# Heinlein and "Dr.Renshaw" **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [November 7, 2000, 5:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/heinlein-and-dr-renshaw/40142 "2000-11-07T17:41:29Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![zen101](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/c68b51/32.png) [@zen101](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/zen101)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2000, 5:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/heinlein-and-dr-renshaw/40142/1 "2000-11-07T17:41:29Z")
For those of you RAH junkies the name “Renshaw” might ring a bell or two. If you read Robert Heinleins’ works this name keeps popping up all over the place (Citizen of the Galaxy, Friday, just off the top of my head). In all the books when he is mentioned he is described as a professor from California or who taught in California (UCLA I think) who founded a method of speed teaching that taught people how have instant retention and memorization. His method is described as “The Renshaw Technique” (catchy name). Anyhow I have been searching archives and on the Web for this person or someone who might be him. I had written Roberta (Robert’s widow) through Baen Books (Heinlein’s publisher) and got no reply. So I was wondering if anyone here knew about this possible ficticious charachter or if it was based on a real life person? Thanx, ---
**Author:** ![a35362](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/3da27b/32.png) [@a35362](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/a35362)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2000, 6:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/heinlein-and-dr-renshaw/40142/2 "2000-11-07T18:09:56Z")
Ahem. I thought his wife’s name was Virginia (“Ginny”). As you were! ---
**Author:** ![zen101](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/c68b51/32.png) [@zen101](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/zen101)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2000, 8:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/heinlein-and-dr-renshaw/40142/3 "2000-11-07T20:14:27Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by a35362 \* > \*\*Ahem. > > I thought his wife’s name was Virginia (“Ginny”). > > As you were! \*\* Your right of course, I had to look it up at the time and copied the address from the back of “Grumbles”. I remember just calling her Mrs.Heinlen in the letter. I am pretty sure I used her correct name in the original letter as I said it was copied from Grumbles From The Grave. I alays think her name is “Roberta” for some reason, was his first wife named Roberta? Or a daughter? I can’t honestly think of why I always mix her name up. ---
**Author:** ![Irishman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/b487fb/32.png) [@Irishman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Irishman)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2000, 10:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/heinlein-and-dr-renshaw/40142/4 "2000-11-07T22:37:45Z")
A google search on “Renshaw speed reading” turned up the following that is the direct response to your question. [http://www.enter.net/~torve/critics/renshaw.htm](http://www.enter.net/~torve/critics/renshaw.htm) > [@](#): > > At the moment, I can think of only one bit of material of which Heinlein has explicitly named the source–in fact, he has done it three times. In the short novel “Gulf,” in Citizen of the Galaxy, and in Stranger in a Strange Land, Heinlein makes reference to the work of a psychologist named Samuel Renshaw. > [@](#): > > ``` > This struck me as an interesting thing to look into: what could I find out about Renshaw? (Here, by the way, you can see Panshin's Law of Repetition at work: if Heinlein had mentioned Renshaw in only one story, it would have seemed quite possible that Renshaw was someone made up for convenient use in a story; used three times, in separate, unconnected stories, it seemed most probable that he really existed.) > I was interested to know Renshaw's stature in the field of psychology: what sort of work he has done, and what other psychologists think of it. I was also interested in finding out how faithful Heinlein's representation of all this was. > I found immediately that there actually is a Dr. Samuel Renshaw of Ohio State University, and that, as Heinlein said, he did attract attention around the World War II years for his work on thresholds of perception. Renshaw has done work in increasing the limits and subtlety of perception of smell and taste; in increasing acuity and field of sight (of which his work in reading speed and comprehension is just a small part); and in increasing the power and strength of memory. > > ``` Lots more there. ---
**Author:** ![zen101](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/c68b51/32.png) [@zen101](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/zen101)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2000, 11:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/heinlein-and-dr-renshaw/40142/5 "2000-11-07T23:08:23Z")
**Irishman** Yeah I read that earlier today and should have noted what little I did find. Overall I was unable to find any real details about his technique or published works on it (unless I overlooked something in that article). I figure RAH must have met him (Renshaw) during his involvement in training Naval officers while Heinlein was involved in Naval Operations during WWII (Special warfare department wasn’t it?). I was somewhat glad to find that much but dissapointed to note that only 2% of his students were capable of gaining an editic memory. Interesting note about Asimov. I never knew he hat total recall. The good and bad of the web, one days there is nothing on a given subject to be found. Next month 50 pages to sort through. heh. ---
**Author:** ![Sir\_Rhosis](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/d9b06d/32.png) [@Sir\_Rhosis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sir_Rhosis)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2000, 12:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/heinlein-and-dr-renshaw/40142/6 "2000-11-08T00:10:55Z")
zen101, I’m almost 100% sure his first wife was named Leslyn (divorced in 1947 or thereabouts, married Virginia Gerstenfeld soon thereafter). I’m also pretty sure Heinlein never had any children by either of his wives. Sir ---
**Author:** ![Tristan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tristan/32/18058_2.png) [@Tristan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tristan)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2000, 12:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/heinlein-and-dr-renshaw/40142/7 "2000-11-08T00:45:43Z")
Nope, Heinlein has no children… officially. Of course, there are those of us that proudly claim his as part of the family, right up there with Grandpa and Niven and Uncle Joe and Bester… I’m a freak, but I don’t care… Some other thread will have to deal with my pilgrimage to his house, and the awe inspiring heinlein relic that I touched… ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2000, 4:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/heinlein-and-dr-renshaw/40142/8 "2000-11-08T04:43:48Z")
I always thought that Dr. Renshaw was another alias of ol’ L.L. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Wendell\_Wagner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/8491ac/32.png) [@Wendell\_Wagner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wendell_Wagner)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2000, 10:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/heinlein-and-dr-renshaw/40142/9 "2000-11-08T10:27:42Z")
Is there anything other than that website that’s been given which says that Isaac Asimov had an eidetic memory? I don’t recall Asimov ever mentioning it, and I’ve read his autobiography. He had a very good memory, no doubt, but that’s not the same thing as having an eidetic memory. Does anyone have a better source for this fact? ---
**Author:** ![Guy\_Propski](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/5e9695/32.png) [@Guy\_Propski](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Guy_Propski)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2000, 1:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/heinlein-and-dr-renshaw/40142/10 "2000-11-08T13:28:35Z")
Asimov joked that he had a “near photographic” memory; in other words, he could remember things that were near photographs. Seriously, he never claimed to have an eiditic memory, just a very good one. ---
**Author:** ![psikeyhackr](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/97f17d/32.png) [@psikeyhackr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/psikeyhackr)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2013, 6:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/heinlein-and-dr-renshaw/40142/11 "2013-03-30T18:46:30Z")
My God, this is really funny. The Internet has really changed in 13 years and now Samuel Renshaw gets 5,000 hits. That really does not seem that much considering the significance of his work. But now we have tablet computers that could be used to do what his tachistoscope did. But this country can’t even create a National Recommended Reading List for all its talk about education. I didn’t even know about this in 2000. The Tyranny of Words (1938) by Stuart Chase > **[Anxiety Culture: Tyranny of Words - excerpt](http://www.anxietyculture.com/tyranny.htm)** > > Chapter from Stuart Chase's 1938 book, The Tyranny of Words, one of the first popularisations of Korzybski's General Semantics. Chapter XIV: TO THE RIGHT WITH THE ECONOMISTS - a look at the abstractions used in classical economics. > **[The tyranny of words : Chase, Stuart, 1888-1985 : Free Download, Borrow, and...](https://archive.org/details/tyrannyofwords00chas)** > > Includes index [![](https://img.youtube.com/vi/M9H1StY1nU8/hqdefault.jpg ""The Tyranny of Words"") ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M9H1StY1nU8) psik ---
**Author:** ![Amateur\_Barbarian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/59ef9b/32.png) [@Amateur\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Amateur_Barbarian)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2013, 6:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/heinlein-and-dr-renshaw/40142/12 "2013-03-30T18:52:26Z")
Not just the internet. The amount of information on Heinlein has exploded by a couple of orders of magnitude. At the original time of this thread, any but the briefest, already-published info was only available by knowing what person to ask what drawer of what filing cabinet in what room of what library in what city it was in. Doing anything but the most shallow research based on mostly erroneous information was nearly impossible. Besides the bloom of info on the net, things like the complete Heinlein Archives are now available to any online researcher, for pennies a page. Not to mention the amount of published research available on the shelf that makes pretty much everything from Stover’s 1988 book back somewhere between worthless and obsolete. ---
**Author:** ![njtt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/ecd19e/32.png) [@njtt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/njtt)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2013, 7:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/heinlein-and-dr-renshaw/40142/13 "2013-03-30T19:03:07Z")
> [@Wendell\_Wagner](#): > > Is there anything other than that website that’s been given which says that Isaac Asimov had an eidetic memory? I don’t recall Asimov ever mentioning it, and I’ve read his autobiography. He had a very good memory, no doubt, but that’s not the same thing as having an eidetic memory. Does anyone have a better source for this fact? There is no such thing as an eidetic memory. There may be (it is disputed) such as thing as eidetic imagery, but those who have it (who, if it exists at all, are all or almost all small children) perform no better on memory tests than anybody else. ---
**Author:** ![Wendell\_Wagner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/8491ac/32.png) [@Wendell\_Wagner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wendell_Wagner)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2013, 7:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/heinlein-and-dr-renshaw/40142/14 "2013-03-30T19:44:26Z")
Which is part of why I said these many years ago (I’m uncomfortable having to defend my twelve-and-a-half-year-old comments) that I don’t think that Asimov ever used that term. Interestingly, Asimov’s widow used that term: > **[Autobiographies of Isaac Asimov](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/In_Memory_Yet_Green)** > > Isaac Asimov (c. 1920–1992) wrote three volumes of autobiography. In Memory Yet Green (1979) and In Joy Still Felt (1980) were a two-volume work, covering his life up to 1978. The third volume, I. Asimov: A Memoir (1994), published after his death, was not a sequel but a new work which covered his whole life. This third book won a Hugo Award. > Before writing these books, Asimov also published three anthologies of science fiction stories which contained autobiographical accounts of his life in the... As had been mentioned, it’s questionable that the term is used consistently and makes much sense. Here’s some of the theories on it: > **[Eidetic memory](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eidetic_memory)** > > Eidetic memory (/aɪˈdɛtɪk/ eye-DET-ik; also known as photographic memory and total recall) is the ability to recall an image from memory with high precision—at least for a brief period of time—after seeing it only once and without using a mnemonic device. > Although the terms eidetic memory and photographic memory are popularly used interchangeably, they are also distinguished, with eidetic memory referring to the ability to see an object for a few minutes after it is no longer present and photog... I don’t think that Asimov’s widow was using it in any precise sense. ---
**Author:** ![Amateur\_Barbarian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/59ef9b/32.png) [@Amateur\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Amateur_Barbarian)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2013, 7:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/heinlein-and-dr-renshaw/40142/15 "2013-03-30T19:56:41Z")
> [@Wendell\_Wagner](#): > > I don’t think that Asimov’s widow was using it in any precise sense. I think that if you are going to be a successful researcher and writer, you have to have the ability to hold a huge amount of information in your head. Having to stop and look things up every few sentences or so is going to be terribly slow, if you can write at a very complex level at all. You have to have all that info on immediate tap in order to correlate it and synthesize new statements. As Asimov could write on damned near any topic that occurred to him, I suggest that he had a highly developed form of this memory, which for all practical purposes is “perfect.” I think that “eidetic” implies you never lose any of this information, which is certainly not true. Speaking from personal experience, I wrote what is so far my most complex book almost entirely from memory; I later verified everything that needed verifying but I did not work with a vast array of open references, notes, etc. in front of me. I could move to any incomplete spot and pick up the thread, bringing together many threads and concepts to form what went on the page. That was a dozen years ago, and while I still retain an enormous grasp of the topic, I more and more frequently am flummoxed by questions for which I have to look up the answers (sometimes in my own book…) My vast and nearly perfect recall of details has eroded through non-use. But in that period of years, I wouldn’t have hesitated to say I had a near-eidetic memory with respect to the material. ---
**Author:** ![Wendell\_Wagner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/8491ac/32.png) [@Wendell\_Wagner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wendell_Wagner)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2013, 8:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/heinlein-and-dr-renshaw/40142/16 "2013-03-30T20:30:12Z")
Asimov had a huge amount of information in his head, but it wasn’t organized in the way that eidetic memory is supposed to work. From what he says, he wasn’t able to remember long amounts of past time like he was replaying a DVD. It was more like (as it is for most people) that all the information was organized in a complex network, so that he could move from one idea to another quickly. I suspect that writing for him was like climbing like a spider through that network very quickly. Eidetic memory (if it really exists) is not good for research, I suspect. It merely messes up any attempt to make connections. ---
**Author:** ![Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/13edae/32.png) [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stranger_On_A_Train)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2013, 9:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/heinlein-and-dr-renshaw/40142/17 "2013-03-30T21:06:21Z")
> [@Sir\_Rhosis](#): > > I’m almost 100% sure his first wife was named Leslyn (divorced in 1947 or thereabouts, married Virginia Gerstenfeld soon thereafter). I’m also pretty sure Heinlein never had any children by either of his wives. Don’t bet the mortgage on that. Heinlein’s first wife (before he became an author) was Elinor Curry. His second wife was Leysln MacDonald. Virginia ‘Ginny’ Gerstenfeld was his third wife. Stranger ---
**Author:** ![njtt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/ecd19e/32.png) [@njtt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/njtt)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2013, 12:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/heinlein-and-dr-renshaw/40142/18 "2013-03-31T00:56:16Z")
> [@Wendell\_Wagner](#): > > As had been mentioned, it’s questionable that the term is used consistently and makes much sense. Here’s some of the theories on it: > > [Eidetic memory - Wikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eidetic_memory) > > I don’t think that Asimov’s widow was using it in any precise sense. There is no precise sense to the term “eidetic memory”. Contrary to the opening of that article, “eidetic memory” is not “a psychological or medical term”. Eidetic memory is not a _thing_, except when used colloquially (by people who do not know the meaning or derivation of the word “eidetic”) as a sciencey sounding synonym for “very good memory”. “Eidetic image” (or “eidetic imagery”) _is_ a psychological term, with a reasonably well defined scientific meaning, but it remains controversial whether it actually designates a real phenomenon. An eidetic image (if real) is a mental image of a recently seen visual stimulus that the subject experiencing it describes as being comparable in vividness and detail to the actual stimulus, and seen “in front of the eyes” (usually more or less where the original visual stimulus was). Technically it is a form of visual memory, but, on standard accounts of it, it only persists for a minute or two at most, and tests have shown that, even during the time that the eidetic image is claimed to persist in consciousness, the subject’s memory for the original stimulus is no better than that of similar subjects who do not claim to have eidetic imagery. (This is quite clearly _not_ what Mrs Asimov had in mind). All the even remotely sound studies of eidetic imagery have found evidence for its occurrence only in young children. Skeptics argue that all that is really going on is that some children (perhaps influenced by inadvertently leading questions from experimenters) are inclined to describe their ordinary visual memories in more concrete terms than an adult would. For a review of the subject from the leading researcher on, and believer in, eidetic imagery (with appended commentaries both from other believers and from skeptics) see: Haber, R.N. (1979). Twenty Years of Haunting Eidetic Imagery: Where’s the Ghost? _Behavioral and Brain Sciences_ (2) 583-629. For an exposition of the skeptical perspective, see: Gray, C.R. & Gummerman, K. (1975). The Enigmatic Eidetic Image: A Critical Examination of Methods, Data, and Theories. _Psychological Bulletin_ (82) 383-407. [I doubt whether you will find any more recent reviews of comparable scientific quality to these, as, since Haber’s retirement, psychologists have largely lost interest in the alleged phenomenon. At best, it is too elusive to be easily studied, and too rare to be likely to be of much general cognitive significance.] That Wikipedia article is confused and misleading in numerous respects, and not well sourced (despite the fact that one of the authorities they cite is me!). However, despite that, and despite the usual Wikipedian hedging in its striving for NPOV, the thrust of what is said there bears out what I said. There is no such thing as eidetic memory. ---
**Author:** ![Amateur\_Barbarian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/59ef9b/32.png) [@Amateur\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Amateur_Barbarian)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2013, 4:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/heinlein-and-dr-renshaw/40142/19 "2013-03-31T04:04:02Z")
> [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](#): > > Don’t bet the mortgage on that. Heinlein’s first wife (before he became an author) was Elinor Curry. His second wife was Leysln MacDonald. Virginia ‘Ginny’ Gerstenfeld was his third wife. He didn’t have any children with Elinor, either. Or anyone else. ---
**Author:** ![Fields24](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/977dab/32.png) [@Fields24](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fields24)\ **Post date:** [June 29, 2023, 5:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/heinlein-and-dr-renshaw/40142/20 "2023-06-29T05:01:48Z")
Lookup HSAM. Marilu Henner has this ability. Hyperthymesia [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/heinlein-and-dr-renshaw/40142.md?page=2)