A song playing comprises a very specific and vivid set of memory cues. Because the multiple-trace memory models assume that context is encoded along with memory traces, the music that you have listened to at various times of your life is cross-coded with the events of those times. That is, the music is linked to events of the time, and those events are linked to the music.
Daniel LevitinAlthough I don't know Paul McCartney, a mutual friend told me that Paul was reading my book, This Is Your Brain on Music, and stopped after chapter two. McCartney said he was concerned that if he learned more about how he does what he does (as far as composing music), he may not be able to do it anymore!
Daniel LevitinAlthough it is easier to find information these days, it is easier than ever before to find misinformation, pseudo-facts, unsupported and fringe opinions, and the like. Children should be taught at an early age what constitutes evidence, how to detect biases or distortions in newspaper accounts, and that there exist hierarchies of information sources. In the medical field, for example, a controlled experiment published in a peer-reviewed journal is a better source than a blog by the Ginseng Growers Association, promoting the health benefits of their own product.
Daniel LevitinWe're making more and more decisions every day. I think a lot of us feel overloaded by the process.
Daniel LevitinWhen we have learned something, there's this thing called belief perseverance. Having learned something, we tend to cling to that belief, even in the face of overwhelming evidence to the contrary.
Daniel LevitinPeople are trying to build a society where they can talk across the aisle so to speak, and have civil discourse. At the same time we're trying to inform ourselves about what's really true so that we can make evidence based decisions that is better than superstition or rumor. But the fact is that people who use evidence based decision making have much better life outcomes, greater life satisfaction, they live longer, they make better personal and medical decisions, better financial decisions. But parallel to that is you can't reason somebody out of a position they didn't reason themselves into.
Daniel LevitinIn order to be a world-class expert in anything, be it audiology, drama, music, art, gymnastics, whatever, one needs to have a minimum of 10,000 hours of practice. Unfortunately, it doesn't mean that if you put in 10,000 hours that you will become an expert, but there aren't any cases where someone has achieved world-class mastery without it! So the time spent at the activity is indeed the most important and influential factor.
Daniel Levitin