We were talking on the phone and tried to recall something trivial....who played Captain Kirk...we BOTH said....darn...I know who you mean. And of course we could picture him.
We dropped it and went on to our next subject...all of a sudden, it was like pulling a card out of an index file....and I could see the name William.
Then my bud chimed in.....Shatner.
And that's what happens when you're old.
I believe we actually shove trivia into a trivia file when we get older and THAT'S WHY it takes so long to recover...it's in the brain's junk drawer.
Sherlock Holmes had an encyclopedic memory for things that were of interest to him and his work. But, Watson noted, he was studiously ignorant of many other things that were to him irrelevant. Holmes thought of the mind as a library with only so much capacity, which he wished to reserve for items of meaning.
On a lower level, Kelly of “Married With Children” had limited memory capacity. Her brother Bud noted that when she was full, any additional added fact meant that one would fall out... she’d forget something to compensate. Like “who scored four touchdowns in a Polk High football game.” FIFO.
I think the brain acts like a computer in other ways too.
For example did you ever stand over someone shoulder while they are operating the computer and mouse and YOU can see where to point and click but it takes them along time to find what is so obvious to you
And if you switch places its the same for them watching you..
I think it shows the brain is multi-tasking by time slicings- and when you are only WATCHING you are doing less than the person sitting down trying to operat all 10 fingers and read and write at the same time...
“Then my bud chimed in.....Shatner.”
Actually, the correct answer is Chris Pine. Chris Pine. :-).
Before Star Trek fans collectively kill me for that comment, I really hope I am still applying serious mathematics when I hit your age :-). I just fear that with the current trajectory society is following, I’ll be discarded in another 25 years or so :-).
At 63 I think that I have a quite large junk drawer.