clair073

In ancient times the ability to memorize was a prized skill. Whole cultures were passed down through the centuries by those who remembered the stories, legends, history, and taboos and laws. The advent of the printing press launched a new era of “looking things up.” Today, the Internet and its search engines may seem to be making memorization irrelevant in the modern world. What we don’t remember, we think we can always look up. Schools have generally abandoned requiring students to memorize poems, famous speeches, multiplication tables, and all sorts of academic material that used to be ingrained in the curriculum. A growing disdain for memorization emerged among the other intellectually damaging effects of post-modernism. Now the emphasis in education is on new math, critical thinking, inquiry learning, “hands-on” activity, and the like. There is nothing wrong with these new emphases, except that they come at the expense of children learning the mental discipline of memorization. Tea...

Deterioration of the brain sneaks up on most of us. The first clue might be hearing loss, especially in the higher frequencies. We may be forced into bifocals, even trifocals. But the most serious signs of deterioration occur in the brain. As we age, our reflexes slow. We walk and act slower. We even talk slower. Our memory starts to fail, especially the short-term form of memory ability that is so crucial for learning new things. Brain-scan technology reveals aging can cause the brain to shrink. Nerve tracts in the brain shrivel, making the cerebrospinal fluid cavities larger and even leaving gaping holes in the brain. Shriveling occurs in the neuron terminal branches that form the contact points among neurons. People may lose 40% or more of dopamine neurons causing Parkinson’s disease. These are brutal truths. Whole societies are being affected in major economic and social ways in countries where the population is aging rapidly, such as Japan (23% over 65), Germany (20.5%), Italy (20...