And what is the best, most optimal approach depending on the category — like abstract words, numbers, etc.?
1 Like
Lots and lots of practice.
The “best” approach is the one that you enjoy employing and that you are willing to practice until you’re fluent with it.
Some techniques are objectively “better,” for example when it comes to data compression with number or card systems, but there are tradeoffs with system size and the effort needed to get fluent with the system.
Only you will be able to determine what the best approach is for your own mental preferences.
5 Likes
It’s possible to use the advanced search settings to search within specific categories like Memory League and Memory Sports. That should turn up some good tips.
Here is an example search for number memorization in the Memory League category:
https://forum.artofmemory.com/search?q=%23memory-league%20numbers
The images event is a good one to start with:
https://forum.artofmemory.com/search?q=%23memory-league%20images
I still think that some techniques are more optimized than others for certain things — it’s a bit like a game with a meta. There will always be a dominant strategy at any given time, and of course everyone will use it because it helps them win and climb to the top.
Of course.
Take the Cards discipline for example. Given equal fluency and speed of recognition per element, a true 2-card system is objectively more optimized than a 1-card system, simply because you only need to work with and recall half as many mnemonic elements to get the same total.
But… and this is a big important but, there is a cost of entry and a maintenance cost to retain fluency for any system.
That cost for a single card system is very low. The cost for a 2-card system is high. A hypothetical 3-card system would be a huge leap in optimization, but the cost of fluency and maintenance would be astronomical and impractical. Similarly with numbers. At some point the cost outpaces the practical usefulness.
So when looking at different systems, it’s all about balancing your own tolerance for those costs with what you consider acceptable performance. This tolerance is different from person to person. That’s why I stress that you have to experiment and figure out where you stand with it and what works best for you.
When it comes to results, the details of the system itself are almost always less important than the commitment to building and maintaining fluency with it.
1 Like
I think getting started Today. Applying methods from Top ranking Memo athletes/ great Memo Coaches, and doing the training as they have described. Continue that Consistently until you get the desired results you are after.
I am confused… Ain’t a PAO this? And a PAO is not impractical (?).
That depends a lot on the person. Some people prefer objects because they have fewer details than characters and also prefer simplicity and functionality in the moment. To acquire a certain skill with characters, I had to practice and read about faces and neuroscience topics… Simple expressions are easy, through action and reaction, and are as quick as looking at an object.
Look at Tom Cruise’s effort when throwing a ball… but when you put a flat face in every scene, it’s understandable that what you put there was a faceless body.
But that doesn’t mean that just because it doesn’t work for others, it won’t work for you either. It depends on what you find best for yourself. My scenes are character-based, but for others, objects feel very good.
Nope.
A PAO (or a PA, or a single-association system, or an LPAAO or whatever other structure you choose) where each element represents one card is a single-card system. One card’s information is represented by one intentionally translated mnemomic element. (The Person and the Action and the Object.) You have to accurately encode and recall 52 specific intentional mnemomic elements to memorize a deck of cards using a single card PAO. The PAO structure itself is just a way to organize those elements into scenes. But it’s not the content of the SCENES or how many cards they contain that determines the X in the “X-Digit System.”
If ToaD is the [Ace 
] and “CaRRying” is the [7 
] and a “NeT” is the [2 ] then the PAO scene “Toad carrying a net” gives me 3 cards worth of info in one scene that is composed by 3 intentional elements.
A 2-card system is where you compress two cards into a single intentionally created mnemonic element. This means you only need to use 26 specific intentional elements to memorize a deck. (The tradeoff is there are 2704 possible card pairs to create associations with.)
If “TRuCK” represents the card pair [Ace ][7 
] “SToNe” represents [Ace ][2 ] and “CaKe” represents [7 
][King ] then making a scene with these three elements gives me 6 cards info in one scene.
In a hypothetical 3-card system, you could combine 3 cards worth of information into a single element, similar to ToaD representing one card in the single-card PAO, or TRuCK representing 2 cards in the bigger system. This would be awesome because then you just need 17 elements to encode a deck. You could do this with like 6 scenes. But the problem is that there are well over 130,000 combinations of three cards. This is practically impossible to learn and train to fluency. Also practically impossible to create unique images for all those entries so as to not be confused between many of them.
The terminology may just seem like semantics but it can be important when communicating about how systems are constructed and used.
A system that uses a person-action-adjective-object-food-vehicle structure where each element represents one card is still just a “single card system.” It’s not a 6-card system. It is just structured into 6-element “PAAOFV” scenes.
This would likely be HARDER to construct and retain at speed than a simpler PAO or even a 2-element PA and it would require twice as many associations to learn and train to fluency. This is why I usually advocate for keeping scene structure simple. You don’t gain any benefit of data compression or reduction of elements to remember unless you can encode more cards across less ELEMENTS like with a 2-card system. If you don’t want to jump to the 2-card system with its thousand(s) or images to learn, then keep it simple since no matter how you structure it, you have to keep track of 52 elements.
Here’s more on that idea of clarity in terminology:
2 Likes