How much stuff CAN you remember?

[Mr. Blue Sky]

Is there a limit to how much stuff a human being can remember? Think about all the stuff in your memory...telephone numbers, movie & tv plots, books, work-related stuff, people, place, song lyrics, etc. I won't go the old "10% of your brain" route, but I am curious about the potential limits of human memories. And just what would happen if you were to reach that limit? Wouldn't it be neat if you could do a memory dump in a "bio-hard drive" for later retrieval? (oh, great, NOW I'm losin' it!)

[Cabbage]

I've often heard that human memory is essentially infinite, meaning, I suppose, that memory capacity is large enough so that its limit could not be reached in a lifetime.

However, you may want to read over this link I found:
http://www.merkle.com/humanMemory.html

I only briefly glanced over it, but I did want to mention that one of their estimates of a few hundred megabytes (relating human memory to computer memory, of course) of human memory capacity seems awfully small to me.

[mangeorge]

What was the question? :confused:
Can one be banned for stupid replies? :)
Peace,
mangeorge

[aseymayo]

Trumpy, I'd say the capacity is about age 40. Then brain cells start being overwritten and you start forgetting things, like, high school. I just wish I had more control over what gets erased - surely the cells that remember the words to the Gilligan's Island theme could be put to better use.

Of course, some files in my brain just fill up and I can't add to them. My visual memory for faces is full, so everybody I meet looks vaguely familiar.

[Wood Thrush]

You probably still have the memories, and A)when you meet someone in your memory you may just have trouble recalling that memory and associating it to the present. Like how you can never remember something and someone tells you what it was and you knew it--you just couldn't recall. Memory and the act of remembering are very different things. B)it mayn't be that you can't fit anymore memories as you can't lay down any new memories.

Example A is kind of like you can bury something underground, but you can't dig it up again. Example B is like you can dig something up, but you can't bury it. Note that the ground is never so full that you actually can't fit any more.


Also, you can't make capacity for human brains in computer terms. You humans tend to think either in abstract ideas or in symbols--never binary code.

It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure this out completely. It requires a brain surgeon. HAHAHAHAHAHAH!!!!!

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To he who has lost his hope:

Please claim it at the lost and found at the front desk.

Thank you

[billehunt]

Cabbage wrote
However, you may want to read over this link I found: http://www.merkle.com/humanMemory.html
Hey, I know that guy (Ralph Merkle). He's quite a character. Something of an expert in a few interesting fields as well.

[Joe_Cool]

Originally posted by Cabbage:
I've often heard that human memory is essentially infinite, meaning, I suppose, that memory capacity is large enough so that its limit could not be reached in a lifetime.

However, you may want to read over this link I found:
http://www.merkle.com/humanMemory.html

I only briefly glanced over it, but I did want to mention that one of their estimates of a few hundred megabytes (relating human memory to computer memory, of course) of human memory capacity seems awfully small to me.

Everything I've read (no references at hand) relating human memory capacity to semiconductor memory has listed total capacity as approaching the hundreds of Terabytes (tera=1,000,000,000,000). The catch is that we don't have an addressing scheme like computers do. And thank God for that, because otherwise we'd only be able to remember 640KB! hahahahaha (if you don't use DOS, nevermind. you won't get the joke)

Wood Thrush:
To he who has lost his hope:

Please claim it at the lost and found at the front desk.

Thank you

Grammar nitpick: To HIM, not to HE!!!!!! AAAaaaugghhhh! I hate that.

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If you say it, mean it. If you mean it, do it.
If you do it, live it. If you live it, say it.
-----
Joe Cool

[Qwisp]

I don't remember anything, and I'm only 35.

What was I talking about. I forget.

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I have great faith in fools, self-confidence my friends call it.---
Edgar Allan Poe

[David, God of Frogs]

It's really hard to measure how much info a brain can hold in megabytes or any unit like that because memory just doesn't work that way. A computer is much less efficient in storing things like pictures than people. Also I think I've heard that you never actually forget anything and hypnotists can make you remember the most trivial stuff from long long ago. Just in case this seemed too easy.

[Beruang]

There is some discussion towards the end of
http://www.straightdope.com/classics/a3_028.html



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"The dawn of a new era is felt and not measured." Walter Lord