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Tuesday 21 July 2020

Hyperthymesia



A while ago I stumbled across a reference to hyperthymesia or Superior Autobiographical Memory, a rare condition possessed by actress Marilu Henner.

Has been confirmed to be one of a rare group of persons, who possess "hyperthymesia" (Superior Autobiographical Memory) which allows her to recall almost every day of her life as featured on the CBS 60 Minutes (1968) episode of December 19, 2010.

Many conditions are easy enough to imagine but I have a problem with radically different mental abilities such as this. My memory is nothing special and quite unreliable in areas where my level of interest is low.

I don’t see that as a problem because it is surely necessary to forget trivia. It’s like keeping the shed tidy so you can find things like a favourite screwdriver. Remembering almost every day of your life though - I can’t imagine what that is like and my immediate assumption would be that it must be a problem. Could be useful at times such as finding that blasted screwdriver but surely not that useful?

Another problem… Oh hang on I think I’ve done that one.

2 comments:

Sackerson said...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Funes_the_Memorious

A K Haart said...

Sackers - I once read a science fiction story where people known as 'mnemonics' were taken on space flights because they were able to make connections computers could not make. The toxicity of beryllium was the obscure piece of information dredged up to save the day if I remember rightly.