I have been reading some very interesting things about the brain lately, particularly regarding memory. Memory has always been puzzling to me. Why is it I can remember every Futurama episode ever made, hundreds of IP addresses, and countless CSS tricks, but not all the names of my forty-some cousins?

Recently on NPR I heard a discussion on the idea of “memory volume.” Throughout the day your brain remembers everything you have experienced, even hanging onto useless information like how much butter was on your toast. While you sleep at night each memory fades, becoming harder to remember.

Important memories, like last nights Spanish lesson, fade less in comparison to the mountain of unimportant memories collected throughout the day. While the “volume” fades on all your memories, import ones remain much louder.

To test his theory myself I employed the latest version of Super Mario Brothers. Last night I tackled a difficult level, which to finish I would need to execute a long series of precise jumps, ducks, and button combinations. I perished twenty times in a row, each time dying from a small miscalculation in timing.

Directly after waking this morning I tackled the same level. This time I sailed through each obstacle without difficulty, completing the level on the first try. Although you could argue the importance of this information, it seams to prove the theory that after one night of rest you brain can more precisely remember items you had concentrated on the previous day.

I urge you to experiment yourself with an even more ambitious task, and let me know if this theory can be applied beyond video games.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, November 13th, 2007 at 11:36 am and is filed under General. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.