http://rogerbourland.com/2007/05/02/the-power-to-remember-and-forget/ Roger Bourland writes about music and life Fri, 12 Mar 2010 09:06:00 -0800 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.8.6 hourly 1 http://rogerbourland.com/2007/05/02/the-power-to-remember-and-forget/comment-page-1/#comment-25176 Brad Wood Wed, 02 May 2007 19:07:43 +0000 http://rogerbourland.com/blog/2007/05/02/the-power-to-remember-and-forget/#comment-25176 This is an interesting area. I tend to think that our capacity for retaining details is generally much greater than we assume. But I have known some quite brilliant people who strive to actively forget nonessential material, out of fear that it is crowding out more significant stuff. Keith O. Johnson, a very smart guy indeed(audio/electronics engineer, revolutionized tape duplication, made many spectacular recordings for Reference Recordings, also a composer, co-inventor of HDCD, marathon runner, etc.) got quite indignant once when I asked him if he remembered a particular transistor type when he was describing a circuit he had designed. He implied that remembering that would be at the expense of something more important. This is an interesting area. I tend to think that our capacity for retaining details is generally much greater than we assume. But I have known some quite brilliant people who strive to actively forget nonessential material, out of fear that it is crowding out more significant stuff. Keith O. Johnson, a very smart guy indeed(audio/electronics engineer, revolutionized tape duplication, made many spectacular recordings for Reference Recordings, also a composer, co-inventor of HDCD, marathon runner, etc.) got quite indignant once when I asked him if he remembered a particular transistor type when he was describing a circuit he had designed. He implied that remembering that would be at the expense of something more important.

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