Just As We Accumulate Memories Of Facts

It Is Forgetting, Not Remembering, That Is The Essence Of What Makes Us Human. To Make Sense Of The World, We Must Filter It. "to Think," Borges Writes, "is To Forget.

Back When I Lived In Brooklyn, I'd Sometimes Take The Q Train All The Way Out To Coney Island And Back, And Work On My Laptop. There's Something About Pushy New Yorkers Looking Over Your Shoulder That Really Makes You Produce Sentences.

During The Middle Ages They Understood That Words Accompanied By Imagery Are Much More Memorable. By Making The Margins Of A Book Colorful And Beautiful, Illuminations Help Make The Text Unforgettable. It's Unfortunate That We've Lost The Art Of Illumination.

The Art And Science Of Memory Is About Developing The Capacity To Quickly Create Images That Link Disparate Ideas. Creativity Is The Ability To Form Similar Connections Between Disparate Images And To Create Something New And Hurl It Into The Future So It Becomes A Poem, Or A Building, Or A Dance, Or A Novel. Creativity Is, In A Sense, Future Memory.

Evolution Has Programmed Our Brains To Find Two Things Particularly Interesting, And Therefore Memorable: Jokes And Sex - And Especially, It Seems, Jokes About Sex.