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Engineering Memory: On learning to memorize first 100 digits of pi (2024)

66 points · 39 comments · fuzzythinker

  1. nickcw · · focus · HN ↗
    I know pi to 50 places learned through lots of repetition. I've always been good at remembering numbers though.

    I don't find the memory palace tricks helpful at all though. I think that is a consequence of my Aphantasia and something I only realised recently. I can't visualise a memory palace so placing things in it is impossible!

    1. abecedarius · · focus · HN ↗
      Is there "benchmark data" on different memory techniques? I also wondered about this because I also memorized 50 digits on a lark back in high school, without the post's encoding technique and memory palace.

      I added one block of 10 digits per night, spending maybe 10 minutes per night? Very roughly an hour total, ~same as the poster spent to get 100 digits, but without the prior investment they spent on the PAO (memorizing 300 key-value pairs, apparently).

      You'd want to compare to Anki, too.

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