yes i know this is off-topic but... how many digits of Pi can you recite from memory? How long do you think it would it take you to memorize the first 1000 digits?

It's not that hard actually, the system allows for you to easily memorize 1000 words, numbers, etc.

They have memory competitions where you have to remember as many random numbers as possible in less than 60 minutes. You are presented with 4000 random numbers and are supposed to memorize as many as you can.

I would say if its your just getting used to using a memory system, it would take 2-3 hours to memorize the first 1000 digits of Pi. For me I would guess between an hour to an hour and a half to memorize it. The current record for memorizing random digits in less than 60 minutes is 1,920 digits - which works out to about one digit per second.

Currently the world record holder for memorizing digits to Pi is a man in Japan, he recited over 70,000 digits of Pi without a single mistake.

This may be of interest to you Lucid. People who use memory systems upon having the brains scanned show only a small region of activation, whereas the control subjects have shown much larger regions of activation. These are Brain Scans taken from Scott Hagwood (a memory grandmaster) and Dr. Burdette.

Doctor Burdette


Scott Hagwood


As you can see, the memory grandmaster has a much smaller area of activation when using a memory system, compared to the doctor who acted as the control subject and used no memory system.

this is similar to scans examining fluency and competence. The more competent and fluent individuals will almost invariably display small BOLD activations compared to controls who are not fluent or competent. It's a somewhat counter-intuitive result, but it has been suggested that the greater activation in non-fluent or incompetent people is due to extraneous activation of unnecessary brain regions or resources. Perhaps this greater activation is what is associated with "effort", where skilled people performs things "effortlessly", which is reflected in lower BOLD activations on their task.