Mnemonics and the Universe

Tuesday, August 07, 2007
8:57 PM

I think I have blogged about this before, but it is worth mention again here. Mnemonics. They are good to help you remember things, but how good are they really? I mean is anyone supposed to actually believe that there are actually 5 T's of early Cyanosis? (Tetralogy, Transposition, Truncus, Total anomalous, Tricuspid atresia). Why would the universe, when it is putting itself together make early cyanosis consist of four things that start with the letter T?

I fully realize this is a silly pet peeve of mine, but seriously! The last time I went to a financial aid seminar they had a mnemonic for remembering how to budget, where they came up with a different word relating to budgeting the started with each letter in the word "budget" (I'm sure you know how these things work). Sure they are good memory devices, but when it comes to things like budgeting, I bet there are better strategies to be a good budgeter than to only use the words whose letter start with B-U-D-G-E-T. Seriously.

If I find myself listening to a presenter in class give a nifty word trick mnemonic, I almost always discount it as not credible. Maybe that's why I have such a difficult time remembering things.

Speaking of things…We watched this universe show last night on NOVA about alien galaxies, which actually means all galaxies other than the milky way--but then they started talking about the Milky Way so I guess it should have just been called Galaxies, but that isn't a cool name. I think throwing a run-on sentence into the mix every now and then is a good way to keep things interesting. But seriously, this universe show was mind boggling, both because of the special effects and because it gives you this incredible perspective on things. Well, not so much perspective on things, but rather just stuns you. I worry about things like food and sleep and money and studying, but my life is so incredibly insignificant in the entire scheme of things. Religion aside, we must live in the most boring pitiful corner of the universe. Our earth is a very average planet in a very average solar system in a very average galaxy (though one of the bigger galaxies here in our local group--oh, and we are located in a very average local group for that matter) in a very average, uniform universe. The expanse and mass of the universe is so incredibly unfathomable (that might not be a word) that is just boggles my mind. Seriously, we are fighting a couple people in the Middle East (or rather they are fighting us with 9/11), Britney Spears is something we talk about, and people save up money for years to buy diamonds??? I guess it is easier than to imagine how much is out there. Our lives give us stability and things we are able to manage. The universe is very unstable and represents a truly giant unknown. To think that we thought going to the moon represented the final frontier…Not even close!