No. Memorize ideas, using the same principle, if you want to memorize verbatim for some odd reason, then simply do strong associations. Mnemonics images tend to be personal, so try following me.
Verbatim:
You can place the images at three mental locations, 1, 2 and 3.
- “the intellectual and practical activity”
= a brain on a book (mnemonic image, mi)
- “encompassing the systematic study of the structure and behavior of the physical and natural world”
= globe surrounded by an squared in construction building skeleton like structure (mi)
- “through observation and experiment.”
= a glass with purple liquid being poured down (mi).
You can always do more chunks, you can choose to rewrite the definitions with less redundant words like physical and natural world == nature. As the following phrase is the main describing aspect of the definition: “systematic study of the structure and behavior”, I would only use this as the main thing to be remembered. Whatever you’re defining could be thought as:
“The systematic study of the structure and behavior of nature with observation and experimentation.” I leave your creativity to think of the images, they don’t really need to be related to the text, that’s just a ‘noob’ aid, all you need is to create the “association” between the target to memorize and the “image” that you will place in a “location”. (LIA = location, image, association. How artistic memorization works. From link system to loci methods, this is it)
Just the idea:
First, what are you defining? Science? The schema is important. This could lead the main image creation, anyways:
“person with white coat flip pages of a book, draws on a paper a shape and and pours colorful liquids from a glass”
this then later could be imagined as
“person wearing a white coat pouring down liquids from a glass to another”.
The stronger your association power the less details you’d need to memorize definitions like this or anything else.
Notes on associations
Association is the attachment of two ideas. I don’t understand the brain process, nor how to tell you what it is, I can only understand it for myself. Now, I can describe what I feel, but first more on how association works, starting by defining memorable ideas which are those that are memorized through the cognitive bias of “generation effect” (see memory biases, Wikipedia no longer has the list memory biases):
Known idea + Known idea = New memorable idea
Mnemonics images are ideas. These ideas could be known or unknown. Example: you want to memorize a list of words and it includes the word “fruit”, this word is a known idea as you know what it is, say you choose as mnemonic image an apple, then almost intuitively you’d be creating a new memorable idea (an association) by mixing known + known.
Known idea + Unknown idea = New memorable idea
When you memorize names, you would encounter the “known + unknown” scenario a lot, as you may find names you never heard before or with variations of known names, but much worse when you don’t “know” someone or something named with the name. But the principle holds.
Unknown idea + Unknown idea = New memorable idea
Now, what I always try to teach in the forum whenever possible is that everything can be memorized, as everything can be a memory palace, everything can be an mnemonic image and then it follows that anything can be associated with anything else. The scenario “unknown + unknown” would also be found when memorizing any text or concept, as you don’t always know either the word nor have you encounter the idea before.
Example:
“circumlocution”: “the use of many words where fewer would do, especially in a deliberate attempt to be vague or evasive.”
I choose this example for two reasons: you may have never heard of this and you may have encountered people who has done this. If you want to learn this concept, you’d be association the concept with the word and both you probably have never crossed before, but this can be associated just as they are or by adding a mnemonic (a known) and mixing it with one of the unknowns.
Word (Unknown A ) + Mnemonic (Known A) + Definition (Unknown B) + Mnemonic (Known B) = New memorable image (Final mnemonic image)
You could omit one mnemonic, or both of them and simply do the association intuitively. Thinking of a politician could be enough, then associating the definition to the politician and the definition word to the politician again. Circular association, and the politician becomes the final mnemonic at the same time, not needing to do the associations from before unknown + known A and B.
But if you didn’t, notice that instead of a politician you could think of a rock, associate the rock to the definition and to the definition word, or you could associate definition word and definition and then to the rock, or generate from the association definition word-definition an image intuitively and then your the method of loci so you have a “where to” think at when you want to recall it.
If you’re still here, ask yourself this, how do I remember the locations? how do I remember my life, why when I read a known name I think of a person? and when I think of the person I think of the events I experienced or know of the person? and when I think of events other “related” things are recalled? What’s all of this? One word: associations. Every memory is associations of ideas. But those associations can be used as images themselves and places to look at or where to’s. In other words: metal locations are images that you remember because they are associated to other ideas, that you recall from the idea associated to them.
Notes on understanding your mind and memorization
I memorize assigned names to faces by acknowledging the association as I create it and pay attention at the feelings of association “name” to “face”. I suppose this is the result of good understanding of my gist of association (when I know I’m successfully mingling idea A with idea B, where A could be a peg like name or number or a mnemonic itself). In my experience the memorization process can be done in multiple ways. you can imagine something without aim, like a anthropomorphic woman like winged horned fire covered entity and then associate to that image anything, then you think of the image and you also think of the associated concept (thus thinking of a mnemonic before even choosing what to memorize). If like me, you ever decide to imagine worlds, full of many things, well, when you want to memorize something, you could just focus in the association as the Location and the Image are already created. Now, I don’t advice this. I have years doing this, so I may be wrong at the reasons why some works and of it would work with you.
