“What societies value is what they memorize. And how they memorize it and who has access to its memorized form determines who has power.”
We’re starting to become a society that “memorizes” private facts — not just public records being written down, but private thoughts, dreams and wishes.
“Living largely in a world of expensive written material and seeking to build a private database of things experienced and learned, early modern Europeans built in their minds memory palaces — imaginary rooms furnished with complex bric-a-brac and decorations. . . By walking through the rooms of the memory palace in their minds, [they] remembered things they needed to know.”
Photographs took a factual and emotional snapshot of experience and put it into a form that could be held and shared, unlike a memory palace.
“The private photograph isn’t private any more.”
I can’t do Eben’s speech justice. I will post the video when I get to it, but he’s really saying some great stuff about privacy.
“What societies value is what they memorize. And how they memorize it and who has access to its memorized form determines who has power.”
We’re starting to become a society that “memorizes” private facts — not just public records being written down, but private thoughts, dreams and wishes.
“Living largely in a world of expensive written material and seeking to build a private database of things experienced and learned, early modern Europeans built in their minds memory palaces — imaginary rooms furnished with complex bric-a-brac and decorations. . . By walking through the rooms of the memory palace in their minds, [they] remembered things they needed to know.”
Photographs took a factual and emotional snapshot of experience and put it into a form that could be held and shared, unlike a memory palace.
“The private photograph isn’t private any more.”
I can’t do Eben’s speech justice. I will post the video when I get to it, but he’s really saying some great stuff about privacy.