Memory is Changing ??

Memory is changing. ?? That's problematic for creativity. I'm figuring out what's happening to my memory—I see patterns and new ways to address creative thought.

Here's what I've learned. ??

Studies have shown, through neuroimaging of frequent internet users, that people have twice the activity in the short term memory as sporadic users during online tasks.

We're connecting fewer dots in the process.

Our brain is learning to disregard information, and this connection becomes stronger every time we experience it.

The more we use Google, the less likely we are to retain what we see in memory. Our long term memory, known as semantic memory, is morphing.

Studies have also shown people have become more likely to remember where these facts could be retrieved rather than the facts themselves, indicating that people quickly become reliant on the Internet for information retrieval.

Creative thought requires knowhow and resilience.

When general knowledge can be acquired through the internet, our brains rely less on storing information. How is creative resilience built when there's no record kept in the brain? How do we connect the dots?

"When you ask creative people how they did something, they feel a little guilty because they didn't really do it, they just saw something. It seemed obvious to them after a while. That's because they were able to connect experiences they've had and synthesize new things." 

I believe we're forming new memory systems that use online information.

Similar to how people remember long strings of numbers like pi, we are developing memory patterns that help us build on top of complex ideas. It's a personal Dewey Decimal system.

I see curious people, who use Google effectively, come up with new ideas quickly.

They use a process that separates them from average people—they hacked their unconscious memory to gain knowhow without specific memories. They connect dots that don't exist yet.

I believe these people have primed their unconscious brain to create a set of pointers, or virtual folders, that informs their short term memory to use online information to direct our long term, explicit memory.

These thinkers do not retrieve information though— they use a system, look at the possible answers, synthesize real-time, and balance contradictory ideas from multiple sources to generate new possibilities.

It's a creative activity that uses short term memory.

I haven't come across a label. I'm calling it exothinking-

• uses system thinking
• uses a set of principles and values
• uses the internet as information storage
• uses dialectic thinking to hold ideas together
• uses abductive reasoning and synthesis to understand

Bryan Zmijewski—On a journey to make creative decisions more effective, satisfying, and rewarding. Husband. Dad. Designer. Chief Instigator ZURB since 1998. Try https://helio.app

Follow him at @bryanzmijewski, or send him a note at [email protected]