time I guessed right about who smokes pot I’d be a rich man.

It’s the grey matter upstairs you should be concerned about; the thought jelly.

33

Your studies aren’t large scale SM

40 people

34

If I can find my fucking car keys every morning, everything else falls into place.

35

[quote]MattyG35 wrote:
Your studies aren’t large scale SM

40 people
[/quote]

You’re not being intellectually honest are you? You say “studies” - plural, are “not large scale” then you mention a study(singular). Conveniently, you’ve skipped over one of the actual “large scale studies” I proffered that tracked over a thousand individuals over 25 years performing brain scans from the age of 13 onwards:

http://www.pnas.org/content/109/40/E2657.abstract

You may not like the findings - lower IQ, psychiatric problems far more likely etc - but there they are.^^

36

[quote]SexMachine wrote:
It’s now accepted that the widespread use of amphetamines(like Ritalin) that began in the 90’s was a huge mistake. It’s accepted in the medical community that it was massively over prescribed and many are questioning its actual efficacy. The fact that kids with “ADD” - assuming such a malady even exists - behave objectively “better”, in the short term, when you pump them full of amphetamines, does not mean that it “works” in the sense of curing or the malady. It is a treatment for an obscure “disorder” - a blurry, ill defined malady, the “symptoms” being largely indistinguishable from what previous generations would call “laziness” and “disruptive behaviour” and so on. The idea that daily doses of amphetamines are a good way to “treat” children who are said to have this “disorder” is now out of favour. It really speaks volumes as to the fundamental flaws underlying psychiatry and the nebulous nature of many psychiatric “disorders”.[/quote]
It sounds like you’re talking about the use of Ritalin to deal with behavioral issues, rather than cognitive issues.

With respect to cognitive issues, specifically with working memory, the drugs are generally effective. Working memory deficits are observable and testable in both the pediatric and adult population.

37

[quote]SexMachine wrote:

[quote]MattyG35 wrote:
Your studies aren’t large scale SM

40 people
[/quote]

You’re not being intellectually honest are you? You say “studies” - plural, are “not large scale” then you mention a study(singular). Conveniently, you’ve skipped over one of the actual “large scale studies” I proffered that tracked over a thousand individuals over 25 years performing brain scans from the age of 13 onwards:

http://www.pnas.org/content/109/40/E2657.abstract

You may not like the findings - lower IQ, psychiatric problems far more likely etc - but there they are.^^ [/quote]

The ones you referenced weren’t. You grabbed that one after you made your statement. Try to keep up.

38

^^ Yep. I don’t deny the efficacy of amphetamines in improving cognitive performance temporarily. I’m just saying I don’t think daily doses of amphetamines for children is necessarily wise.

39

[quote]Phoenix44e wrote:
I’ve come to the realization that I have a problem retaining any new information that I come across. I guess I’ve known for a while, but never actually realized how bad it was until the other day, when I got called out by a friend after trying to explain something that I had literally just read 3 hours before the conversation.

I consider myself someone who wants to constantly learn. I have lots of interests in many different areas. Reading was never important in my house growing up…my parents were too busy with other things to worry about whether I was actually doing the book reports, research papers, etc. I barely scathed by highschool and eventually (with a complete lack of guidance and glearing personal issues) failed out of college.

I can remember always being interested in new information, but never being able to finish learning anything…at that point I would just chalk it up as ADD and not being interested completely in the subject, and continued on with my life. (not a good choice btw)

At some point I started controlling the ADD aspect of it.(barely) I could read books, listen to lectures/presentations, and watch docs/movies/presentation a little longer and longer. I do not believe it’s under control, but I do believe it’s going in the right direction.
My set back is that when ever I’m learning something new regardless of the median it’s being introduced through, I cannot retain said information.

This has been going on for as long as I can remember now and I’m just completely fed up with it. So my question is to fellow TNationers, how do I retain information that I learn? Is there something wrong with my brain? Is it just the way I’m learning it? am I doomed? [/quote]

Try to outline or summarize what you are reading as you go along; physically write out the outline or summary. The physical act of summarizing or outlining should help both retention and understanding. “Studying” material like this is a learned skill.

40

[quote]MattyG35 wrote:

[quote]SexMachine wrote:

[quote]MattyG35 wrote:
Your studies aren’t large scale SM

40 people
[/quote]

You’re not being intellectually honest are you? You say “studies” - plural, are “not large scale” then you mention a study(singular). Conveniently, you’ve skipped over one of the actual “large scale studies” I proffered that tracked over a thousand individuals over 25 years performing brain scans from the age of 13 onwards:

http://www.pnas.org/content/109/40/E2657.abstract

You may not like the findings - lower IQ, psychiatric problems far more likely etc - but there they are.^^ [/quote]

The ones you referenced weren’t. You grabbed that one after you made your statement. Try to keep up.[/quote]

Matty, Matty, Matty…what am I going to do with you? Check the links fully before you attack them or you’ll look silly. The study of more than a thousand participants over a 20 year period was the study referenced in the UK Daily Mail link I posted. It was conducted by Kings College London. Here’s an overview of the study:

http://www.kcl.ac.uk/ioppn/news/records/2012/August/cannabis-IQ.aspx

And here’s a quote from one of my original links referencing the study:

“It comes after a review of 20 years of cannabis research, published last month by a professor at Kingâ??s College London, revealed that one in six teenagers who use cannabis become dependent on the drug, as do one in 10 adults…” - UK Daily Mail(one of my original links)