The busier you get , the more stuff you forget , and navigating that genial clutter can be worsened than steer through an asteroid subject . Luckily , lots of audacious galactic heroes have faced faulty memories , and create some ready to hand proficiency for remembering .
Here ’s a complete list of all the methods we found for trot your memory from scientific discipline fiction narrative , from the least fantastical to the most . ( The ending of the list , sadly , includes some items that you ’re unlikely to be able to receive at your local position provision store . )
Use an acronym .
hypothesise you ’ve got a beautiful blue time machine that go by the ungainly name of Time And Relative Dimensions In Space — you’re able to always shorten it down to TARDIS , which is much promiscuous to commemorate . That ’s what the Doctor ( and his granddaughter Susan ) did inDoctor Who .
The same goes forMarvel Comics ‘ first-rate - hush-hush spy organization , the Supreme Headquarters , International Espionage , Law - Enforcement Division ( S.H.I.E.L.D. ) The only problem with acronym is , people will change what they stand for when you ’re not looking — S.H.I.E.L.D. now stand up for Strategic Hazard Intervention , Espionage Logistics Directorate in the comic strip , or Strategic Homeland Intervention , Enforcement and Logistics Division in the picture .
There ’s also the General Unilateral Neuro - link Dispersive Autonomic Maneuver ( GUNDAM ) , and lots of other examples , here .
compose yourself a post - it note .
This may be the most foolproof method acting out there . InStar Trek : Voyager , Chakotay falls in love with a fellow member of a species that score out itself from your memory after a while — and also somehow delete all data processor platter . To ward his memories of their torrid , torrid passion affair , Chakotay writes himself a paper line excuse everything that go on .
likewise , in Scott Westerfeld ’s novel ugli , Tally Youngblood undergoes the surgery to become a Pretty — but first she writes herself a note explaining all the programme she made to reverse the surgery . Because she wo n’t remember them after she ’s become a Pretty .
In the motion picture Push , Nick gets someone to wipe out his memories and the memories of all his ally , so the idea - readers ca n’t follow their plans . But he publish letters for himself and everybody else , to avail them commend at the crucial second — and there are instructions on how long to hold back before reopening the varsity letter .
And this proficiency is also used by Gwen Cooper in Torchwood ( with so - so results ) , Noah Bennet on Heroes and Kurt on Odyssey Five . There ’s a great list over atTVTropes .
Keep a journal :
This is one step further than just writing a little note to yourself . In Gene Wolfe ’s novel Soldier in the Mist / Soldier of Arete , the friend loses his memory every undivided 24-hour interval . And he does n’t realize that his power to converse with god , ghost and other mythologic digit is strange . He write himself a detailed diary , and the first line of it is , “ translate THIS EACH MORNING . ”
Lost‘s Daniel Faraday keep a journal too , and seems to expend it to remind himself of a plenty of stuff he ’s forgotten as a result of some time - travel experimentation that run wrong . Among other thing , he does n’t remember write the stuff and nonsense about Desmond Hume being his constant .
Make up a song :
That ’s what Draycos does in Timothy Zahn ’s new Dragon And Thief : A Dragonback Adventure . Draycos sees Jack being taken aside on a spaceship , and involve to call up the words written on the ship ’s side — but they ’re in English , a language Draycos does n’t do it . allege Draycos , “ Alien symbol are difficult for one unfamiliar with them to memorize . But I am a poet - warrior of the K’da , and so as you were take aboard the ship , I draw up a song . ” For example , to describe the letter A , his lyric goes , “ Two soldiers lean to , with joined hands . ” Or to describe the letter of the alphabet O , he sings , “ Squeezed ring of firing , and what is more / A fire burn within its core . ” If you have an easier time remembering goofy song language than unfamiliar symbols , this could work for you .
Leave yourself some objects to actuate a memory :
InPaycheck , Ben Affleck sees his own future , but then has his memory board wipe off . So he leaves himself an gasbag full of lilliputian objects , including a nail and an old cent , and a lottery slate . They mean nothing to him — until he gain that they ’re each fabulously utile at just the veracious moment . And they do help ramble his computer storage , sort of . The Doctor onDoctor Whois constantly tying a mi in his handkerchief to remind him of things — but then he has to bequeath another knot in his hanky to help him retrieve why he made the premature knot .
Make yourself a video :
That ’s what Arnold Schwarzenegger does in Total Recall — he ’s forgotten his true identicalness as an federal agent of Mars intelligence ( or possibly there was never anything to forget ? ) And now he leaves himself a video recording to explain everything — except maybe his past sellf is n’t quite telling the exact truth .
Rodney McKay also leaves himself a video subject matter in Stargate Atlantis after everybody loses their memory in the episode " Tabula Rasa . " He tell himself to feel Teyla rapidly , or hundreds of multitude are going to die .
Create a memory Florida key or “ remembering castle ” :
This one is a bit more mired . InJohn Crowley‘s modernistic phantasy novels , the Aegypt tetralogy , we meet the real - life philosopher Giordano Bruno , who had created a complex occult memory organization , based on assigning graphic images to different pieces of information , allow you to access them easily later . One such scheme involved homocentric circles , and could reserve you to set apart lots and tons of information . The Aegypt novels include the adventure of Bruno , who becomes the librarian of the Secret Library of San Domenico , keep track of the vast collection of heterodox textual matter using his amazing memory powers :
He knew and retrieve every volume , where it lie down in Fra ’ Benedetto ’s cases , who had involve for it , and what was in it . In his immense and grow memory castle , the whole paradise in small , all that claim up next to no way at all .
Also , inOrson Scott Card‘s Intergalactic Medicine Show , Tzu creates a “ toy cupboard ” in his mind , among other techniques for creating an order for random facts :
He learned to memorise longer and longer list of things by putting them inside a plaything cupboard the private instructor separate him to make in his brain , or by mentally stacking them on top of each other , or putting them inside each other . This was fun for a while , though pretty soon he got sickish of having all kinds of nonmeaningful lean memorized . It was n’t funny after a while to have the ball follow out of the fish which came out of the tree which come out of the car which amount out of the briefcase , but he could n’t get it out of his memory .
The Mentats , or human computers , in Frank Herbert ’s Dune seem to utilise a variety of techniques , including memory key ( and sapho juice ) to think back tons of information with perfect clarity . There ’s a Yahoo groupwhere would - be Mentats have send advice on how to train your mind to be as percipient as that of a Mentat — or a Vulcan .
Tattoo yourself :
It work for the guy in Memento .
Take fresh drug :
It ’s pretty awesome what you may do with wise drugs , butin Woody Allen ’s story “ Think Hard , It ’ll follow Back To You,”a smart drug called Cranial Pops can help you recall any weird bit of information that may have gotten by from anyone , allowing you to be the hit of a party — until they wear off and you crash .
https://gizmodo.com/is-woody-allen-finally-going-back-to-science-fiction-5077439
Use hypnosis :
Lots of science - fabrication heroes use hypnosis as a memory aid . InRobert Heinlein‘s Citizen Of The Galaxy , Baslimhypnotizeshis foster son Thorby , so he can learn a ride substance to the Space Police , as well as a alphabetic character to a space captain to help Thorby get off the planet . When Claire draw a blank her ravishment by Ethan on Lost , the castaways use hypnosis to help her remember , and Fox Mulder on X - Files use hypnosis to call back his babe ’s abduction by alien .
More complex spins on the idea of trot your memory using hypnosis admit the mesmeric gun trigger that do off River Tam and activates her cleanup - machine programing inSerenity :
And the icon that make Chuck Bartowski suddenly recall scrap of spy selective information deposit in his brainiac , inChuck :
assume video goggles or use image - recognition capability :
InDavid Brin‘s Earth , people wear True - Vu lensesthat record everything they see , so they can recall hooey afterwards . And in Amitav Ghosh ’s novel The Calcutta Chromosome , an object recognition computer can wring out all the detail about object you ’ve see . Science - fiction author Charles Stross suggests soon it ’ll be chintzy and easyto store visual data on everything you ’ve seen all Clarence Shepard Day Jr. for a year , raising all sorts of questions about the boundaries between secret memory board and public record book . Already , researchers have developedsmart television gogglesthat will get across what you see .
More elbow room out solutions :
You could get a repositing organisation in your fountainhead hold all the information you necessitate to safeguard , as inJohnny MnemonicbyWilliam Gibson(and the movie of the same name . ) You could cauterise your own initials into your nous to remind you that you rub out your own computer storage , like Zaphod Beeblebrox in TheHitchhiker ’s Guide To The Galaxy . You could useWonder Woman‘s magic lasso to doctor your memories , if you love where to get over her down . You could transfer your store into someone else , like Data in Star Trek : scourge or Spock in Star Trek II : The Wrath Of Khan . You could record your store , like the mass in Strange Days , or the bird in Dollhouse . You could use a Delaware - neuralizer to restore your memory , like Agent J in Men In Black II .
Top simulacrum : Citizen Of The Galaxy byPhil Golyshko . extra reporting by Josh C. Snyder and Cyriaque Lamar .
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