>
Rather his analysis is focused at the individual level and then expands to
consider impacts on society at large.  The author observes that much of our
remembering (courtesy of Google and others) is largely decontextualized and
that human memory is weakest along the temporal plane.  By that he means if
you are trying to remember a past event which of the following pieces of
information will be the least helpful in recall: (a) place, (b) person, (c)
time.  He quotes research to demonstrate that time is the least helpful
>

David, this indeed sounds like an interesting book.  Setting the RM and
Organizational aspects aside and thinking about how this applies to
individuals, I have to admit that since I've had electronic gadgets to
assist me in keeping track of some more mundane information (phone numbers,
addresses, names of people's children and nurses/assistants at doctors
offices, etc) I've jettisoned that type of info from my primary storage
device, allowing it to concentrate on other more important things... or to
excuse the fact that my ability to recall some of it just isn't what it used
to be.

But I'm not sure I agree with the author's one comment about "time is the
least helpful" piece of information in recall.  For me, it's of great use-
placing myself in a time frame to help contextualize a piece of information
I'm trying to recall, which sometimes includes a place and then the balance
of what's associated with it.  I've also seen some interesting studies where
smell http://bit.ly/8B8at6 or "texture" are used to enhance or stimulate memory.

I think as we get older, the desire to recall rather than dismiss memory or
things from the past grows greater... and the ability to access those with
the keys to a lot of this information disappears. 

For this reason, I encourage young people to taker a cruise through family
photo albums with their grandparents or aunts and uncles and identify family
members, locations, events and try to capture that information while they
can... and if as a result of these efforts, you bring a little joy to these
folks in re-enacting the memories, or just by spending time with them and
showing your interest in them and their past, well... all the better. 

Then if you want to offer to scan some of the photos and create new albums
for them or "memory books" that include some of the information you've
gathered that's another plus... so many people want to simply scan the
photos and fail to take the time to connect with the past while they can.  

Worse yet, few of us have tactile photo albums these days, instead electing
to have electronic image albums, or online repositories of photos... but as
we were discussing about the smell and feel of a book, there's nothing like
sitting with family members and going through a photo album and asking
"Who's that?" or "Where was that taken?" and getting the story.

Maybe while some folks are sitting around watching football this holiday
season, get out the albums and a notepad and take a cruise down memory lane.

Larry
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