@gingersnap (gingersnap) posted a new topic, subject "Photographic memory?". It read:

   What exactly IS a “photographic memory”. I've run across several people lately who claim to have this. Also I've often heard others claim they have an “almost photographic memory”.
    
    What is the difference between a normal memory, a good memory, an “almost photographic memory” and a true “photographic memory”?

So @ultrafilter (ultrafilter) replied

    I recall reading about a woman who could see two halves of a stereogram and then see the 3-d picture in her head. That's what I'd call a photographic memory.

So @ReillyDog (ReillyDog) replied

    I have a truly photographic memory. I just keep forgetting to put the film in.
    
    drat. @#%!^&@#

To which @GrizzRich (GrizzRich) replied

    We all have photographic memory.
    
    It's waiting-for-the-film-to-come-back-from-the-lab that's the bad part!

So @Jinx (Jinx) replied

    It's been stated that we all have some degree of a photographic memory. It is the ability to picture a scene in your mind. Granted, definitions can get stretched. Here's two examples:
    
    a) Suppose you lose your keys, but you can clearly “see” in your mind exactly where they were last. “It was yesterday in the kitchen. They were on the butcher-block counter top next to the fridge. Mom was standing by the window over the sink rinsing a brown stain off her blue blouse since she spilled coffee on it. Oh, yeah! And the keys were bumped off the counter by Jimmie's ball knocking them into the gap between the counter and fridge. And, here they are!” Some of us will recall more details than others.
    
    b) Another form of photographic memory people speak about more often comes from reading and studying. Some people have a better ability at remembering not just words on a page, but their relative positions…like they can actually picture the whole page in their minds.
    
    Once, I had to remember a speech in a foreign language for a class. I spent days studying from a photocopy with the words on the page starting at the bottom of one column of text and continuing on to the next. I could picture places where the words were lighter than others, etc., due to the quality of the photocopy.
    
    Then, during a trial run in front of my class, I got half-way through and then my mind went blank. When shown the text, the lay-out of the page was totally different. It really threw me off even more!
    
    I've had the same experience with practising sheet music from one book and trying to play from another. It's a subconscious act. I should be meorizing the notes, but the mind seems to link the data with the data's position on the page. …So, I'll always bring my own version to be safe - THE version with which my mind's eye is most familiar. Maybe you've experienced this, too?
    
    Ok, this second example is a degree of a photographic memory, too. Although, I wish I could use this skill to the ultimate degree - reading text from pages in my mind's memory. As you can see, it can sometimes work against you.
    
    Just from my experiences and readings on the subject…
    
      * Jinx

To which @Scott_Dickerson (Scott Dickerson) replied

    “Photographic memory” may have once had a fairly precise meaning, but like copies-of-copies, that meaning has deteriorated. Nowadays it just means “a really good memory, especially for visual details.”
    
    Likewise, “an almost (whatever)” may have once etc. but… Nowadays it just means “I'm asserting (whatever) but don't quote me.”

@MattyG (MattyG) replied

    The great one approached this topic.  
    Is there such a thing as Photographic Memory?

Then @RedSage (RedSage) said

    Photographic memory (or eidetic memory) is the innate ability to picture something in your head and describe it. Apparently (and I'm not too sure on this, but it's a generally contested psychological fact) everyone is born with a photographic memory, however during development it is neglected in preference to other more common skills, which could explain autistic savants, who have some amazing abilities, but lack social understandings.  
    A good test of your own photographic memory is to get someone to write down a list of questions about a picture. I have a psychology book which has a picture of a girl (looks like Alice in Wonderland) who's picking a flower out of the ground, with a tree on the left of her and the sky above and to the right.  
    The idea is that you look at the picture for about 15 seconds (enough time for it to transfer from visual memory to short term memory) and then cover up the picture and answer questions like “How many stripes were on the girl's socks?”, “How many petals were on the flower?” “what pettern was on the girls dress?” “Was her hair tied back or loose?”  
    If you have eidetic memory you'll be able to see the picture just as it was on the page, every detail, even if you can't quite recall focusing directly on how many stripes were on her sock, you can focus on it in your mind.  
    I'm not sure how many people have it, I think it's only like 1 in 1000 or something. That's a very rough guess though. I can't remember what it said in the book because I don't have a photographic memory!


{'source': 'discourse', 'url': 'https://boards.straightdope.com/t/photographic-memory/95927', 'title': 'Photographic memory?', 'views': 1767, 'has_accepted_answer': False, 'word_count': 892, 'like_count': 0, 'reply_count': 7, 'participant_count': 8, 'posts': 8, 'tags': '', 'author': '@gingersnap (gingersnap)', 'participants': '@gingersnap (gingersnap), @ultrafilter (ultrafilter), @ReillyDog (ReillyDog), @GrizzRich (GrizzRich), @Jinx (Jinx), @Scott_Dickerson (Scott Dickerson), @MattyG (MattyG), @RedSage (RedSage)', 'image_url': [None], 'created_at': '2001-11-29T15:14:10.000Z', 'last_posted_at': '2001-11-30T00:23:02.000Z'}