Memory

What exactly is a memory?  I find it interesting that what we are talking about in class is the process of how to remember and specifically what a memory is.  I guess this might lead discussion toward a more philosophical and rhetorical end, but I still find the subject note-worthy. 

Is a memory simple a stored image of items and events one has experienced in the past? An echo of what has happened to the individual retained in the inner space of conscious thought?  That works I suppose, but what about the excercises we are working with in this class?

Here, we are being asked to remember lists of words and not actual events or entities.  In this case, I think Ferdinand de Saussure comes in handy to explain my issue.  Saussure would argue that a word (a symbol) in print is not and can never be the same as the thing it represents.  The word 'apple' for instance does not indicate a specific apple, but as Professor Agruss has explained, "Represents the essence of appleness."  What happens is that the word 'apple' causes a reaction in the mind where all the images stored in the brain which are associated with the printed word are recalled so the thinker can mentally project an image of 'appleness'.

With this process, one can thereby train their mind to associatively recall other visual images when presented with words/symbols. For instance, if someone said 'golf club' the visualization of a pitching-wedge might pop in your head, or maybe a broken golf club from a frustrating round, or perhaps well maicured grass surrounding a stately building.  For me I see an image of my grandfather right-off because he taught me how to play the game.  Still, having not read 'Moonwalking' yet, I get the idea that what we are looking at when we learn memory stragegy is simply the recategorization of the symbols for items and the associated mental projections they incite.