Atomic memorizations: pros and cons

Most of the visualizations we use to remember things are atomic. By atomic I mean that you cannot divide the visualization without ruining it, and connections to other visualizations are not as strongs connections within the visualization. Such visualizations are not a part of a story, and require complex mental structures. Beginners almost never use atomic memorizations, and experts almost always use them.

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A statue as an atomic memorization

For example, PAO (person-action-object)  is an atomic visualization. Basically this is a statue, possibly on pedestal, that we can take to any mental palace or map we want. Typically PAO encodes 5-6 words in one visualization. Any word within the visualization is meaningless by itself, and the order in which the words are encoded usually matters -especially with numbers.

Memory masters train a lot with fixed PAO tables for numerical digits and often combine PAO with other methods. For example, the selection of words for PAO may be inspired my major method. This generates dual coding in case we are not sure about our visualization tables.

A story cannot have PAOs

You should never try to form a PAO from just one word. Moreover, PAO do not form stories or cartoons. They are sort of statues, and they are best used with mental palaces or heavily modified mindmaps.  Not the sort of tools beginners can use.

In hands of a master, mindmaps or mental palaces with fixed itineraries are extremely fast and stable. Masters almost never have a usecase for memorizing less than 5 words at once. So masters absolutely love PAO or other complex visualization and use them a lot.

There are exceptions. For example, in history or a board game, a hero or a unit may travel from one location to another, participating in multiple stories. In medicine, a complex protein can have all sorts of effects on human organs. The same PAO is reused within multiple areas of the same mental palace or map at various times.  This can be encoded in mental skyscrapers: multifloor buildings with similar floor design, and positioning modifications of PAO per floor.

Memorization is not just visualization

When we learn words in foreign language or music, the memorization is more than just visualization. Usually, we use audio signal and other senses to convey a similar message. This is called dual coding. If we forget something in one sensory channel, we can address another. For example, ashvagandha literally means “smells like a horse”, so every time I address the use of the food supplement my smell sense is activated.

An atomic memorization does not have to be a statue. It can be a diagram, like  a flowchart, a face of a clock with a fixed position of its hands, a chessboard, or a map. It can also be very simple like an emoji. Or it can be incredibly complex and involving multiple senses, like a phrase in a foreign language or a culinary recipe.

Flashbulb memories

Some of the most effective atomic visualizations are a part of a story, the story of our lives. When we are shocked we have so called flashbulb memory. Like a photo we remember all the details of a very specific moment. We might forget when it happened, and things that happened before or after. We do remember the moment itself, and may address it later.

There are also global flashbulb memories shared by entire generations, like the landing on the moon. Events generating flashbulb memories do not have to be good or bad, but they have to be incredibly rare. Keeping in memory every waking moment is an incredible burden, and the few people who have this condition are not happy.

What can be so bad in atomic memorizations?

You might think that once a person learns to use atomic memorizations with memory palaces that will be the only sort of memorizations to use. Wrong. We reuse our visualizations in different contexts to enforce associative connections. The best atomic visualizations are reused all the time.

Sometimes things shift. If we make a misunderstanding and encode it in atomic memorization, we have very little chance of fixing it. Not only it will appear in the original memorization, and every mental structure reusing this memorization, it will also be fixed like 1+1=2. You can replace all instances of the original memorization with a new one, and still occasionally you will pause to think which version is more accurate. And this pause will slow you down.

Additionally, sometimes there are not enough meaningful keywords to make a good complex visualization. If you add your own details, you will probably generate a recurring mistake very hard to erase.

Are mental palaces atomic?

By default mental palaces are generic. We fill them with our visualizations, and maybe add some thematic colors to provide a context. Some mental palaces need to be reused, like mathematical theorems and philosophical concepts. For example. Plato’s cave is reused in better half of philosophical papers. It is a cave, not your home. So it definitely stands out, no matter where you put it. You can put within the cave projectors and tessaracts, but it still will be recognizable.

Once we generate an especially successful mental palace and make it stand out, each time we reuse it we reuse an atomic memorization. We can put a model of another mental palace in the corner of our mental palace. Mathematicians always nest lemmas and theorems. Each mental building may become atomic. You will not tear it down to modify the collection of visualizations within.

Suppose I do not want an atomic structure, now what?

By default, mindmaps are very good for keeping partial information. They are two-dimensional and can be easily modified. You can put a mental palace or a PAO as one of the leaves. A 3D model or a 2D photo if you prefer. But you can also add small and abstract pieces: colors, emojies, formulas.

If the structure of the mindmap is too limiting for your taste, you can use flowcharts with logical symbols. They will encode almost any algorithm. Usually the atomic structure will be there in the leaves of the mindmap or large rectanular boxes of flowcharts. Everything else can change.

Alternatively you can use an upgraded version of a story, for example a comic book or a long tapestry. If you look at Bayeux tapestry, it has not only knights fighting. For example, it has a comet in the sky.

These structures are better for very heterogenous data, combining simple and complex ideas, logic, emotions and facts. What we lose in efficiency we gain in flexibility.