Ask MetaFilter questions tagged with mnemonics

SuPerman is Prone, waterSlides are Supine is just not working for me.

thebrokedown — Wed, 24 Jun 2009 10:35:22 -0800

Help me with a mnemonic device to remember that "prone" is face down, "supine" is face up.

Got Any Mathematical Mnemonics?

Proginoskes — Thu, 28 Aug 2008 12:12:15 -0800

Do you have some mnemonic you came up with to help memorize formulas or concepts in mathematics (particularly for university math)? Or was there a different way of looking at a concept that really helped it sink in? I'm looking for things that you might have come up with yourself that aren't so common or widely used. For example, when I was trying to memorize the formula for integration by parts, I always thought about the fact that uv was like "uv rays" and vdu sounded like "video." Or, when I learned about span, the professor compared vectors to colours and said that the span of "red" and "yellow" would include all the shades of orange.

In fourteen hundred ninety-two, Columbus sailed the ocean blue, and other mnemonic devices wanted. Apply within.

iamkimiam — Mon, 15 Oct 2007 17:09:30 -0800

In fourteen hundred ninety-two, Columbus sailed the ocean blue. Great, Columbus=1492, got it. What else you know? I'm looking for silly and/or clever ways to remember history. As I'm getting older, I'm finding that I often horribly embarrass myself with my appalling knowledge of history and events. My problem is that I can't seem to retain the information. I've had the Middle-east conflicts summarized and explained to me several times. I've read about wars in various contexts. I've learned all the capitals, world leaders, evolutionary timelines, biblical events...repeatedly. It just doesn't stick.

However, you play me the first two bars of any song and I can tell you the entire lyrics. I must know 10,000 songs, but can't name 10 presidents. Acronyms stick too. I will go to my grave knowing exactly who ROY G. BIV is referring to. Or that Kings Play Chess On Fine Grained Sand. Ask me to name a king and I'm stumped.

I'm looking for mnemonic devices, acronyms, poems, songs, quotes or other things that could help me remember historical events. Things that are memorable, catchy, contextual, or otherwise clever.

No events are off limits here. Bring me your religion, your human evolution, your historical obscurity. Painfully obvious historical references will be just as valued as well.

Other examples of the type of information I'm seeking:

The States Song (I don't actually know it, but I know there is one)

The President's Song (ditto)

Oh how sad, I can't even come up with a third example. Allow me to repeat myself. "In fourteen hundred ninety-two, Columbus sailed the ocean blue."

Thanks! I'm sure I'll be singing (and smart) in no time.

mnemonic way to memorize amendments

bkpr — Mon, 12 Mar 2007 18:44:45 -0800

I am looking for a mnemonic device (?) to remember the 27 U.S. Constitutional Amendments? Thanks!

Help me find a Major/Phonetic system mnemonic program for OSX! or Help me compile & run this mnemonic program that I've been assured cannot be run in OSX!

sdis — Thu, 06 Oct 2005 21:12:46 -0800

Help me find a Major/Phonetic system mnemonic program for OSX! **or** Help me compile & run this mnemonic program that I've been assured *cannot* be run in OSX! I'm trying to get a program running on my computer to help with the Major System aka the Phonetic System. (Info at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Major_system) (It's basically a mnemonic system that turns numbers into consonant sounds that you can make words out of. "Toads", for example is t/d[1] t/d[1] s/z[0] = 110. Computer programs help in this endeavor, because it is easy to convert a given number into consonant sounds (1973 = t/d-p/b-k/g-m) but it's relatively difficult to turn those sounds into a word. (tabegim? tipkem?) Programs can be made to search an english dictionary for appropriate words.

So far, it appears Mnemisis (http://mnemisis.sourceforge.net/ ) is my best/only bet. However, when I try to configure it, this occurs:

% ./configure
loading cache ./config.cache
checking for c++... c++
checking whether the C++ compiler (c++ ) works... yes
checking whether the C++ compiler (c++ ) is a cross-compiler... no
checking whether we are using GNU C++... yes
checking whether c++ accepts -g... yes
checking how to run the C++ preprocessor... c++ -E
checking for ctype.h... yes
checking for regex.h... yes
checking for stdlib.h... yes
checking for streambuf.h... no
configure: error: couldn't find needed C header for back end

streambuf.h is on my system in the /backward directory, and has, from what I understand, been flagged by Apple as a broken header file. As I've heard, the solution is an update to Mnemesis, but this seems unlikely, since Mnemesis was last updated in 2003.

Songs to Remember Math

adamkempa — Wed, 14 Apr 2004 12:54:43 -0800

I've recently been asking people how they learned the quadratic equation (self link). A large percentage of people appear to have learned it to the tune of a familiar melody. I've heard from people who learned it to all sorts of different tunes, including Pop Goes the Weasel, God Rest ye Merry gentlemen, and various University fight songs (UofM and Notre Dame so far...) How about you? Did you learn it with music? What song? [Excuse the self link - I genuinely just want to know if there are other variations, this isn't a sad plea for traffic.]