Comments on: Remember Any Number With the Major Memory System

By: Luciano Passuello

Luciano Passuello — Thu, 10 Sep 2009 13:18:35 +0000

Another idea you might want to try: instead of making the decimal point an object to peg (like the numbers), you could make it an event in your association chain. Treat it like separator in your story. You could, for example, make a lightning bolt strike every time you need the decimal point. That may integrate better in the ’story’ you’re telling yourself for the number.

I confess that I never tried this idea — it just occurred to me. I also admit that I never used a decimal point in the major system, but that’s not because I don’t see value in it, but because I didn’t need it yet.

Thanks for your great input Adam and David!

By: David M.

David M. — Mon, 07 Sep 2009 02:39:09 +0000

Wow!!! A black hole is great for a decimal.

I used a picture of a hay bale since H A & Y all have no value in the phonetic system.

A friend of mine suggested an eyeball, however this could conflict with my peg for the alphabet letter I.

Any other suggestions for a way to visualize a decimal from other users of the system??

Dave

By: Adam Rulli-Gibbs

Adam Rulli-Gibbs — Fri, 04 Sep 2009 22:34:28 +0000

Personally, I usually use a black hole as an encoding for a decimal point but, depending on how you view it, you could use anything round, anything tiny, anything pointy etc.

It’s also useful to have an encoding for the minus sign used to signify negative numbers. Also, depending on what you need to memorise, perhaps for standard scientific form e.g. 1.2345x(10^23) or 1.2345E23. I tend to use the image of a military standard for that (and of course you don’t need to encode the decimal point in that case because you know it should always be after the first digit.

In fact, one (of many) of my pet peeves about those who regurgitate the same old information on mnemonics all over the web without understanding how it all fits together, (obviously that doesn’t include Luciano), is that they only ever seem to consider positive integers worth memorising.

Adam (remarkablemarbles.com)

By: Dave M

Dave M — Fri, 04 Sep 2009 16:28:28 +0000

How do you handle a decimal in the system.
Sometimes I know where it goes, but others i do not.

I have visualized hay for a decimal.

What do others use?

pharmd_director

By: used vans

used vans — Wed, 05 Aug 2009 09:56:08 +0000

This seems like a really long-winded way to go about remembering numbers to me…and i’m not sure it would work for me, being an audio learner as opposed to visual.

By: Luciano Passuello

Luciano Passuello — Mon, 27 Jul 2009 13:02:01 +0000

Wow, I have never thought about using pictures in a multiplication table! That sound like a promising idea!

The link to the video didn’t get included in your comment. Would you mind posting it again? Thanks!

By: Plat4M

Plat4M — Sun, 26 Jul 2009 02:19:36 +0000

Hi everybody! Thanks for providing that information about the memory table, just crossed my mind about a multiplication grid table where numbers on each cell is replace by a picture.
that could help in multiplying numbers by looking at the big picture from above.

check out this Rudiger Gamm video:

By: Vottivott

Vottivott — Tue, 07 Jul 2009 22:01:16 +0000

Some years ago my grandfather gave me a really old book including this system and much more. This system is really great! After learning this system by reading my grandfather’s book my brother actually memorized 5,000 decimal digits of pi ;D

By: Luciano Passuello

Luciano Passuello — Tue, 23 Jun 2009 14:15:14 +0000

Getting started using the Major System may seem overwhelming to many, so tools like the Memory System trainer are definitely welcome — thanks for sharing!

Regarding your comment about chaining images, I agree with you — one should be careful not to ‘hard code’ associations into the system.

That’s why I like to keep the Major System as just an additional layer on top of other memory systems — a “translation aid” for dealing with numbers, nothing more.

By: Adam Rulli-Gibbs

Adam Rulli-Gibbs — Tue, 23 Jun 2009 08:05:14 +0000

Great explanation of the Major System Luciano.

One thing that I particularly liked about it, that I think perhaps should be made explicit, is that you didn’t chain together images from the Major System. If you’re in the habit of chaining encoding images you eventually end up with multiple visualisations hanging off various images making it difficult to know which visualisation you should be pursuing in any particular case. This “interference” makes long term memorisation more difficult.

Instead, you used the Major System purely as an encoding system, used the Memory Palace (a.k.a Method of Loci, Journey, Roman Room) as a “trigger” system, and of course the old favourite visualisation to link the trigger to the encoding.

It wasn’t up and running at when this post went up but, if anybody is interested in using the Major System but is finding it difficult to put in the effort to personalise and/or train on it I have a personalisable Memory System trainer on my site at

http://www.remarkablemarbles.c.....em-trainer

(Incidentally, my wife is also Italian with dual citizenship. She is now a Britizen (poor thing). Here’s hoping our children grow up with better Italian than mine and congrats on your English – as with my wife’s, it is spot on.)