When we first hear [a] word, we start putting these associational hooks into it that make it easier to fish it back out at some later date.

To the extent that experience is the sum of our memories and wisdom the sum of experience, having a better memory would mean knowing not only more about the world, but also more about myself.

When we first hear [a] word, we start putting these associational hooks into it that make it easier to fish it back out at some later date.

What distinguishes a great mnemonist, I learned, is the ability to create lavish images on the fly, to paint in the mind a scene so unlike any other it cannot be forgotten. And to do it quickly. Many competitive mnemonists argue that their skills are less a feat of memory than of creativity.

The more we remember, the better we are at processing the world. And the better we are at processing the world, the more we can remember about it.

Over the last few millennia we've invented a series of technologies - from the alphabet to the scroll to the codex, the printing press, photography, the computer, the smartphone - that have made it progressively easier and easier for us to externalize our memories, for us to essentially outsource this fundamental human capacity.

A meaningful relationship between two people cannot sustain itself only in the present tense.