Stay Curious. Stay Connected.
MailNewsletters♡Donate Now
Sign up
*Password must be at least 8 characters and contain one uppercase letter, one lowercase letter, one number and one symbol.
Already have an account?
By submitting, you consent that you are at least 18 years of age and to receive information about MPR's or APMG entities' programs and offerings. The personally identifying information you provide will not be sold, shared, or used for purposes other than to communicate with you about MPR, APMG entities, and its sponsors. You may opt-out at any time clicking the unsubscribe link at the bottom of any email communication. View our Privacy Policy.
Sign in to your profile
Forgot Password?
New to MPR News?
Welcome back
to news
for you
Reset Password

Enter the username on file and we'll send you a code to reset your password.

Still require assistance or not sure what your User Name is?
Welcome back
to news
for you
Email Verification

A verification code has been emailed to

Still awaiting the code?
MPR News Presents

Aspen Ideas Festival: Joshua Foer on 'The Art and Science of Remembering Everything'

Joshua Foer
Science journalist Joshua Foer used special "memory goggles" and earphones to become U.S. memory champion. He detailed his road to the competition in his book "Moonwalking with Einstein."
MPR Photo/Steve Mullis

Go Deeper.

Create an account or log in to save stories.

Log inCreate a free Account

Like this?

Thanks for liking this story! We have added it to a list of your favorite stories.

Show me!

Science journalist Joshua Foer has studied techniques for improving your memory. Humans have great visual and spatial memory, and if we simply pay attention we can remember a lot more.

The author of "Moonwalking with Einstein: The Art and Science of Remembering Everything,” Joshua Foer says the tricks for improving memory go back to Greek and Roman times. “These tools were invented in antiquity specifically for remembering speeches. These were the tools of oratory and rhetoric.”

The great orator of the Roman republic, Cicero, reportedly used a good trick for remembering what you want to say in public. Don’t write it all out, but “create an image of every topic you want to address, and make a blueprint.”

In his research, Foer discovered that we are better able to remember information that is concrete, not abstract. And “we have amazing visual and spatial memories… so we should use them.”

Studying the techniques of “memory champions,” Foer found that it helps to create a “network of meaning, or associational hooks” to remember names, faces, and other things. To remember things in everyday life, it’s important to make connections meaningful, and “tethered” in some way.

He shares three tricks for remembering names and faces:

1) Pay attention. These tricks only work if you pay attention. And it takes work.

2) Associate the name with a physical presence (create an image).

3) Associate the person or face with somebody famous.

Humans are able to remember words to songs, even when parts of the brain are damaged, because “music is a structuring device. It has rhythm, meter and rhyme.”

Joshua Foer spoke June 26, 2019 at the Aspen Ideas Festival in Colorado.