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You probably already know this, but of course the companion trivia there is that chess masters' incredible recall for board positions only works for realistic l

You probably already know this, but of course the companion trivia there is that chess masters' incredible recall for board positions only works for realistic layouts - when tested on randomly placed pieces, masters apparently remember them no better than beginners. If basketball is analogous, one could suppose that (A) there may not be anything special about LeBron's memory per se - e.g. he might remember the plays in a cricket match as poorly as anyone else - and (B) it argues that on the court LeBron is thinking out the game, and the implications of each exchange, in a way comparable to how chess masters think out moves (and he probably puts similar mental effort into the other pursuits the article describes).

FPGAhacker 8y ago
I have heard, though no citations, a psychologist or two on podcasts say that memories as we commonly understand them are reconstructions from fragments and snapshots. If one accepts that hypothesis then it would make sense that you can reconstruct more accurately things that behave according to a fixed and small set of rules that you understand thoroughly and intuitively. *small relative to the universe of rules outside of things like chess and basketball.
philwelch 8y ago
While true, there are also stories about LeBron having remarkable memory for non-basketball-related details, like remembering the color of the shirt a journalist was wearing the first time they met several years ago.
jmulho 8y ago
This is presumably because the chess master understands the position. I see three pawns, a king, a rook, and a knight. The chess master sees a castled king. I see 30 pieces all over the board. The master sees the Sicilian Dragon Harrington-Glek variation. I have no idea what happened next. I see eight candidate moves. The master sees three but knows that only one will make this particular opponent uncomfortable. With this level of understanding, it is way easier for the master to remember the game.
- jimbokun 8y ago
  It's like a compression algorithm, eliminating redundant details.

FPGAhacker 8y ago

I have heard, though no citations, a psychologist or two on podcasts say that memories as we commonly understand them are reconstructions from fragments and snapshots. If one accepts that hypothesis then it would make sense that you can reconstruct more accurately things that behave according to a fixed and small set of rules that you understand thoroughly and intuitively. *small relative to the universe of rules outside of things like chess and basketball.

philwelch 8y ago

While true, there are also stories about LeBron having remarkable memory for non-basketball-related details, like remembering the color of the shirt a journalist was wearing the first time they met several years ago.

jmulho 8y ago

This is presumably because the chess master understands the position. I see three pawns, a king, a rook, and a knight. The chess master sees a castled king. I see 30 pieces all over the board. The master sees the Sicilian Dragon Harrington-Glek variation. I have no idea what happened next. I see eight candidate moves. The master sees three but knows that only one will make this particular opponent uncomfortable. With this level of understanding, it is way easier for the master to remember the game.

jimbokun 8y ago
It's like a compression algorithm, eliminating redundant details.