Photographic Memory: What Is It Like?

[En_lizard]

how is it like?

 

[DaveC426913]

What is the phone number of the house where you grew up? Do you remember it? I remember mine, though it's been 35 years.

I don't think photographic memory is really any different than the rest of us, they just don't have any trouble recalling things.

But that's just MHO.

 

[NateTG]

I don't think that people with photographic memory really exist. Rather, there are people who have more sophisticated memory techniques.

To test this, you could, for example, generate a screen of characters (80x25=2000) which are all either 1 or 0, and see if anyone can reproduce it. As the numbers become less random i.e. more compressible, you should see people able to remember better.

I remember the phone number of some of the houses that I grew up in. However, I don't remember any of my college telephone numbers.

 

[Evo]

We've already discussed this here. https://www.physicsforums.com/showthread.php?p=147034

I have a link to this paper in that thread.

Imagine being able to memorize an entire sheet of Russian vocabulary, a list of math equations, or the window arrangement on a large building just by observing it for a few seconds. These are the abilities associated with eidetic imagery, more commonly known as photographic memory. Eidetic imagery has been defined as "the ability to retain an accurate, detailed visual image of a complex scene or pattern... or see an image that is an exact copy of the original sensory experience" (1). People capable of eidetic memory, or eidetikers, are therefore able to recall vivid images within their mind and examine these images as one would examine a photograph.