Umberto Eco on why you need to develop memory and why its weakness - our curse

Umberto Eco, Italian writer and philosopher, wrote a startling for its wisdom and depth of a letter, which is addressed to his grandson. It's called "My dear grandson, teach by rote". The main idea in it that we suffer from poor memory and create our own, instead of her workout, crutches as Google, gadgets and various web services.

We limit the life of their own and ignore the experience of past generations. Read it thoroughly and to admit that the memory you need to do something and it's not a matter of utilitarian, it is a question of understanding the world and what is happening in it. It is a matter of survival!

There will come a day, and you grow old, but you will feel that I have lived a thousand lives, as if you took part in the Battle of Waterloo, was present at the murder of Julius Caesar visited the place where Berthold Schwarz, mixing in a mortar and various substances in an attempt to get gold, accidentally invented gunpowder and flew in the air (and it serves him right!) And your other friends, not seeking to enrich their memory will live only one's own life, monotonous and devoid of big emotions.

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I would like to talk to you about the diseaseThat struck your previous generation, which is already studying at universities. I say the loss of memory.

The memory is like muscles - it is necessary to train

It is true that if you want to find out who or where Charlemagne is Kuala Lumpur, you can press the button and immediately learn everything from the Internet. Do it when you have to, but get help, try to remember its contents, so as not to look for a second time when this knowledge you will need in school, for example. The bad news is that the understanding of what a computer can at any time to answer your question, discourages you wish to memorize the information.

This phenomenon can result in the following comparison: to learn that from one street to the other can be reached at bus or subway, which is very convenient in the case of hurry, a man decides that he no longer needed to go foot. But if you stop walking, then turn into a person who has to move around in a wheelchair. Oh, I know what you're doing sports and know how to control his body, but go back to your brain.

Memory is like the muscles of your feet. If you stop her exercise, it will become flabby and you (we say without equivocation) turn into an idiot. In addition, we all run the risk of old age Alzheimer's disease, and one way to avoid this trouble is to constantly exercise our memory.

Extend the brain due to exercise

Every morning, learn some short poem as forced us to do as a child. You can arrange a competition with your friends for the best memory. If you do not like poetry, you can memorize the composition of football teams, but you must know the players not only commands the Club of Rome, but also to other players on the team, as well as their composition in the past tenses (present, that I remember the names of the players of the Turin club, who were on board the plane that crashed on the hill of Superga: Paolo Bacigalupi, Ballarin, and so marozi Further).

Compete to see who is better remember the content of the books they read (who was on board the "Hispaniola", went in search of Treasure Island? Lord Trelawney, Captain Smollett, Dr. Livesey, John Silver, Jim ...) Find out if your friends are servants of the names of the three Musketeers and D'Artagnan remembered (Grimaud, Bazin, Blunderbuss and Planchet)... And if you do not want to read "The Three Musketeers" (although you do not know what is lost), then do a similar game with the book that you I read.

It seems the game, so this is a game, but you will see how your head is filled with characters, stories and a variety of memories.

You may ask why once the computer called an electronic brain. This is because it was designed on the model of your (our) brain, but the human brain - more connections than the computer.

Brain - is a computer that is always with you, its ability to expand as a result of exercise, and your desktop computer after prolonged use loses speed and after a few years, requires replacement. And your brain can last you up to 90 years, and in ninety years, if you exercise it, you'll remember more than you remember right now. He, moreover, is free.

See what happened before you were born, to better understand the present

Is there some more historical memoryWhich is not connected with the facts of your life or that you have read. It stores the events that happened before you were born.

Today, if you go to the cinema, you must come to the beginning of the film. When the film begins, then you like all the time lead by the hand, explaining what is happening. In my time it was possible to enter the cinema at any time, even in the middle of the film. A lot of events happened before you came, and I had to conjecture what happened earlier. When the film first began, you could see if your correct reconstruction. If you liked the movie, you could stay and watch it again.

Life reminds watching a movie in my time.

We are born at a time when there was already a lot of events for hundreds of thousands of years, and it is important to understand what happened before we were born. This is in order to better understand why today there are so many new developments.

Today, the school (in addition to your own circle reading) would teach you to remember what happened before you were born, but she does not succeed. Various surveys show that today's youth, even university, born in 1990, does not know, and, perhaps, he does not want to know about what happened in 1980, not to mention the fact that it was 50 years ago ago. Statistics says that when young people are asked who the Aldo Moro, they respond that he led the "Red Brigades", and he was killed by members of the underground leftist organization.

The activity of "Red Brigades" for many remains a mystery, but because they were present on the political scene only thirty years ago. I was born in 1932, ten years after the Nazis came to power, but I knew who was prime minister during the march on Rome. Maybe in Nazi school told me about it, to explain how stupid and bad was the Minister ( "cowardly Fact"), offset by the Nazis. Even so, I knew about it.

But let us leave aside the school. Today's young people do not know actresses movie twenty years ago, and I knew who this Francesca Bertini, who starred in silent films for twenty years before I was born. Maybe it was because I was flipping through old magazines piled in the closet of our house. I suggest you flip through old magazines, because it helps to understand what happened before you were born.

Why is it important to know about the events of the distant past

Because often such knowledge helps to understand the course of current events and in any case, knowledge of the composition of football teams, helping to enrich our memory.

Bear in mind that you can train your memory not only through books and magazines, but also through the Internet. It is suitable not only to chat with your friends, but also for the study of world history. Who are the Hittites and Camisard? What were the three ships of Columbus? When the dinosaurs became extinct? Was the wheel on Noah's ark? What was the name of the bull ancestor? One hundred years ago, more than vodilos tigers than they are now? What do you know about the Mali Empire? Who told her? Who was the second pope in history? When was created Mickey Mouse?

I could go on asking questions indefinitely, and they would be perfect subjects for the study. All of this should be remembered. There will come a day, and you grow old, but you will feel that I have lived a thousand lives, as if you took part in the Battle of Waterloo, was present at the murder of Julius Caesar visited the place where Berthold Schwarz, mixing in a mortar and various substances in an attempt to get gold, accidentally invented gunpowder and blew up (and it serves him it is necessary!). And your other friends, do not seek to enrich their memory will live only one's own life, monotonous and devoid of big emotions.

So enrich your memory and tomorrow learned about memory «La Vispa Teresa».

Transfer letters Umberto Eco Run of site New York Times.