9 ms·
I tweeted about this yesterday, from the article: > "Students remembered 57 per cent ... written in Sans Forgetica, compared to 50 per cent .... in Ariel" 7%
by liamzebedee 8y ago
I tweeted about this yesterday, from the article:
> "Students remembered 57 per cent ... written in Sans Forgetica, compared to 50 per cent .... in Ariel"
7% delta retention isn't so much, is it?
- tudelo 8y agoI honestly will take 7% less retention to not have to look at this font any longer than I have to...
- deleted 8y ago[deleted]
- curiousgal 8y agoHey, it's based on "the principles of cognitive psychology", a field that's renown for its accuracy and reproducibility.
- unit91 8y agoYeah, they should rename it "Sans Scientifica".
- HarryHirsch 8y agoHow about litteræ pinguis serpentis?
- unit91 8y agoBeen a long time since my Latin days and there's so much nominative/genitive overlap in those words I can't figure it out. "Writings of a fat snake" or something, I don't know. Help? :-)
- HarryHirsch 8y agoIt's "snake oil font". littera is a letter, and I hope that the plural form means "font" or "script". But litteræ definitely means "science" as well, so that's OK. Tufts University has Lewis & Short online: http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/resolveform?redirect=true&lang=Latin http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/resolveform?redirect=tru...
- jaclaz 8y agoI would have used oleum instead of pinguis, which is more like "grease", I believe: https://books.google.it/books?id=pdFLAAAAcAAJ&pg=PA85&lpg=PA85&dq=oleum+serpentis&source=bl&ots=-MFtNmrpqQ&sig=Sxea6rurYnBkw-Bnhbhx9vbux5s&hl=it&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwiYw-myvu3dAhWhyoUKHVkgAW8Q6AEIIDAF#v=onepage&q=oleum%20serpentis&f=false https://books.google.it/books?id=pdFLAAAAcAAJ&pg=PA85&lpg=PA...
- HarryHirsch 8y agoGood question. Is oleum used for liquid fat, no matter the source, or is it confined to plant-based oils? pinguis has definite animalistic qualities. You'd think it was oleum nucis indicæ [1], not pinguis nucis indicæ, except when used in a metaphorical manner. Paging Reginald Foster, Father Reginald please! [1] nux indica is the coconut
- Camillo 8y agoPinguis isn't even a noun, is it? I think it's an adjective.
- jaclaz 8y agoPinguis can be a name alright besides an adjective, but it is more "fat": http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/morph?l=pinguis&la=la&can=pinguis0#lexicon http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/morph?l=pinguis&la=la&ca... I provided the link to google books to the Liber fundamentorum pharmacologia only to show that oleum serpentis was actually an ancient remedy, of course the Latin of a book translated from medieval Persian might be not exactly Cicero, still it should be much better than any translation I can do. But most probably oleum was a synonym of olive or however vegetable oil in ancient Rome, and it is entirely possible that the actual Persian medicine was the extract of some plant and only called serpentis. On the other hand, besides the name, we don't actually know if snake oil is actually made of snake oil or snake fat or something else.
- jschulenklopper 8y agoI found the name "Sans Forgetica" well-chosen though. I'll remember that name for quite some time...
- slg 8y agoYou also have to factor in reading speed. If you can remember 7% more but end up reading more than 14% slower, you are better off reading more (or rereading) with the lower 50% retention rate.
- moate 8y agoThat's not entirely valid. There is SOME number where it may not be beneficial because another learning technique would be more efficient, but having to read slower isn't a problem of itself if there goal is simply "get better at retaining this information". Also, there's a certain point where the delta is relevant enough to justify the extra effort invested (things involving safety/security for example).
- miranda_rights 8y agoI rarely re-read things, at least immediately. If it's something interesting (e.g. a link from HN), I'll bookmark it and hopefully come back to it later, but I frequently never get back to it. Something that forces me to stop skimming & forgetting would be helpful.
- slg 8y agoDoesn't "get better at retaining this information" have an inherent assumption of "in a certain amount of time"? If not, you could always just keep rereading the text until you memorize it.
- moate 8y agoYes, but that's included in my point. Maybe the slow-reading with this font is less overall time than the number of rereads required in order to hit the same retention levels. It's also possible that reading something slower allows for greater mental association or memory building than just speed reading something 10 times. There's a bunch of reasons why this could be either better or worse, depending on a myriad of different factors. I think it's a cool tool to have in your kit.
- bluetwo 8y agoDepends on size of population.
- gowld 8y agoWhat is "Ariel"? Mermaid language?