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> Problem with paper is that it's not searchable, as I discovered to my cost trying to find some specific reference details for a job I did last year and am rep
by jeromenerf 6y ago
> Problem with paper is that it's not searchable, as I discovered to my cost trying to find some specific reference details for a job I did last year and am repeating today.
Our brain works wonders, yet mysteriously.
I can somehow locate notes I wrote by hand on notebooks years ago. I remember the sketches, the color and size of the notebook, the location on the shelves ... and sometimes, finding the note isn’t important because I have actually memorized it.
It could a visual memory thing, reinforced by 20+ years of pen and paper school system. Were I 20 years younger and having been taught on tablets/xxx, I could have developed a different long term memory system. As of today, writing down notes on my computer feels like offloading my brain to disk. When writing notes of paper/iPad, it feels like writing to my brain.
- bnj 6y agoI definitely agree that our brains work wonders and I'm not denying the main point you're making at all, but there is also an element of confirmation bias inherent here because you'll never look for the notes you don't remember taking. Going over old notebooks I've been astonished at the patterns I've uncovered of thinking about similar ideas and having similar insights over and over, each time not recalling that I've been on the same path at an earlier time.
- jeromenerf 6y agoOh you are right for sure but it’s a whole different point. I don’t know how our memory works and I guess our passion / interest plays an important part, as your conscious thoughts revisits those subjects as a routine. I am just noticing how the multidimensional characteristics of hand written notes seem to provide “more ways” to search and explore our memory. Just like having both a spatial and a full text indices.