Comment by ortusdux | Hacker News Reader

Comment by ortusdux | Hacker News Reader

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There is a documented phenomenon called the Photo-Taking-Impairment Effect, where taking photos of something can reduce your ability to recall details about it at a later date. It was originally theorized that it was a sort of 'cognitive offloading', but further tests have shown that reviewing and deleting the photos does not make up for the deficit.

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S22113...

I remember finishing a complex math test in high school and checking my calculator's memory to find that I had done some rather simple single digit multiplication that I had no recollection of. Ever since then I've tried to be conscious of what I offload and what the long term consequences might be. For example, I'm confident that my ability to spell has decreased as spellcheck technology had advanced.

I'm not recommending against keeping a log. In fact I keep several myself. I use google keep for simple things that I eventually want to forget. I use anki flash cards for spaced repetition study of short concepts that I want to remember. I use oneNote for sprawling interconnected datasets. And lastly, I used waldenpond.press to print and bind stories and articles that I want to remember and revisit.

I just think that there is a risk to haphazardly externalizing more and more of your cognition. I started a new carrier 5 years ago, and found that many of my skills had atrophied over the years. I think I spent more time in my first 6 months relearning abilities I had taken for granted 10 years earlier than my new job duties.

Memorizing facts is a pointless exercise and waste of cognitive energy because there is too much information and it's easily replaced by inorganic storage media. What's more valuable than winning Jeopardy! or being a London black cab driver is 1. developing critical reasoning skills, learning skills, and mastering first principles and 2. offloading important factual details onto searchable, error-free documentation that others can use. It's far more useful and reliable than fallible, car-crash-vulnerable, knowledge-hoarding.

Crossword puzzles and memorizing lists won't stave off dementia either.

Knowing facts personally is very important. Obviously the type of facts you're describing here are usually not useful. However if I had to look up the syntax for a while loop that would be horrible! Imagine if I had to look up what looping structures were available! Your personally known set of facts is a huge factor in how effective you can be in any given endeavor

Very true. Being able to do routine things quickly and accurately without much mental effort reduces cognitive load that makes capacity available for tackling larger more complex problems. The other thing to note is that we are not only limited in size of what we can hold in our head, but also time. Not having to look up an easily found answer means that we can get to a solution before running out of time.

If you use the loops in this particular language often, then you memorize it just by practice along otherwise there is nothing wrong to look up a syntax for a language you use once in a blue moon (f.s.)

> there is nothing wrong to look up a syntax for a language you use

Of course not. My only statement was that the person who doesn't have to look it up will be (all else equal) more effective.

The effort to memorize the syntax may exceed the number of times you actually use it--wasted effort is not efficient.

This is a really great point!! It's not only about knowing facts, it's also a bit more meta and it's knowing what to know and what's worth jolting down somewhere

If you are coding in 5 different languages at work, then I am afraid you will have 5 cheatsheets open in front on you, no matter how good your memory is. Cheatsheet access can be faster than human memory access, especially for the infrequently used stuff.

> Crossword puzzles and memorizing lists won't stave off dementia either.

No, it actually will, since your brain will have more connections so it will take longer for it to degenerate to the point of dementia. So as an example, someone would develop dementia at 85, but the brain activities will push it to 20 years later, probably beyond the death point.

Disruption and creativity are often best when pulling arbitrary knowledge from between different domains/industries.

I keep a key list of links, but more importantly a strong basic reference knowledge of everything I've read, to be able to quickly find the more in-depth knowledge when needed.

What I've read is that e.g. doing Sudoku puzzles won't save you from dementia, but you'll be starting from a higher point so that you'll be older when you reach a certain diminished level than if you didn't exercise your abilities beforehand--use it or lose it (sooner).

This is why Socrates refused to write things down. As he said, writing is a crutch for memory. Just as a man who leans on crutches will have his legs atrophy, so will one who relies on writing have his recall atrophy.

I on the other hand am a prolific notetaker because my recall isn’t eidetic as it was when I was younger and I need the crutch to operate at the level I became accustomed to.

I hate when you think you've made a good point only to find that Socrates beat you to it! I think his sentiment is valuable, but I don't think that kind of extremism is the answer for most people. There is a fine line between a crutch and a ladder, and if you don't take the time to figure out which you are using you will find yourself spending more time leaning than climbing.

Crutches normally connote injury, but I bet a non-injured person who actually did athletic sports on crutches would become really dexterous with the things. Four points of contact with the ground. Or they could be used to assist when balancing.

Anyway, I don't think the crutch model is correct, even at the risk of disagreeing with Socrates. I think we just learn some way to learn, and part of that is a memorization ritual. Socrates learned to load things into his long term memory by discussing them. The vast majority of over-30 (at least) American who learned to load things into long term memory learned to do so by the ritual of writing them down with pen and paper. I'm sure there'll be a contingent who learn a ritual of typing notes.

Writing often improves memory and retention. I understand the sentiment but I believe writing something down (even in a digital way) improves recollection because of the physical movement involved which is (distinct from each written item).

A picture, and typing, is the same action regardless of the substance being captures. There is not enough uniqueness to the process to help memory. But writing I believe is.

The fact that certain skills atrophy if not used is the brain prioritizing efficient allocation of resources. If you're not making daily and active use of relevant concepts then the only way to reliably remember them is to use spaced repetition on carefully crafted question answer pairs.

Task relevant context residing in an [intermediate-term memory](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6596466/) is built up over time as you gain expertise, it's more durable than working memory but impermanent, unlike long term memory. According to this model, fine details are unfolded in working memory and details not relevant to current attentional focus shift into latent intermediate storage.

Those structures locate the expert at a point where they are quicker and more effective in solving domain relevant problems but also bias which paths are taken in problem solving (such as not noticing you're using a calculator for trivial arithmetic). It's loss is why the same person can write complex algorithms or mathematical proofs and come back months or a year later and be unable to make heads or tail of it.

It's quite likely that long term memory does not store at the same level of detail as intermediate context, relying on inference in recovering into WM. Keeping a notebook of detailed derivations of unintuitive or complex workings reduces the complexity of inference during recall and helps for more successful and reliable recovery of desiccated memories. Notes are also important for things you expect to fall out of intermediate context due to rare use but caused a great deal of headaches to solve.

Tools do have a cost but good tools are net positive. Good tools will be pivotal in an era of exponentially expanding knowledge, fixed human capacities and slowed population growth. From oral stories to books, from the abacus to computers, humans are unique among all animals in how much we extend our cognition beyond our brains.

A lot of what you're writing rings true. That is, if one is rote copying or "offloading", you're less likely to retain or truly understand material. I can certainly relate.

But on the other hand, concepts you're building up in interconnected data sets (one-note etc), or anki cards you author _yourself_ are likely forging new neural pathways via the 'generation effect'. They are more a case of 'note making' than 'note taking'. In these cases, when you're reviewing, you're likely not just recollecting random unrelated facts, but re-experiencing the understanding you built up whilst authoring.

Perhaps thats a nuance to the risk that you're highlighting: whatever the medium (anki, org-mode, etc), there are risks to our cognitive abilities atrophying over time if we skip that generation phase.

I think maybe it is underestimated how much cognitive load there is in taking a photo. All your attention is going into the act of taking the photo (is it level, is the light right, is it focused, etc.)

That and more importantly that you unconsciously aware that it's saved somewhere that you can recall / review later. So your brain doesn't store the information to long term storage.

In terms of computing, it was only stored on ram, and not going to hdd / ssd, and later will be flushed to be replaced with other info.

Which is not a bad thing if that information isn't crucial for long term.

This study is interesting, but very narrow and might not be relevant to a lot of practical situations. In particular the reverse effect is observed on other subjects, manual note taking improving memory for instance.

I think the important part here is that the “log” isn’t the goal nor something we are explicitely asked to do, but a step that comes after we experienced the work. I would compare it to taking photos of your own painting: arguably you wouldn’t be remembering a piece less because of the photo, you’ve been staring at it for hours/days in the first place.

I dont know if this is what you are talking about but I have noticed so many times that when trying to recall an event I took a photo of, first image I get in my head is that photo. I try build the rest around that photo and it only works for very old photos/memories. For recent ones (e.g. photos of my newborn) I only see the photo in my head instead of the actual visual event.

This makes me sad when I try to remember seeing him for the first time, I can only remember a few things and lots of photos. Now to mitigate that, I still take photos but avoid reviewing them immediately. I would rather go through them later when trying to recall. When I review immediately, it feels like the photo overrides the visual memory of the real event.

It's important to note that "at a later date" means 10 minutes... not exactly a longitudinal study.

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