Meditation techniques -The Power of Your Mind
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Meditation has been called the path to inner peace! Practicing meditation techniques is the most empowering of all self development methods.
This is where you learn to use your mind as a tool - in fact it is the most powerful tool at your disposal.
The term Meditation techniques covers a wide range of skills, methods and practices, some of which have been developed and refined over at least five thousand years.
Meditating was once regarded as the domain of monks and mystics, yet today more and more people are finding a place in their life for meditation techniques.
These may range from methods of relaxation through to esoteric spiritual practices.
The idea of practicing meditation techniques often conjures up images of a shaven-headed monk sitting cross-legged on top of a mountain, oblivious to the world around him.
I would also include a quiet walk in nature as being within the realms of meditation techniques.
Sportsmen use meditation techniques to focus their efforts and improve on their performances, businessmen are taught meditation techniques in the guise of visualizing the outcome of goals and also to relax and relieve stress.
Everyone can use some form of improvement in their lives and in one form or another, meditation techniques are the shortest path to self-improvement, particularly through the mind-power meditation techniques.
The importance this chapter and the chapter on affirmations is that when both affirmation and meditation techniques are understood - and practiced - you possess the basic tools of self-empowerment.
When affirmations and meditation techniques are used in concert, you have the ability to change virtually any condition in your life, in other words, you can attain mastery of life.
The first goal of meditation is to calm the mind and body. From calmness the mind finds peace and the body relaxation to recharge and heal. To guide you to a state of peace and calm, we need to know what is happening in our minds.
Brain Activity :
Medical science has identified four states of brain activity on an EEG-machine:
Beta:
Your normal waking state, which is characterized by brain rhythms of 14 cycles per second and above,. In this state your mind activity is a veritable can of worms. The higher the brain activity becomes, the greater the stress factor.
Alpha:
A very relaxed state of mind, characterized by brain rhythms of between 7 and 14 cycles per second. In this state of mind you are relaxed, somewhere halfway between being fully awake and asleep. Dreaming and daydreaming occur in the alpha state.
The big difference between operating in alpha and beta is that in beta your mind is in control of yourself, whereas in alpha you are in control of your mind.
Theta:
Usually the state of sleep, when not dreaming. Characterized by brain rhythms of between 3.5 to 7 cycles per second. The theta level is also reached in very deep forms of meditation where consciousness becomes separate from mind and body.
Delta:
Very deep sleep or coma, characterized by a brain rhythm of between .5 to 3.5 cycles per second.
Learning :
As with all new skills, there is a learning curve as you become proficient. This learning curve is particularly applicable to learning to mediation because the experience of meditation is both subjective and personal. With mediation there are no signposts, no predetermined levels of skill to guide you, just a growing of awareness of yourself and a subtle but definite improvement in events in you life.
Discipline : Regular practice is the first requirement for making meditation techniques work for you.
It is also a good idea if you can set aside a time of day for relaxing and meditating, in fact if you are serious about meditating it is necessary that a specific time be set and a certain discipline be observed.
You do not need to have a definite goal in mind to be attained from your meditations, however as you travel up the learning curve you will find that purpose will manifest itself.
Initial discipline and preparation for meditation are very important, because in meditating you are teaching your mind to be still and at peace. For some this in itself can be a new experience!
Separation :
We live in times where we find ourselves continually bombarded by stimulation. Our minds constantly receive input from a hectic world around us and, assuming you do not live on a desert island, your mind has grown accustomed to being busy most of the time.
It is necessary to separate yourself from all this daily "white noise". When you are in a meditative state, you are in effect isolated - even if you are with a group!
Develop an awareness of just how much stimulation you are receiving from the media and advertising in particular. Bright colours, sensational images, fast action and more fast action: the messages we receive are go, go, go!
Separation is not isolation, it is placing yourself in the position of an observer see - Self Awareness level of consciousness.
Imagination :
Considering what never was and what could be!
When you read a book, your imagination supplies the pictures. A vivid imagination is your path to creativity!
Before we were bombarded with continual images by the media, we had to use our imagination to provide our own images - as children we developed our own games.
Not only is todays constant stimulation detrimental to our peace of mind, our imagination is being replaced by carefully preprocessed images.
The media industry is trying to steal your Imagination!
Your faculty of imagination is a vital part of your being. It is the essence of your creative ability and is the seed of your intuition.
In fact, by developing your imagination you can open doorways to latent skills and abilities which many would find amazing.
Imagination Is Your Individuality.
Through meditation techniques you will learn to reverse the process of over stimulation by teaching your mind to be peaceful, and reaching a state of simply being from where your creativity is free to flow.
This puts you back in control.
To start with you may experience difficulty from your accustomed state of always thinking of something or other. You will find that you cannot simply block thoughts out.
Thinking of not thinking is a thought-process in itself!
Envisage it this way: you are not your thoughts, you are the space which they occupy!
An allegory to this statement is to see yourself as the sky and your thoughts are the clouds. As they appear, simply let them drift by and vanish.
Some forms of meditation do not require a release of the thought-processes, in fact they use it creatively.
In guided meditations in the Alpha State of Mind, where someone is talking you through a meditative experience, your thought-processes are guided into suggested images. Note - This is not hypnosis or even near it. This is simply suggested imagery which you are free to follow or not. At all times during a guided meditation you are free to open your eyes and break off the session.
With this type of meditation, the ability to visualize clearly is very important. This is the ability to 'see' with your eyes closed, invoking the powers of your imagination.
With discipline and practice, you will learn to produce clearer images in your mind, not just a general picture, but absoloutely specific images in living color. The more real the better.
This is the image of what you are projecting to the universe, and the clearer the image you project, the better connection you can establish between the reality of your imagination and the reality of your life.
This is the point where you are in control, with the power of your mind working for you - at your command.
Visualising :
There is a learning curve to visualising :
At first you pretend you are visualising
Then you imagine you are visualising
Finally at last you are visualising
Visualising something is the art of imagining something then being able to see it in your minds eye.
For some people this ability is automatic, whilst others have to work at it - however, you can do it! Practice, practice, practice.
Clearly visualising your desires is a vital step in bringing your desires into being, in fact alpha meditation techniques depend upon it.
An excellent article on Visualising is available at Relaxation-for-meditation.com bringing you valuable information about stress relief, relaxation, meditation and aromatherapy. Enhance the awakening energy flowing in every area of your life.
Cleansing Your Aura
The process of cleansing (compacting) your aura is one of clearing your body/mind/spiritual connection.
It goes like this :
Massage your third eye with the fingertips of your dominant hand whilst repeating the following affirmation :
In the name of (whatever you hold to be sacred) I cleanse my body and soul!
Place the fingertips of both hands on your third eye, no draw them over tho top of your head and down to the nape of your neck.
Shake your hands vigorously as if shaking water off your hands.
Again run your fingertips fron the third eye to the nape of your neck and shake,
Now pass the palms of your hands over your whole head starting at the temples, and shake.
Thats it!
Feels refreshing and cleansing, doesn't it?
I perform this little ritual before meditating, saying affirmations and in fact before performing any spiritual exercise.
A word on posture before starting :
The classic 'lotus position' is the preferred posture of many people, who can achieve it, because sitting upright with legs crossed ensures a straight back with the chakras in line to optimize the body's energy flow.
Likewise holding hands together one in the other with the thumbs together or placing the index fingers against the thumbs is also completing a circle of energy.
Many westerners may find the lotus position unfamiliar and uncomfortable if maintained or extended over a long period of time. The most important elements of posture are: your back should always be straight, and you should be comfortable and symmetrical.
Particularly for 'meditation in the Alpha state' you can sit in a comfortable chair with your legs uncrossed.
If you prefer it, by all means lie down. If you should doze off during a meditation, then this is what your body needs at the time, and with practice you will learn to remain conscious.
I have written out each meditation so you can read it or record it for yourself.however if you press the button you will play my pre-recorded guided meditation.
You have a choice of two formats of each recorded meditation. The Blue player button is one minute of relaxing music followed by guided meditation with a quiet background, whilst the Green player button has a faint music track behind the meditation. Choose the one you find it easier to focus with.
Note : You will need to have Adobe Flash Player installed. If the audio tracks do not play then click
Get Adobe Flash Player
Meditation in the Alpha StateEntering Your Meditation StudioMeeting Your Life GuidesNow that you have completed these introductory meditation cycles, you have the tools and basic skills to perform your own Meditations in the Alpha State.
The longer you spend in alpha meditation the better, however you will find that the time required to enter the Alpha state of mind becomes shorter and shorter. Eventually you could find yourself both in and out of the Alpha state at the same time.
Here are three more cycles to build on your studio awareness :-Projecting your FutureHealing MeditationExpress Meditation Technique
Once you have practiced these six meditation cycles, you have the skills and the knowledge to make a difference to your life.
To reiterate - practice makes perfect. If you only just hone your visualisation skills, you will be well on the way to improving your life.
Resources and Techniques :
There are some excellent sites devoted to improving your life through meditative practices so I have listed here some of the best!
Visualization - The Key to the secret Law of Attraction. In my research on the law of attraction it is clear that visualization stands above all other Law of Attraction training, in importance.
Healing meditation is an awesome way for you to heal your body ... yourself! A new healing meditation is released every week.
Relaxation for Meditation Bringing you valuable information about stress relief, relaxation, meditation and aromatherapy. Enhance the awakening energy flowing in every area of your life.
Be Master of Your Life Course in Personal Development will teach you how to become Master of all dimensions of your life including : Self Awareness, Health, Relationships, Abundance and Success.
Tantra meditation and PracticeBeginners tantra, what is tantra? Tantra is the way into spiritual freedom and love. Tantra is a path that you follow. It will bring you closer to yourself and the World.
Tuesday, August 19, 2008
Exam Tips
The Fine Art of Writing an Exam This Article was strongly edited/modified by my good friend “N.Thamizhvaanan”.Any grammatical errors/complaints may be attributed to him and compliments/homages/donations may be forwarded to me. J I got inspiration to write this piece, the day I finished my CAM(Computer Aided Manufacturing Exam).Should my professor decide to sit down and read the intricate details provided by me as to why DNC systems are preferred to CNC systems, I am sure he can convert it into some sort of a bollywood movie script. If you read my paper closely, I am sure you will notice something about fairies and talking lions in there. Pre-requisites Don't worry; there is nothing that will take more than a few minutes of your "Oh! So busy" schedule. Just a few minor tips that will let you laze around till the 13th hour before you decide to do something about the exam next day. I know people tell you that you must relax before an exam and there are even more weird people who say stuff like relax the day before an exam. Had I followed such advice, I would have definitely failed at least 70% of my exams. The key to success ( I mean Pass) is PANIC. Panic at least two hours before the exam and get the adrenalin flowing. By doing this you make sure that you cram in as much data as you could have slogged throughout the semester. As I was saying, the 2-3 hours prior to the exam must be spent with a person who has finished the syllabus the previous day. Pester him with frequent doubts, as obvious as they may be, but still ask, even though he says he's gotta do some zillionth revision (some weird people do that). Listen to all the important topics, remember topics (VERY IMPORTANT!),remember keywords, they help in making you look like you have actually read through the book . Any graphs, simple diagrams and flow charts must be vaguely remembered. Don't forget to remember what the X and Y axes symbolize. Crunch Time Here is where you put in all your effort. There are a large number of ways of distracting the examiner from finding out that there actually isn't anything worth grading in this paper (well, there is a very fine line that separates forgery and writing an examination ). Active and Passive voice The most powerful English tool in writing an exam. If you are fortunate enough to know even a single point in a given question. It can be converted to 2 sentences with ease and if you are determined enough a whole paragraph. Example? The primary advantage with CNC systems is that they don't have a tape reader which increases efficiency and doesn't need skilled labour. The lack of a tape reader in CNC systems not only ensures better performance but also ease of operation. You could also insert another sentence in between the above examples just so that it doesn't get too obvious, should the examiner choose to actually sit down and make sense of your answer (the probability of that is as much as you actually sitting and studying for the exam, so I think you are safe) . Make sure that the extra line carries a word atleast from the question or sub-heading title. Use the name of the subject if you know neither of them . This is called contextual answering. VERY IMPORTANT. Colourful Presentation Get yourself a Blue pen and a Black pen.(or any colour from within visual spectrum that exists as a pen in this planet.).Keep writing your stories in blue and every now and then there will be one or two keywords that you will remember that is actually part of the given topic. This is where you pull out your black pen and insert it between your blue lines. This method maybe used effectively in conjunction with the above "Active and Passive Voice" method. Make sure you write different keywords in Black in your passive sentence. It maybe a little time consuming but it will usually ensures that your prof. doesn't really read the stories that you have written and added to this it gives the prof a false sense of security that you have studied something. Flow Charts-Graphs-Diagrams A Picture is worth a thousand words. This phrase, our wise ancestors framed purportedly for exam writing. Make sure that you are sure of your graph is correct because it is easier to spot a mistake in a flow chart or graph rather than in a huge paragraph. Hence make sure you are familiar with all the basic flow charts, graphs and diagrams in the given syllabus. Make some passing reference to the keywords that we talked about earlier. (Note: Diagrams are good source of keywords, so studying diagram helps in more than one way.) Draw it Big-Preferably occupying at least half the page Draw it Neat-Use one of those lead pencils Label it properly If possible come up with unnecessary supporting stuff like legend, scale etc. Explain what you are going to draw in a paragraph before the diagram and what you have drawn in another paragraph after the diagram. Atleast four sides of your answer sheet should have been filled by now Don't follow the point system (neglect the fact that I've bulletted the points that I mentioned above. Those are exceptions) Never write only points. Even if, by the grace of god or by a sudden stroke of madness, you have studied for an exam and want to write only points. DON'T DO IT . Make sure you have written something below. Eg:- Point No. 4-No Friction Reduces Wear Primarily, Friction will cause wear but when we make use of the following component. There is a drastic drop in dynamic and static friction, resulting in reduced wear compared to the wear with more friction! Fill the darned answer sheet. One among the thumb rules of the art of exam writing. Always believe that you can guess your way to the right answer. A good student(or should I say a good “Exam Writer”) should be able to write volumes of pages of answer without illuminating a speck of his profound ignorance of the subject. And if all else fails, the keywords desert you, you suspect you've got one of those "Hard disk not found" kinda memory failure and the superviser after repeated pestering, convinces you that the question paper is indeed for the right subject and not misplaced and you wish the ground would open up and eat you alive, there is PLAN B. This is often attacked on ethical grounds, but almost everyone does it and even the few who don't do it are not doing it more so for the fear of consequences rather than any ethical grounds. OH! Did I forget to mention what this method is? COPYING Even though COPYING is unchartered territory for me (*Cough Cough*), I do know some people who do indulge in such "APPALING" activities. Even though I don't condone such behaviour, it must be accepted that copying is an art unto itself. Copying is broken down into 3 primary categories Copying from the guy near you Copying from some prepared document (usually prepared by you) Copying from Text book It is usually a combination of all of the above methods but quite often you come across the person who solely depends on the other guy and doesn't even take the initiative to follow the more arduous second path. That's just plain lazy.(*Looks around nervously*) Copying from someone near you In this age of Telecommunications, students still rely upon primordial ways of Data Transfer from one person to the other which varies from rudimentary vocal communication to sophisticated cryptic body language and every other possible type of communication except anamolous communications. (a).Sound Waves This is basically orally asking your doubts to any person who is in a one bench radius (Left, Right, Front, Back, Diagonal…doesn't matter really). If you are desperate enough you could try a 2 bench radius, but this usually back fires as even the even the examiner hears your question and comes to you to give a fitting reply. Make sure that when you are asking the question your mouth is clearly facing the person because quite often ,you will look in front and ask something to the guy behind you and you don't really have to be Einstein to figure out that sound wont make a "U" turn and a subsequent left turn into your friends ear. You must also ENUNCIATE. Many a times I have seen a guy literally mumble something to himself and then crib later that he didn't get help. This method is time consuming and quite often wastes a lot of time of both the copier and the "copiend" (The guy who assists in copying, Yay! New Word). This method also preferred by the Ethical lot in the class. There is always the option of just asking a small doubt which is more or less like the "Open Sesame" of their brains. He looks left, he looks right and then left again( you would think he is crossing a busy highway), and then sudden strike "Dai, what does the "O" stand for in LOM(Laminated Object Modelling). I barely say ”Obje..”. And he goes something like "Ok ok ok! Got it, Got it!" . Hmmm, works for him. He needs just a word to strike upon the entire answer, whereas in my case, all I know is that one word . (b).Paper Hanging No, this is not death penalty for paper. If you are blessed with relatively good eye sight, you could ask the guy in front of you to hang the paper on the side of his table. This method is very effective as it doesn't really need your partner to worry about paper getting lost and it also has a quick retraction system should the professor start walking towards you. Make sure that the guy in front of you writes big. And no, you shouldn’t bring binoculars to exam because i)I am pretty sure that they are not allowed ii) they are too obvious (c)Paper Passing Slightly risky, but will avoid a lot of wastage of time in asking doubts. It involves the passing of the answer paper of the guy, either behind you or in front of you. Beware, this is a very common source of passing mistakes from one fools paper to some other moron's paper. Thats because we normally tend to switch of our brains (that is the default state) while copying from answer sheet. Unless both the copier and copiend is calm, things could get a little ugly should the professor start walking up towards you. For those of you who just don't have the guts to pass paper, there is also an effective alternative. Question Paper Passing All you have to do, is get the guy to write major points behind the question paper and exchange the question paper. (Don't just take his question paper and forget to give him a question paper. This can easily lead to getting caught) Copying from some prepared document (usually prepared by you) Prepared document covers a large spectrum. It can be books, Xerox copies of books, hand written bits, drawing boards, personal data written on permitted items in the exam hall, like calculators, data books. Essentially anything that you are allowed to take into the exam hall (which includes yourself). So you can also have stuff written on your body. Yea, we students invented body art too. Each of these concepts have been plagiarized in the film Memento and double plagiarised in the tamil film "Ghajini", wherein the hero writes important details on his body.I am in talks with the Students Federation Of India. We are planning to sue them soon. A good student should maintain perfect symbiosis with his environment. Make use of any object that you can see within your reach. It is within this context, that I am going to explain the next method - The Drawing Board Practice . This may be a practice that is specific to my college but it is one of the most fool proof methods I have witnessed so far. I have never seen a single professor looking at the boards before an exam. Sometimes they come and lift the boards to see if there is any bits underneath the board but will completely ignore to see the stuff written on the board. I don't get it, there is so much data written on the boards and yet no action is taken to either clean the board, punish those who write on it or even make an effort to see if anyone is actually writing on the board. The fact that the boards have at least 9-10 layers of ink, spread out over 3-4decades of their survival makes it really hard for the professor to actually search and detect the data relevant to his subject. Thus making it visible only to the eye of the writer. I am sure the word BIT needs no introduction, basically a very small piece of paper in which you cram in as much detail as possible. Beleived by many to be the precursor to Nanotechnology. Once you are done with that, follow the previous step till you feel confident enough. Another extension of BIT is the Mini-Xerox. It's nothing but your normal Xerox but scaled down to an A8 or A9 paper. Your ability to face embarrassment is tested here when you go to your local Xerox shop(quite often you will make a trip to an alien neighbourhood so that no one recognizes you). You enter the Xerox shop-you wait till it is empty-you call the Xerox guy to the side-quietly ask him for a "mini-xerox"-he will say it will cost you 4 times the normal cost because he will use “special ink"(HAH! The excuses are hilarious)-But you are desperate and say "ok ok, please take it fast". Copying from a text book. Some beleive it is not feasible, but after witnessing several live demonstrations myself, I should say it is damn effective. Make sure you've got one of those "local authors" text book (which is actually a question bank with a mis-spelt title) that are easy to sneak underneath the board and easier to flip through. Make sure you have gone through the book atleast once before the exams. Or else you will keep flipping the pages but never hit upon the right portion. Excuses If you get caught, there is nothing, really that you can do about it. You could try coming up with some excuses but they are all more likely to fail than succeed. Moral: Prevention is better than cure. DONT GET CAUGHT. But just as a backup you could try the following excuses before completely giving up. -Deny point blank that you copied and it was merely a circumstantial coincidence which has made it look like you were copying. -Once you realize that the above excuse holds no water, you could try pleading with the professor. " I met with an accident yesterday" "Life is very tough at home, I am supporting my family" "My uncle passed away yesterday" For some reason, the moment you get caught, you tend to loose all sense of common sense and come up with the most weird excuses. Here is couple of "Brilliant Excuses" that have ever been uttered in my presence. My professor catches one guy with the paper of the guy behind him. He accepts to the crime and gives one of the standard excuses mentioned above. Then he moves onto to the guy who gave him the paper and confronts him and this is where total brilliance of this young man comes out, instead of just accepting it, he goes something like this "Illa sir, kathulla parandhu avanode tablikku poiiduche" That basically means "No sir, the paper flew due to the wind and landed on his table".Even the professor couldn't control him self from laughing and told him there was a limit to bluffing. Another time, this guy writes on the question paper and passes it up front but forgets to take the other guys question paper. The examiner comes and asks him where his question paper is. This guy is totally flabbergasted and looks around desperately and finds a question paper on the next table which was empty, takes that and shows it to the examiner. As luck would have it, the question paper wasn't even the same subject. The hilarity of the situation kind of broke down the tension and the examiner let him off with a warning. So you could try some funny excuses in the hope that he just might start laughing and let you go. If all else fails, you could try playing dead! That round about sums up this article. Even though this report will contain specifics pertaining to Anna Univ. slight modifications can be made to suit schools, colleges, universities all over India. In these 3 years of college studies, my college may not have modelled me into an ideal mechanical engineer, but if there is one thing that I have learnt it is how to write exams. Now, this doesn't really mean I have been acing my exams or anything. Just that I manage to clear all my courses(so far!) with minimum work possible. May you all have a wonderfully lethargic and lazy academic life ahead of you. DISCLAIMER: I hereby declare that details provided above are true only to the best of my friends fictitious imaginations. It has been written for pure entertainment. Any resemblance to anything living or dead is purely coincidental. I would like to reiterate that I am nothing but a innocent bystander and I do not endorse nor recommend any of the techniques of mentioned above. Hopefully that will ward off any law suits that may be flying in at me. If any one has any other fool proof disclaimer please reply with it. I will edit the disclaimer accordingly. Special Thanks to “N.Thamizhvaanan” again. _________________"In the beginning the Universe was created. This has made a lot of people very angry and is widely regarded as a bad move." - Douglas Adams
Eye Movement Identification
Eye Movements
This instalment brings to you a brief introduction into eye signals and how to tell if the person you are speaking with is telling the truth or not! So in this instalment we will bring you the basics into eye signals, what the various eye positions mean and whether the person is generally telling the truth or not.
When reading this material, please have the image of a person in front of you, as if you were talking to them.
If that person moves their eyes to THEIR left, it would be to OUR right. But we will be doing these directions from the other person’s perspective.
So when you read that the person’s eyes are to the left and up, this would mean they would be looking right from our perspective.
Try to think about this from the other person’s eyes.
These eye signals you will read about are not 100% accurate. Bear this in mind and only use the person’s eye signals to how they react to what you say or ask them.
We will also recommend some excellent books about body language at the end of this newsletter.
So on with the basics to reading peoples eye signals.
When speaking with someone and you ask them about how their day has been and they usually will reply “Oh, it was fine. How was yours?” You won’t see a lot of eye signals from this; these are almost pre programmed responses.
When engrossing in a conversation with someone and the topic you are talking about has some impact on them, or they are fully giving you their attention, you will generally be able to receive unconscious eye signals that will allow you to get a deeper insight into what is going on in the other person’s head.
Let’s first talk about looking to the left hand side. The left hand side is predominantly to do with accessing material from your past, like images and sounds.
So imagine for a moment that you are speaking to a friend of yours. You are discussing the plans for the weekend and what you want to do.
You mention to your friend about a new disco that opened recently, downtown.
Your friend looks up and to the left and says to you that he has been there already and that he had a great time.
You ask your friend what the music was like the night he went to the disco.
He looks left, towards his left ear, then says the music was great and he really enjoyed the night out.
So what has popular psychology told us about the responses from the friend?
Well firstly he looked up to the top left, like the image below:
This reaction tells us he is looking up to access images in his memory. This means he is “looking” at images of his time at the disco, a strong suggestion that he is telling the truth. Up and to the left signifies accessing images, therefore it has happened in the past.Be careful, he could be accessing images for “downtown” so make sure you pick your questions carefully. He may say he hasn’t been there and still look left, thinking of “downtown”.
You asked your friend about the music at the disco. He looked left towards his ear. This tells us he is accessing the audio part of his brain and is trying to recall the music.
A good one to try this one out is to ask your friend to describe to you what their door bell sounds like. Watch as their eyes move level with their left ear as they access the audio part of their brain. Even if they don’t have a door bell they will still look left, looking for a sound that they may have had.
After understanding the above eye signals we can look forward to what the right hand side has to offer.
Imagine for a moment you are talking to your friend about your car that you lent to him for the weekend.He hands you the keys and doesn’t mention anything about the smashed headlight.
You ask him about it and he looks to the top left. This suggests he is looking for images to associate with the smashed headlight. He then immediately looks to the top right. Now you await his response.
He tells you someone must have reversed into him at the supermarket and driven off.
Looking to the top right suggests the creation of images. This is a strong indication that he is lying to you.
Bear in mind that your friend may not react in this way as he may have had a lot of time over the weekend to conjour up an excuse. In this case always try to ask something that they may not necessarily be unaware of, like were they smoking in your car as there is a cigarette hole in the seat. See how the eyes move!
Next let’s take a look at creating sounds… Yep, you guessed it. Looking to the right ear is a strong indication your test subject is creating a sound.
There aren’t any strong examples that can be used in this context, only that you should be aware of it happening.You could try asking your friend to image a really loud noise, the loudest noise they could ever imagine, and watch their eyes move.
Please note that what you have read may not be 100% accurate and that people vary immensely. This can be used as a guide only, to help you with your investigations.
Just because someone looks to the right does not mean they are lying or making something up. They may be a nervous person, easily distracted, seen something to their right, whatever the case may be. So be careful if you are going to accuse anyone of telling fibs!
Temperature Conversion
This is a shortcut to convert Fahrenheit to Celsius and vice versa. The answer you will get will not be an exact one, but it will give you an idea of the temperature you are looking at. Fahrenheit to Celsius: Take 30 away from the Fahrenheit, then divide the answer by two. This is your answer in celcius.
Example: 74 Fahrenheit - 30 = 44. Then divide by two, 22 Celsius. so 74 Fahrenheit = 22 Celcius. Celcius to Fahrenheit just do the reverse: Double it, then add 30. 30 Celcius double it, is 60, then add 30 is 90
30 Celcius = 90 Fahrenheit Remember, the answer is not exact but it gives you a rough idea. Memorizing the OSI Network Model
If you do not want to use a mnemonic (and let's face it, they aren't much good if you are unable to recall what the letters stand for!), you can link it into a scene using your imagination.
When I think of networking I think of my local PC world store.
This is the scene for my 7 layers.
In the shop I can see someone doing some Physical exercise. But it isnt a person, its a robot and they have a Datalink cable plugged into its foot! I follow the cable and I see it is connected to a rather large computer that has a big picture of a train on the screen. It is blowing its whistle too. The train represents Transport. Session makes me think of sachet of ketchup. I imagine seeing sachets dropping out of the computer screen and splattering all over the floor. But all the burst sachets of ketchup are ruining a lovely Presentation a sales person is doing for a customer in the store. Their big white presentation pad is getting covered with red ketchup. The sales person gets out an Application form for the customer so sign so as they can seal the deal but the customer says no as the Application form is covered with ketchup!
Resistor Colour Codes
It is a mnemonic for remembering the colour codes of resistors. Bold Boys Ravage Only Young Girls But Violet Gives Willingly Black Brown Red Orange Yellow Green Blue Violet Grey White How to remember which resistor has the value of 0, Black always reminds me of black holes, where nothing can escape, so this makes me think of 0! Therefore, the rest of the colours have the code 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8 and 9 being white! Adding Time
Here is a nice simple way to add hours and minutes together: Let's add 1 hr and 35 mins and 3 hr 55 mins together. What you do is this: make the 1 hr 35 mins into one number, which will give us 135 and do the same for the other number giving us 355 Now you want to add these two numbers together: 135 355 ____ 490 So we now have a sub total of 490. What you need to do to this and all sub totals is add the time constant of 40.
No matter what the hours and mins are, just add the 40 time contant to the sub total. 490 + 40 = 530 So we can now see our answer is 5 hrs and 30 mins!
Longitude and Latitude
I have always wondered which way these go, is longitude North/South or East/West? Well here is a nice easy way to remember which one is which. Think of a ladder as it sounds like latitude. The rungs of the ladder are horizontal, going from left to right, or east to west. When you hear latitude you will think of ladder, then the rungs of the ladder. East/west, so latitude is horizontal. Therefore longitude is North/South or vertical!
Another method for memorizing longitude and latitude:
longitude has an N in it for North, so the north-south line is longtitude, so the other east-west is latitude
Here, try these . . .
The French word for
poster
is
l'affiche
(feminine word) which sounds like LA FISH.
So we have for you a mermaid putting up a poster of a FISH.
Now try this one . . .
the French for
horse
is le cheval
This sounds like SHOVEL so . . .
... we get you to imagine a Knight on a horse with a SHOVEL..
.
It is easy to remember the scene, because a picture paints a thousand words.
Again it is pretty easy.
... and certainly beats any other method you might see.
Here is another one.
hen
is
la poule
It sounds like POOL.
So we get you to imagine a hen beside a swimming POOL with the Polish actress (a POLE) Izabella Miko.
The female POLE (which sounds a bit like POOL) Izabella tells us that the word is feminine. . .
... as does the red font...
That is pretty easy I am sure you will agree.
Here's great one that I really like. The French word for
OK!
is
d'accord!
which sounds like DA CORE!
Well take a look at the cartoon and see for yourself!
With memory triggers, pics and learning techniques like these you can see how easy and fun our language learning methods are. . .
and...
Knight's tour
The Knight’s tour is a great feat of mathematical calculations that allow you to move the Knight around a chess board landing on all squares only once.
To see just how difficult it is, get out your chess board and try moving the Knight around the chess board in its L shaped motion. Imagine now that you were told to start on a particular square and do the tour from there. Or, you were told to finish on a particular square. The task will prove even more complicated!
There is a way to do the Knight’s tour starting on a given square or ending on a said square. You will nee to have completed the Dominic System at www.memorymentor.com/dominic_system.htm and you will be using numbers 1 though to 64 as there are 64 squares on a chess board.
Have in your mind a location that you can use solely for the Knight’s tour. I use a holiday resort in Tunisia that I stayed at. I chose this as the tiles in the hotel reminded me of a chess board.
The numbers you will need to memorise and the order they are in is below:
01, 11, 05, 20, 37, 27, 44, 29, 35, 50, 33, 43, 58, 41, 26, 09, 03, 13, 23, 08,
14, 04, 10, 25, 19, 02, 17, 34, 49, 59, 53, 47, 64, 54, 60, 45, 28, 38, 21, 36,
30, 15, 32, 22, 07, 24, 39, 56, 62, 52, 42, 57, 51, 61, 55, 40, 46, 63, 48, 31,
16, 06, 12, 18
In a situation like this it is possible to place four people from the Dominic System at each location. So in my first room, I have 01, 11, 05, and 20. But I don’t have four people in that room. I have two people. What I have is the first person, ie 01 (Ozzie Ardillez) doing the action of 11 Arthur Askey. So I use the image of a Bee for Arthur Askey so instead of Ozzie Ardillez kicking a football I imagine him doing kick ups with bees! You could imagine something different for example Ozzie could be running around waving his arms frantically in the air trying to get the bees away from him! Remember, whatever image comes to mind, use it. That is the image that will first come to you. Trust your imagination.
If you look at the bottom left corner (the black square), in chess, this is called A1. But we are going to call it 1. The bottom right square (white), is number eight.
I hope the picture is clear enough for you! Just start in the bottom left and you will be able to figure out which square is numbered with what.
So if you look at the list again, you can see, for example, 01, 11, 05, and 20 this is the route you take on the board. So 01 will be Ozzie Ardilez, square one, next route on the Knight’s tour, is 11, Arthur Askey. So if someone was to say to you to start from square E6, that would be square number 45. That would be Duke Eliington or whoever you have for number 45. You now know the next square will be 28, Benny Hill!
Maths and formulas
In this section I am not going to go into depth as to how to do various aspects of mathematics, but to show you how to remember formula and symbols.
When I was in college, I did actually use the techniques I am going to show you to remember formula.
Formula looks nasty. There's no nice way to put it. Big long formulas that you have to learn off by heart and the only way you know them is by saying them out parrot fashion. "... Plus minus B, square root A squared minus B squared over 4 AC ..." etc. You get the picture.
Usually you would do some example questions using the formula so as you can see it working. All to easily though the formulas are forgotten. Not to worry. What I am going to show you will make you remember the formula forever. Unfortunately (some may think) you will never forget it!
Starting off with a simple formula, one I think most of us will have come across many times while at school.
Area of a circle = Ï€r²
This formula is really quite simple, most of you may even know this off by heart. But as an example, I will show you how I would remember this formula had I not already known it.
So, it is the area of a circle we are looking for. I need to find an association with area of a circle. Well a circle usually reminds me of one of those round abouts that children would play on. You held onto a railing and pushed the round about round and round!
Ok, so we have our scene, the roundabout.
The symbol, π, is called Pi, pronounced pie (the food).
So I would imagine lots and lots of pies piled onto the round about.
That's the first part of the scene. Next, the r²
R is the 18th letter of the alphabet. 18 is broken down to A H from learning the 100 people which you should have done by now. A H is, in my list, Adolf Hitler. He also has an action, the Heil Hitler arm raising action.
So Adolf Hitler would be standing beside the round about as the pies are spinning round and round.
So this is the scene:
The pies are spinning round and round really fast. So fast in fact that they begin to fly off the round about. Standing nearby is Adolf Hitler defending himself from the pies by doing his Heil Hitler action. He may even be catching some pies with his mouth and eating them!
The fact that I am using Adolf Hitler and his action, emphasises that the number 18 is being used twice. Counting 18 letters of the alphabet will give you R. Two R's is r²
The Quotient Rule is used to differentiate a y value of the form u/v.
The formula is:
So, the question is how do we begin to remember this?
Using the names and letters that we learned earlier the task of remembering the formula will prove to be quite easy.
Take the d/dx part first. Well this does come up in calculus etc quite a lot. The best thing to do in this instance is to memorise something that represents those letters. It makes me think if my friend Dee, short for Deirdre, and dx makes me think of ducks. So I could have my friend Dee, with feathers and a duck's bill!
Next, u/v makes me think of UV sunlight, so I would probably imagine a pair of sunglasses to symbolise u/v!
So that's the start of it. I don't want to tell you how to do it exactly, as it will not be the same for you. What you imagine first will be far better than learning what I imagined first. It is easy for me to recall as it is what I imagined. The same will be easy for you too.
Here's a good one. What's √2 ? I wish I knew
That's the answer! Each word represents the number of letters needed to give you the answer, so I = 1, wish = 4, I = 1, knew = 4: so √2 = 1.414
Absorption Spectrum
Location:When I hear or read “Absorption Spectrum” I will immediately think of a grassy wet field with a giant rainbow pouring into a sponge. I can see and hear the sponge getting bigger and changing to different colours of the rainbow.
Definition: A spectrum showing the amounts of the different wavelengths of light absorbed by the different pigments of chlorophyll.
Key: Spectrum = rainbowShowing = a show i.e. Punch and Judy show (puppets).Amounts = bag of moneyDifferent wavelengths = two beams of light of different coloursAbsorbed = spongeDifferent pigments = two fat pigsChlorophyll = potent smelling bottle of liquid (actually chloroform but sounds similar).
Story:I imagine, beside the giant coloured sponge, a Punch and Judy show (showing) happening. I can hear Punch’s squeaky voice. I notice he has two large bags of money (amounts) in his hands and can hear the coins clashing together as he waves his arms around franticly. All of a sudden, a beam of light appears out of each of the bags (different wavelengths), a yellow and a red one! Punch gets frightened and pushes both bags of money off the stage show and onto the floor. There is another sponge (absorbed) at the base of the stage and it starts to soak up the light coming from the bags of money. Two pigs (different pigments) come running over to the bags of money and each pig sticks his nose into the bags and are eating the coins! But one of the pigs gets greedy and wants to eat all the money himself, so takes out a bottle of chlorophyll (chlorophyll) and puts it under the other pig’s nose. The pig can’t stand the smell and leaves.
Accommodation
Location:When I hear or read “Accommodation” it reminds me of a hostel in Sydney I stayed at.
Definition: Changing the curvature of the lens so that light from the near and distant objects can be focused on the retina to give clear visual images.
Key:Lens = giant contact lensRetina = Bull’s eye on a dart board
Story:I imagine I am back in the room in the hostel I stayed at in Sydney (Accommodation). I imagine holding a giant contact lens and am bending it making it change shape (changing the curvature). I notice a candle on the table (near) in the room and can clearly see a beam of yellow light leave the candle and go into the lens. The window in my room is also open and a street light can be seen (distant). Its yellow glow too finds its way into the lens. I then notice the two beams of light coming together and focusing (focused) on the Bull’s eye (retina) of a dart board hanging on the door! I can clearly see the light on the Bull’s eye!
Acoelomate
Location:When I hear or read “Acoelomate” it reminds me of an air seal in a submarine and then think of the Captain’s mate.
Definition:An animal that does not have a fluid filled body cavity that arises from a split in the mesoderm.
Key:Animal makes me think of a wild large brown bear.Arises = Aries
Story:I imagine the bear with a tube in his mouth. There is a pump attached to the tube removing all the fluid from the bear! The bear’s body cavity is deflating like a balloon. I imagine, beside the pump, a ram (Aries = arises) with a piece of wood in his hooves and splitting it in two. There are splinters of wood everywhere and the ram has really messed up the Dorm (mesoderm).
Action Spectrum
Location:When I hear or read “Action Spectrum” it makes me think of a soldier abseiling down a rainbow in a field.
Definition: A spectrum showing the rate of photosynthesis for each of the different wavelengths of light.
Key: Showing = Punch and Judy showRate = a receiptPhotosynthesis = a bushy treeEach = peach
Story:I imagine a soldier landing on top of the Punch and Judy show. He topples over and falls onto a giant tree and a receipt falls from the tree onto his face. Two peaches suddenly start to shake and beams of different coloured light (different wavelengths of light) start to emit from them.
Active Site
Location:When I hear or read “Active Site” it reminds me of a building site I walk past on my way to work every day.
Definition:The part of the enzyme that the substrate temporarily attaches to. It makes the enzyme specific.
Key:Part = Art easel (sounds like part)Enzyme = giant jigsaw pieceSubstrate = soccer substituteMakes = mortal and pester
Story:I imagine walking past the building site and see a giant art easel (part) with a picture of a bright green jigsaw (enzyme) on the white canvas. I soccer player (substrate) is standing beside the easel and sticks his hands (temporarily attaches) onto the picture. Then I notice a builder walking past the soccer substitute with a mortal and pester (makes) and he is grinding up a piece of jigsaw (enzyme). I shout up to him what he’s making. He replies he is making something specific.
Active transport
Location:When I hear or read “Active transport” it makes me think of a train journey.
Definition:This is the movement of molecules against the concentration gradient. It requires energy.
Key:Movement = flag (as in a people movement with a flag waving).Molecules = moles (moles have terrible eyesight so I imagine moles wearing yellow hard hats with a light on them to help see where they are going).
Story:I imagine I am sitting on a train. All of a sudden there is a loud bang and a hole appears in the train floor. The first thing I see coming out of the hole amongst the rubble is a flag (which makes me think of movement) followed by a group of moles, (molecules). The moles start to climb up the pile of rubble. It is a rather steep gradient (gradient). Half way up, one of the moles stops for an energy drink. (He requires energy!)
Allele
Location:When I hear or read “Allele” it makes me think of an alien in an aircraft hanger like the ones I have seen in lots of Hollywood movies!
Definition:An alternative form of a gene.
Key:Alternative = alternate (something that alternates, like a switch).Form = an application form, perhaps for a new job!Gene = genie
Story:I imagine I am in the aircraft hanger looking at the alien. He is holding onto a giant switch (which reminds me of alternative). Stuck to the switch is a sheet of paper (which reminds me of form), and a genie (gene) is having difficulty in filling it in as it is moving back and forth with the switch! The Genie is sticking out of a lamp.
Anaerobic respiration
Location:When I hear or read “Anaerobic respiration” it makes me think of my friend Anne puffing and panting after doing exercise at my local gym.
Definition:This is the release of energy from food without using oxygen.
Key:Energy = sports drink like LucozadeFood = hamburger
Story:I imagine Anne holding her breath on an exercise bike (without using oxygen). She is holding a hamburger (food). All of a sudden she opens the burger and a sport drink pops out! (Release of energy).
Note this image may seem to run backwards when you are reading it, but when you play it back in your mind it will all make sense!
Antibiotic
Location:When I hear or read “Antibiotic” it reminds me of the isle in the supermarket that sells washing powder (bio washing powder).
Definition:Chemical secreted by bacteria and fungi, which can be used to kill other bacteria and fungi.
Key:Chemical = spray bottle of bleachSecreted = oozing liquidBacteria = a person’s backFungi = mushrooms
Story:I imagine my Auntie spraying a bottle of bleach (chemical) around the supermarket! People are sliding all over the floor because of her! All of a sudden a purple liquid starts to ooze (secreted) from her back (bacteria) and a giant mushroom (fungi) appears on her back and it too starts to ooze! There is a Witch sitting on a giant tin can (which can) laughing at all this and she takes out a gun and shoots (kill) the mushroom (fungi) and my Auntie in the back (bacteria)! What a sight.
Antibody
Location:When I hear or read “Antibody” it reminds me of my Auntie’s house.
Definition:A protein produced by white blood cells in response to an antigen.
Key:Protein = Pro football playerProduced = cow (produces milk)Response = small hammer a Dr uses to check peoples reflexesAntigen = jewels (Antigen reminds me of gemstones)
Story:I imagine I am in my Auntie’s house (Antibody). There is an American football player (protein) in the middle of the living room milking a cow (produced)!! White and red (blood cells) milk appears to be coming from the cow! The footballer then takes out the little hammer and hits the cow on the back leg (response). The cow kicks back and knocks over a table that has a beautiful green gemstone (antigen) on it. I shudder when I hear it smash on the ground.
Antigen
Location:When I hear or read “Antigen” it reminds me of a green Gemstone which may be found in a jewellery store. I immediately think of the jewellers in my local town.
Definition:A chemical, which stimulates the production of antibodies.
Key:Chemical = spray bottle of bleachWhich = Witch with a broomstickStimultates = stimulant such as a cigaretteProduction = cowAntibodies = Autnie’s house ( in this case I imagine her cat, which is always sleeping) I am not imagining her house as I have my location already, in this case my local Jewellers.
Story:I imagine I am in my jewellers buying my girlfriend a present. I notice the jeweller is spraying liquid (chemical) onto the glass surfaces of the display. I look into the reflection of the display and see a Witch (which)! She is smoking a cigarette (stimulates). I look up, shocked. I look at the jeweller to tell him what happened but he has turned into a cow (production)! He moo’s at me. He hand’s me a fresh bottle of milk which I drop by accident. Good job I brought my Auntie’s cat (Antibody) with me to lick it all up!
Autosomes
Location:When I read or hear “Autosomes” it reminds me of my local car dealership in my town.
Definition:Non sex chromosomes
Key:Non = NunChromosomes = Giant X placed on a placard
Story:I imagine several Nuns (Non) protesting outside my local car dealership. I take a look at their placards which reads “X” (chromosomes) on them. I don’t need to think of a word or image for “sex” as it comes hand in hand with chromosome.
Autotrophic
Location:When I hear or read “Autotrophic” it reminds me of a tropical (trophic) tree growing in my front garden.
Definition:An organism that can make its own food.
Key:Organism = organ (like a piano)Make = mortal and pesterFood = hamburger
Story:I imagine sitting in the shade of the giant tropical tree (autotrophic) in my front garden. I am relaxing in a chair as I listen to the music being played on an organ (organism) beside me. How lovely it is!As I am listening to the music I notice the musician is making his own hamburgers (make its own food) while he plays!
Axon
Location:When I hear or read “Axon” it makes me think of an Axe hanging up in my garage. I use it to chop firewood.
Definition:A nerve fibre that carries messages away from the cell body.
Key:Nerve = red stringFibre = home made brown breadCarries = plastic bagMessages = envelopeCell = steel bar that would be on a prison cell window
Story:I imagine I am standing in my garage and there is red string (nerve) everywhere. I decide to wind it up and find a loaf of brown bread (fibre) attached to the end! I decide to place the bread into a plastic bag (carries) but forget I have some envelopes (messages) in there and get them covered in crumbs. I don’t want to get the envelopes any dirtier so I hang the bag on the end of a steel bar (cell) so my hands don’t contaminate them.
Memorizing random letters and numbers
Pre-requisites: Morse Code and Dominic System
I have been asked many times on how to memorise letters and numbers when they are all in the same group, for example a number plate.
e.g.. SG04 LUV or 3456L2X
This is quite achievable and only requires you to know the Morse Code and the Dominic System.
So let's take the example SG04 LGG
S = Sierra = Cab from our image from the Morse code tutorial
G = Golf = Sub
04 = Otto Dix from our list of people
L = Lima = Come
U = Uniform = Kit
V = Victor = Won
So from above you can create a scene to play back in your mind.
You might imagine a CAB pulling up (at the location where you need to memorise the number plate), and a football SUBstitute getting out. He is holding a painting (Otto Dix's action) and he is telling you to COME here and take it off him. You take the painting and hand him a new football KIT and ask him if he WON or not.
French ER Verbs
Below is a walkthrough for memorising the present tenses for ER verbs in French. We need to fix all ER verb tenses in a scene so we can visualise it when we need to call on it from memory. I suggest using your local town. Your town will have everything you need in it so use it as a sponge to absorb your vocabulary. Please make sure you have read the foreign language tutorial found here We also need to associate ER verbs with an image and EAR is the perfect one! Present tense makes me think of Christmas (presents!!) So I have my whole ER Present tense scene based around a giant Christmas tree that is on display in my local town. At the top of the Christmas tree is a giant EAR and there is lots of ear wax dripping out from it!! It’s all messy and sticky under that tree! So when I think of present tense it will remind me of Christmas, then the tree. If it is a verb ending in ER then I will see the giant EAR at the top of it and then my associated ER verb endings. We now need to find a commonly used ER verb to use as an example.
Let’s try Manger – To eat
Je mange ----- I eat
Tu manges ----- You eat (singular)
Il mange ----- He eats
Nous mangeons ----- We eat
Vous mangez ----- You eat (plural)
So now we need to set the scene. Manger – to eat We need to memorise the Je, Tu, Il, Nous, Vous, Ils part first and this is how: I would suggest the number shape system for this. That way you have a definite order to follow and it makes it much easier to recall it later on! 1 sounds like nun 2 sounds like shoe 3 sounds like tree 4 sounds like door 5 sounds like hive 6 sounds like sticks Ok so you get the idea with number rhyme. The nun is going to be associated with the Je, the shoe is going to be associated with the Tu and so on… Let’s look at that now: Number Ending 1 sounds like nun Je e 2 sounds like shoe Tu es 3 sounds like tree Il e 4 sounds like door Nous ons 5 sounds like hive Vous ez 6 sounds like sticks Ils ent So how do we remember which is which? Well when we do this it is best to memorise the endings to the verb also as we will have the whole tense memorised then. So at the Christmas tree I see the nun standing there. But what is she doing? She is Shouting out JESUS!! But she is saying it funny… Jesus. The nun is shouting out the Je part loudly but the sus softly! Now we need to incorporate the “e” of the ending of mange (French part of "I" eat) into our nun image. So I imagine a large Snail coming up to the nun and starts shouting out Je too!! The idea of the snail as an “e” is because the shell of the snail reminds me of an “e” withthe pattern of it. So now onto Tu –You and the number rhyme is Two Shoe So just then I see this giant Shoe kick the snail! (this helps to keep the image moving). I look up at the giant shoe, and can smell the leather off it! Wow it must be brand new! (helps to anchor the image). So I look at the shoe and it spits at me! Making a spit sounds like Tu – try it and see for yourself! I then turn to the shoe and say to it “Was that you, shoe?” And the shoe replies “yES” getting louder after the y. Try doing it as a whisper, it sounds freaky! Another anchor help. Number 3 is the “Il” linking with number rhyme 3 - tree. So I start to walk away from the shoe and walk straight into a tree! I look up and notice that instead of a tree trunk it is a giant fat eel! (the eel reminds me of il - French for He He looks at me and says “Do you mind, I am trying to eat” I look down and notice the Eel is using a knife and fork and eating snails!! The snails remind me of “e”, the ending of the verb. Number 4, door is linked with Nous. After walking away from the tree I walk to the entrance of a shop near to where the Christmas tree is… But I can’t open the door. Someone has thrown a cowboy lasso to make a noose (Nous)and it has wrapped around my hand! I can’t grab the door handle! But luckily my friend “the Fonz” (from Happy Days TV comedy!! Fonz reminds me of ons) rescues me! 5 is hive and links with vous which reminds me of Poo as in Whinnie the Poo (the bear, check Google if you are unfamiliar). So I manage to get into the shop and walk straight over to the sweets section. There I see some lovely looking honey coming straight fresh out of the bee hive!! And who better to be eating all the honey than Poo Bear!! But he is jammed inside the bee hive and I ask him how he got in there. He replies “it was EEEEZZZZZZ” (sounds like easy). This lets you know that the ending for Vous verbs is ez. I walk past Poo Bear and hear a cracking sound… I realise I am standing on lots of sticks (sounds like 6). I look down and see that there are lots of eels (ils in the bunch of sticks too! Eels remind me of Ils. I ask them what on earth they are doing down there and they respond “We are pitching a tent. Go away!”. The ENT of tent lets you know the ending of the verb for Ils. This method is easy. It lets you memorise the present tense endings very well. But like everything else you need to go over it again and again. I suggest doing it out once, then after half an hour do it again in your head, then an hour later, then when in bed, then in the morning, then when in bed, then once every couple of days. Believe me after a week or so of this it will stick. But whatever you do DO NOT miss going over it on a regular basis. I know what happens as I have done it myself. I say “Ah, I know it, I don’t need to go over it again!”. This is the time when it get's lost in your memory banks! Happy memorising!
Mental Shopper
Introduction
This is a great effect by Doug Canning, and is presented here with his permission. Practicing and performing it will help you to learn the basics of the Phonetic Alphabet system so that you know it cold. In the original write-up of this effect (May 1993 Linking Ring), Doug mentions that many people say he just memorized all the prices, but are amazed how he could add them so fast. He doesn't mind, because they're still giving him more credit than he deserves for the work in this effect!
Effect
You hand the spectator 5 cards with 6 grocery item and their 3-digit prices on each one. The spectator calls out one item from each card, but not the price. Thanks to your powerful mind, you are able to not only recall the prices of the items, but add them up quickly in your head, as fast as a calculator!
Mental Shopper
Prerequisite: (This link opens in a new window)Phonetic alphabet
Set-up
On a separate page, I have included a PDF File (opens in a new window) for you to download, which lists the items and their prices. If you print this file, and use pre-perforated business card (10 to a sheet) stock, you can simply pop out each card individually. Otherwise, just cut up the paper so that you have 10 individual cards. You should now have two complete sets of cards, with cards labeled A through E in each set. One you'll use in the effect, and the other can be a back-up set.
Method
You are going to have your spectator(s) give you one item off of each card, from which you will determine the answer. There are two methods here, one mathematical and the other mnemonic. First I'll explain the mathematical method. Instead of adding five 3-digit numbers, you're simply going to add five 1-digit numbers. If the spectator were to choose, say, Maalox, Crackers, Bacon, Slimfast, and Tupperware (see PDF File, which opens in a new window), you would simply add the last digit in each price. In this example, you would add 3 plus 7 (which makes 10), plus 9 (making 19), plus 0 (which keep the total at 19), plus 1 (for a final total of 20. This “20” will be the total number of cents in the price.
To find out the number of dollars in the price, simply subtract the number of cents from 50. In the example above, this would mean that the final total is 30 dollars and 20 cents ($30.20). If the final total of the single digits had been, say, 22 cents, the final total would have been $28.22 (because 50-22=28). You'll get prices ranging from $11.39, up to $45.05 in this effect.
Since you're only given the product names, though, how do you know what numbers to add? This is where the basics of the Peg system are going to be put to use. Look carefully at the PDF file (opens in a new window). The phonetic sound that represents the last digit in each price in the peg system (the only number you need to know) is the first sound in the name of the product! For example, the “mmm” sound represents 3 in the phonetic Peg system, so you should instantly know that when the spectator says “Maalox” (which begins with the “mmm” sound) you know to add 3 to your running total. Quick, without looking, can you tell me how much “Vitamins” equals?
This instalment brings to you a brief introduction into eye signals and how to tell if the person you are speaking with is telling the truth or not! So in this instalment we will bring you the basics into eye signals, what the various eye positions mean and whether the person is generally telling the truth or not.
When reading this material, please have the image of a person in front of you, as if you were talking to them.
If that person moves their eyes to THEIR left, it would be to OUR right. But we will be doing these directions from the other person’s perspective.
So when you read that the person’s eyes are to the left and up, this would mean they would be looking right from our perspective.
Try to think about this from the other person’s eyes.
These eye signals you will read about are not 100% accurate. Bear this in mind and only use the person’s eye signals to how they react to what you say or ask them.
We will also recommend some excellent books about body language at the end of this newsletter.
So on with the basics to reading peoples eye signals.
When speaking with someone and you ask them about how their day has been and they usually will reply “Oh, it was fine. How was yours?” You won’t see a lot of eye signals from this; these are almost pre programmed responses.
When engrossing in a conversation with someone and the topic you are talking about has some impact on them, or they are fully giving you their attention, you will generally be able to receive unconscious eye signals that will allow you to get a deeper insight into what is going on in the other person’s head.
Let’s first talk about looking to the left hand side. The left hand side is predominantly to do with accessing material from your past, like images and sounds.
So imagine for a moment that you are speaking to a friend of yours. You are discussing the plans for the weekend and what you want to do.
You mention to your friend about a new disco that opened recently, downtown.
Your friend looks up and to the left and says to you that he has been there already and that he had a great time.
You ask your friend what the music was like the night he went to the disco.
He looks left, towards his left ear, then says the music was great and he really enjoyed the night out.
So what has popular psychology told us about the responses from the friend?
Well firstly he looked up to the top left, like the image below:
This reaction tells us he is looking up to access images in his memory. This means he is “looking” at images of his time at the disco, a strong suggestion that he is telling the truth. Up and to the left signifies accessing images, therefore it has happened in the past.Be careful, he could be accessing images for “downtown” so make sure you pick your questions carefully. He may say he hasn’t been there and still look left, thinking of “downtown”.
You asked your friend about the music at the disco. He looked left towards his ear. This tells us he is accessing the audio part of his brain and is trying to recall the music.
A good one to try this one out is to ask your friend to describe to you what their door bell sounds like. Watch as their eyes move level with their left ear as they access the audio part of their brain. Even if they don’t have a door bell they will still look left, looking for a sound that they may have had.
After understanding the above eye signals we can look forward to what the right hand side has to offer.
Imagine for a moment you are talking to your friend about your car that you lent to him for the weekend.He hands you the keys and doesn’t mention anything about the smashed headlight.
You ask him about it and he looks to the top left. This suggests he is looking for images to associate with the smashed headlight. He then immediately looks to the top right. Now you await his response.
He tells you someone must have reversed into him at the supermarket and driven off.
Looking to the top right suggests the creation of images. This is a strong indication that he is lying to you.
Bear in mind that your friend may not react in this way as he may have had a lot of time over the weekend to conjour up an excuse. In this case always try to ask something that they may not necessarily be unaware of, like were they smoking in your car as there is a cigarette hole in the seat. See how the eyes move!
Next let’s take a look at creating sounds… Yep, you guessed it. Looking to the right ear is a strong indication your test subject is creating a sound.
There aren’t any strong examples that can be used in this context, only that you should be aware of it happening.You could try asking your friend to image a really loud noise, the loudest noise they could ever imagine, and watch their eyes move.
Please note that what you have read may not be 100% accurate and that people vary immensely. This can be used as a guide only, to help you with your investigations.
Just because someone looks to the right does not mean they are lying or making something up. They may be a nervous person, easily distracted, seen something to their right, whatever the case may be. So be careful if you are going to accuse anyone of telling fibs!
Temperature Conversion
This is a shortcut to convert Fahrenheit to Celsius and vice versa. The answer you will get will not be an exact one, but it will give you an idea of the temperature you are looking at. Fahrenheit to Celsius: Take 30 away from the Fahrenheit, then divide the answer by two. This is your answer in celcius.
Example: 74 Fahrenheit - 30 = 44. Then divide by two, 22 Celsius. so 74 Fahrenheit = 22 Celcius. Celcius to Fahrenheit just do the reverse: Double it, then add 30. 30 Celcius double it, is 60, then add 30 is 90
30 Celcius = 90 Fahrenheit Remember, the answer is not exact but it gives you a rough idea. Memorizing the OSI Network Model
If you do not want to use a mnemonic (and let's face it, they aren't much good if you are unable to recall what the letters stand for!), you can link it into a scene using your imagination.
When I think of networking I think of my local PC world store.
This is the scene for my 7 layers.
In the shop I can see someone doing some Physical exercise. But it isnt a person, its a robot and they have a Datalink cable plugged into its foot! I follow the cable and I see it is connected to a rather large computer that has a big picture of a train on the screen. It is blowing its whistle too. The train represents Transport. Session makes me think of sachet of ketchup. I imagine seeing sachets dropping out of the computer screen and splattering all over the floor. But all the burst sachets of ketchup are ruining a lovely Presentation a sales person is doing for a customer in the store. Their big white presentation pad is getting covered with red ketchup. The sales person gets out an Application form for the customer so sign so as they can seal the deal but the customer says no as the Application form is covered with ketchup!
Resistor Colour Codes
It is a mnemonic for remembering the colour codes of resistors. Bold Boys Ravage Only Young Girls But Violet Gives Willingly Black Brown Red Orange Yellow Green Blue Violet Grey White How to remember which resistor has the value of 0, Black always reminds me of black holes, where nothing can escape, so this makes me think of 0! Therefore, the rest of the colours have the code 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8 and 9 being white! Adding Time
Here is a nice simple way to add hours and minutes together: Let's add 1 hr and 35 mins and 3 hr 55 mins together. What you do is this: make the 1 hr 35 mins into one number, which will give us 135 and do the same for the other number giving us 355 Now you want to add these two numbers together: 135 355 ____ 490 So we now have a sub total of 490. What you need to do to this and all sub totals is add the time constant of 40.
No matter what the hours and mins are, just add the 40 time contant to the sub total. 490 + 40 = 530 So we can now see our answer is 5 hrs and 30 mins!
Longitude and Latitude
I have always wondered which way these go, is longitude North/South or East/West? Well here is a nice easy way to remember which one is which. Think of a ladder as it sounds like latitude. The rungs of the ladder are horizontal, going from left to right, or east to west. When you hear latitude you will think of ladder, then the rungs of the ladder. East/west, so latitude is horizontal. Therefore longitude is North/South or vertical!
Another method for memorizing longitude and latitude:
longitude has an N in it for North, so the north-south line is longtitude, so the other east-west is latitude
Here, try these . . .
The French word for
poster
is
l'affiche
(feminine word) which sounds like LA FISH.
So we have for you a mermaid putting up a poster of a FISH.
Now try this one . . .
the French for
horse
is le cheval
This sounds like SHOVEL so . . .
... we get you to imagine a Knight on a horse with a SHOVEL..
.
It is easy to remember the scene, because a picture paints a thousand words.
Again it is pretty easy.
... and certainly beats any other method you might see.
Here is another one.
hen
is
la poule
It sounds like POOL.
So we get you to imagine a hen beside a swimming POOL with the Polish actress (a POLE) Izabella Miko.
The female POLE (which sounds a bit like POOL) Izabella tells us that the word is feminine. . .
... as does the red font...
That is pretty easy I am sure you will agree.
Here's great one that I really like. The French word for
OK!
is
d'accord!
which sounds like DA CORE!
Well take a look at the cartoon and see for yourself!
With memory triggers, pics and learning techniques like these you can see how easy and fun our language learning methods are. . .
and...
Knight's tour
The Knight’s tour is a great feat of mathematical calculations that allow you to move the Knight around a chess board landing on all squares only once.
To see just how difficult it is, get out your chess board and try moving the Knight around the chess board in its L shaped motion. Imagine now that you were told to start on a particular square and do the tour from there. Or, you were told to finish on a particular square. The task will prove even more complicated!
There is a way to do the Knight’s tour starting on a given square or ending on a said square. You will nee to have completed the Dominic System at www.memorymentor.com/dominic_system.htm and you will be using numbers 1 though to 64 as there are 64 squares on a chess board.
Have in your mind a location that you can use solely for the Knight’s tour. I use a holiday resort in Tunisia that I stayed at. I chose this as the tiles in the hotel reminded me of a chess board.
The numbers you will need to memorise and the order they are in is below:
01, 11, 05, 20, 37, 27, 44, 29, 35, 50, 33, 43, 58, 41, 26, 09, 03, 13, 23, 08,
14, 04, 10, 25, 19, 02, 17, 34, 49, 59, 53, 47, 64, 54, 60, 45, 28, 38, 21, 36,
30, 15, 32, 22, 07, 24, 39, 56, 62, 52, 42, 57, 51, 61, 55, 40, 46, 63, 48, 31,
16, 06, 12, 18
In a situation like this it is possible to place four people from the Dominic System at each location. So in my first room, I have 01, 11, 05, and 20. But I don’t have four people in that room. I have two people. What I have is the first person, ie 01 (Ozzie Ardillez) doing the action of 11 Arthur Askey. So I use the image of a Bee for Arthur Askey so instead of Ozzie Ardillez kicking a football I imagine him doing kick ups with bees! You could imagine something different for example Ozzie could be running around waving his arms frantically in the air trying to get the bees away from him! Remember, whatever image comes to mind, use it. That is the image that will first come to you. Trust your imagination.
If you look at the bottom left corner (the black square), in chess, this is called A1. But we are going to call it 1. The bottom right square (white), is number eight.
I hope the picture is clear enough for you! Just start in the bottom left and you will be able to figure out which square is numbered with what.
So if you look at the list again, you can see, for example, 01, 11, 05, and 20 this is the route you take on the board. So 01 will be Ozzie Ardilez, square one, next route on the Knight’s tour, is 11, Arthur Askey. So if someone was to say to you to start from square E6, that would be square number 45. That would be Duke Eliington or whoever you have for number 45. You now know the next square will be 28, Benny Hill!
Maths and formulas
In this section I am not going to go into depth as to how to do various aspects of mathematics, but to show you how to remember formula and symbols.
When I was in college, I did actually use the techniques I am going to show you to remember formula.
Formula looks nasty. There's no nice way to put it. Big long formulas that you have to learn off by heart and the only way you know them is by saying them out parrot fashion. "... Plus minus B, square root A squared minus B squared over 4 AC ..." etc. You get the picture.
Usually you would do some example questions using the formula so as you can see it working. All to easily though the formulas are forgotten. Not to worry. What I am going to show you will make you remember the formula forever. Unfortunately (some may think) you will never forget it!
Starting off with a simple formula, one I think most of us will have come across many times while at school.
Area of a circle = Ï€r²
This formula is really quite simple, most of you may even know this off by heart. But as an example, I will show you how I would remember this formula had I not already known it.
So, it is the area of a circle we are looking for. I need to find an association with area of a circle. Well a circle usually reminds me of one of those round abouts that children would play on. You held onto a railing and pushed the round about round and round!
Ok, so we have our scene, the roundabout.
The symbol, π, is called Pi, pronounced pie (the food).
So I would imagine lots and lots of pies piled onto the round about.
That's the first part of the scene. Next, the r²
R is the 18th letter of the alphabet. 18 is broken down to A H from learning the 100 people which you should have done by now. A H is, in my list, Adolf Hitler. He also has an action, the Heil Hitler arm raising action.
So Adolf Hitler would be standing beside the round about as the pies are spinning round and round.
So this is the scene:
The pies are spinning round and round really fast. So fast in fact that they begin to fly off the round about. Standing nearby is Adolf Hitler defending himself from the pies by doing his Heil Hitler action. He may even be catching some pies with his mouth and eating them!
The fact that I am using Adolf Hitler and his action, emphasises that the number 18 is being used twice. Counting 18 letters of the alphabet will give you R. Two R's is r²
The Quotient Rule is used to differentiate a y value of the form u/v.
The formula is:
So, the question is how do we begin to remember this?
Using the names and letters that we learned earlier the task of remembering the formula will prove to be quite easy.
Take the d/dx part first. Well this does come up in calculus etc quite a lot. The best thing to do in this instance is to memorise something that represents those letters. It makes me think if my friend Dee, short for Deirdre, and dx makes me think of ducks. So I could have my friend Dee, with feathers and a duck's bill!
Next, u/v makes me think of UV sunlight, so I would probably imagine a pair of sunglasses to symbolise u/v!
So that's the start of it. I don't want to tell you how to do it exactly, as it will not be the same for you. What you imagine first will be far better than learning what I imagined first. It is easy for me to recall as it is what I imagined. The same will be easy for you too.
Here's a good one. What's √2 ? I wish I knew
That's the answer! Each word represents the number of letters needed to give you the answer, so I = 1, wish = 4, I = 1, knew = 4: so √2 = 1.414
Absorption Spectrum
Location:When I hear or read “Absorption Spectrum” I will immediately think of a grassy wet field with a giant rainbow pouring into a sponge. I can see and hear the sponge getting bigger and changing to different colours of the rainbow.
Definition: A spectrum showing the amounts of the different wavelengths of light absorbed by the different pigments of chlorophyll.
Key: Spectrum = rainbowShowing = a show i.e. Punch and Judy show (puppets).Amounts = bag of moneyDifferent wavelengths = two beams of light of different coloursAbsorbed = spongeDifferent pigments = two fat pigsChlorophyll = potent smelling bottle of liquid (actually chloroform but sounds similar).
Story:I imagine, beside the giant coloured sponge, a Punch and Judy show (showing) happening. I can hear Punch’s squeaky voice. I notice he has two large bags of money (amounts) in his hands and can hear the coins clashing together as he waves his arms around franticly. All of a sudden, a beam of light appears out of each of the bags (different wavelengths), a yellow and a red one! Punch gets frightened and pushes both bags of money off the stage show and onto the floor. There is another sponge (absorbed) at the base of the stage and it starts to soak up the light coming from the bags of money. Two pigs (different pigments) come running over to the bags of money and each pig sticks his nose into the bags and are eating the coins! But one of the pigs gets greedy and wants to eat all the money himself, so takes out a bottle of chlorophyll (chlorophyll) and puts it under the other pig’s nose. The pig can’t stand the smell and leaves.
Accommodation
Location:When I hear or read “Accommodation” it reminds me of a hostel in Sydney I stayed at.
Definition: Changing the curvature of the lens so that light from the near and distant objects can be focused on the retina to give clear visual images.
Key:Lens = giant contact lensRetina = Bull’s eye on a dart board
Story:I imagine I am back in the room in the hostel I stayed at in Sydney (Accommodation). I imagine holding a giant contact lens and am bending it making it change shape (changing the curvature). I notice a candle on the table (near) in the room and can clearly see a beam of yellow light leave the candle and go into the lens. The window in my room is also open and a street light can be seen (distant). Its yellow glow too finds its way into the lens. I then notice the two beams of light coming together and focusing (focused) on the Bull’s eye (retina) of a dart board hanging on the door! I can clearly see the light on the Bull’s eye!
Acoelomate
Location:When I hear or read “Acoelomate” it reminds me of an air seal in a submarine and then think of the Captain’s mate.
Definition:An animal that does not have a fluid filled body cavity that arises from a split in the mesoderm.
Key:Animal makes me think of a wild large brown bear.Arises = Aries
Story:I imagine the bear with a tube in his mouth. There is a pump attached to the tube removing all the fluid from the bear! The bear’s body cavity is deflating like a balloon. I imagine, beside the pump, a ram (Aries = arises) with a piece of wood in his hooves and splitting it in two. There are splinters of wood everywhere and the ram has really messed up the Dorm (mesoderm).
Action Spectrum
Location:When I hear or read “Action Spectrum” it makes me think of a soldier abseiling down a rainbow in a field.
Definition: A spectrum showing the rate of photosynthesis for each of the different wavelengths of light.
Key: Showing = Punch and Judy showRate = a receiptPhotosynthesis = a bushy treeEach = peach
Story:I imagine a soldier landing on top of the Punch and Judy show. He topples over and falls onto a giant tree and a receipt falls from the tree onto his face. Two peaches suddenly start to shake and beams of different coloured light (different wavelengths of light) start to emit from them.
Active Site
Location:When I hear or read “Active Site” it reminds me of a building site I walk past on my way to work every day.
Definition:The part of the enzyme that the substrate temporarily attaches to. It makes the enzyme specific.
Key:Part = Art easel (sounds like part)Enzyme = giant jigsaw pieceSubstrate = soccer substituteMakes = mortal and pester
Story:I imagine walking past the building site and see a giant art easel (part) with a picture of a bright green jigsaw (enzyme) on the white canvas. I soccer player (substrate) is standing beside the easel and sticks his hands (temporarily attaches) onto the picture. Then I notice a builder walking past the soccer substitute with a mortal and pester (makes) and he is grinding up a piece of jigsaw (enzyme). I shout up to him what he’s making. He replies he is making something specific.
Active transport
Location:When I hear or read “Active transport” it makes me think of a train journey.
Definition:This is the movement of molecules against the concentration gradient. It requires energy.
Key:Movement = flag (as in a people movement with a flag waving).Molecules = moles (moles have terrible eyesight so I imagine moles wearing yellow hard hats with a light on them to help see where they are going).
Story:I imagine I am sitting on a train. All of a sudden there is a loud bang and a hole appears in the train floor. The first thing I see coming out of the hole amongst the rubble is a flag (which makes me think of movement) followed by a group of moles, (molecules). The moles start to climb up the pile of rubble. It is a rather steep gradient (gradient). Half way up, one of the moles stops for an energy drink. (He requires energy!)
Allele
Location:When I hear or read “Allele” it makes me think of an alien in an aircraft hanger like the ones I have seen in lots of Hollywood movies!
Definition:An alternative form of a gene.
Key:Alternative = alternate (something that alternates, like a switch).Form = an application form, perhaps for a new job!Gene = genie
Story:I imagine I am in the aircraft hanger looking at the alien. He is holding onto a giant switch (which reminds me of alternative). Stuck to the switch is a sheet of paper (which reminds me of form), and a genie (gene) is having difficulty in filling it in as it is moving back and forth with the switch! The Genie is sticking out of a lamp.
Anaerobic respiration
Location:When I hear or read “Anaerobic respiration” it makes me think of my friend Anne puffing and panting after doing exercise at my local gym.
Definition:This is the release of energy from food without using oxygen.
Key:Energy = sports drink like LucozadeFood = hamburger
Story:I imagine Anne holding her breath on an exercise bike (without using oxygen). She is holding a hamburger (food). All of a sudden she opens the burger and a sport drink pops out! (Release of energy).
Note this image may seem to run backwards when you are reading it, but when you play it back in your mind it will all make sense!
Antibiotic
Location:When I hear or read “Antibiotic” it reminds me of the isle in the supermarket that sells washing powder (bio washing powder).
Definition:Chemical secreted by bacteria and fungi, which can be used to kill other bacteria and fungi.
Key:Chemical = spray bottle of bleachSecreted = oozing liquidBacteria = a person’s backFungi = mushrooms
Story:I imagine my Auntie spraying a bottle of bleach (chemical) around the supermarket! People are sliding all over the floor because of her! All of a sudden a purple liquid starts to ooze (secreted) from her back (bacteria) and a giant mushroom (fungi) appears on her back and it too starts to ooze! There is a Witch sitting on a giant tin can (which can) laughing at all this and she takes out a gun and shoots (kill) the mushroom (fungi) and my Auntie in the back (bacteria)! What a sight.
Antibody
Location:When I hear or read “Antibody” it reminds me of my Auntie’s house.
Definition:A protein produced by white blood cells in response to an antigen.
Key:Protein = Pro football playerProduced = cow (produces milk)Response = small hammer a Dr uses to check peoples reflexesAntigen = jewels (Antigen reminds me of gemstones)
Story:I imagine I am in my Auntie’s house (Antibody). There is an American football player (protein) in the middle of the living room milking a cow (produced)!! White and red (blood cells) milk appears to be coming from the cow! The footballer then takes out the little hammer and hits the cow on the back leg (response). The cow kicks back and knocks over a table that has a beautiful green gemstone (antigen) on it. I shudder when I hear it smash on the ground.
Antigen
Location:When I hear or read “Antigen” it reminds me of a green Gemstone which may be found in a jewellery store. I immediately think of the jewellers in my local town.
Definition:A chemical, which stimulates the production of antibodies.
Key:Chemical = spray bottle of bleachWhich = Witch with a broomstickStimultates = stimulant such as a cigaretteProduction = cowAntibodies = Autnie’s house ( in this case I imagine her cat, which is always sleeping) I am not imagining her house as I have my location already, in this case my local Jewellers.
Story:I imagine I am in my jewellers buying my girlfriend a present. I notice the jeweller is spraying liquid (chemical) onto the glass surfaces of the display. I look into the reflection of the display and see a Witch (which)! She is smoking a cigarette (stimulates). I look up, shocked. I look at the jeweller to tell him what happened but he has turned into a cow (production)! He moo’s at me. He hand’s me a fresh bottle of milk which I drop by accident. Good job I brought my Auntie’s cat (Antibody) with me to lick it all up!
Autosomes
Location:When I read or hear “Autosomes” it reminds me of my local car dealership in my town.
Definition:Non sex chromosomes
Key:Non = NunChromosomes = Giant X placed on a placard
Story:I imagine several Nuns (Non) protesting outside my local car dealership. I take a look at their placards which reads “X” (chromosomes) on them. I don’t need to think of a word or image for “sex” as it comes hand in hand with chromosome.
Autotrophic
Location:When I hear or read “Autotrophic” it reminds me of a tropical (trophic) tree growing in my front garden.
Definition:An organism that can make its own food.
Key:Organism = organ (like a piano)Make = mortal and pesterFood = hamburger
Story:I imagine sitting in the shade of the giant tropical tree (autotrophic) in my front garden. I am relaxing in a chair as I listen to the music being played on an organ (organism) beside me. How lovely it is!As I am listening to the music I notice the musician is making his own hamburgers (make its own food) while he plays!
Axon
Location:When I hear or read “Axon” it makes me think of an Axe hanging up in my garage. I use it to chop firewood.
Definition:A nerve fibre that carries messages away from the cell body.
Key:Nerve = red stringFibre = home made brown breadCarries = plastic bagMessages = envelopeCell = steel bar that would be on a prison cell window
Story:I imagine I am standing in my garage and there is red string (nerve) everywhere. I decide to wind it up and find a loaf of brown bread (fibre) attached to the end! I decide to place the bread into a plastic bag (carries) but forget I have some envelopes (messages) in there and get them covered in crumbs. I don’t want to get the envelopes any dirtier so I hang the bag on the end of a steel bar (cell) so my hands don’t contaminate them.
Memorizing random letters and numbers
Pre-requisites: Morse Code and Dominic System
I have been asked many times on how to memorise letters and numbers when they are all in the same group, for example a number plate.
e.g.. SG04 LUV or 3456L2X
This is quite achievable and only requires you to know the Morse Code and the Dominic System.
So let's take the example SG04 LGG
S = Sierra = Cab from our image from the Morse code tutorial
G = Golf = Sub
04 = Otto Dix from our list of people
L = Lima = Come
U = Uniform = Kit
V = Victor = Won
So from above you can create a scene to play back in your mind.
You might imagine a CAB pulling up (at the location where you need to memorise the number plate), and a football SUBstitute getting out. He is holding a painting (Otto Dix's action) and he is telling you to COME here and take it off him. You take the painting and hand him a new football KIT and ask him if he WON or not.
French ER Verbs
Below is a walkthrough for memorising the present tenses for ER verbs in French. We need to fix all ER verb tenses in a scene so we can visualise it when we need to call on it from memory. I suggest using your local town. Your town will have everything you need in it so use it as a sponge to absorb your vocabulary. Please make sure you have read the foreign language tutorial found here We also need to associate ER verbs with an image and EAR is the perfect one! Present tense makes me think of Christmas (presents!!) So I have my whole ER Present tense scene based around a giant Christmas tree that is on display in my local town. At the top of the Christmas tree is a giant EAR and there is lots of ear wax dripping out from it!! It’s all messy and sticky under that tree! So when I think of present tense it will remind me of Christmas, then the tree. If it is a verb ending in ER then I will see the giant EAR at the top of it and then my associated ER verb endings. We now need to find a commonly used ER verb to use as an example.
Let’s try Manger – To eat
Je mange ----- I eat
Tu manges ----- You eat (singular)
Il mange ----- He eats
Nous mangeons ----- We eat
Vous mangez ----- You eat (plural)
So now we need to set the scene. Manger – to eat We need to memorise the Je, Tu, Il, Nous, Vous, Ils part first and this is how: I would suggest the number shape system for this. That way you have a definite order to follow and it makes it much easier to recall it later on! 1 sounds like nun 2 sounds like shoe 3 sounds like tree 4 sounds like door 5 sounds like hive 6 sounds like sticks Ok so you get the idea with number rhyme. The nun is going to be associated with the Je, the shoe is going to be associated with the Tu and so on… Let’s look at that now: Number Ending 1 sounds like nun Je e 2 sounds like shoe Tu es 3 sounds like tree Il e 4 sounds like door Nous ons 5 sounds like hive Vous ez 6 sounds like sticks Ils ent So how do we remember which is which? Well when we do this it is best to memorise the endings to the verb also as we will have the whole tense memorised then. So at the Christmas tree I see the nun standing there. But what is she doing? She is Shouting out JESUS!! But she is saying it funny… Jesus. The nun is shouting out the Je part loudly but the sus softly! Now we need to incorporate the “e” of the ending of mange (French part of "I" eat) into our nun image. So I imagine a large Snail coming up to the nun and starts shouting out Je too!! The idea of the snail as an “e” is because the shell of the snail reminds me of an “e” withthe pattern of it. So now onto Tu –You and the number rhyme is Two Shoe So just then I see this giant Shoe kick the snail! (this helps to keep the image moving). I look up at the giant shoe, and can smell the leather off it! Wow it must be brand new! (helps to anchor the image). So I look at the shoe and it spits at me! Making a spit sounds like Tu – try it and see for yourself! I then turn to the shoe and say to it “Was that you, shoe?” And the shoe replies “yES” getting louder after the y. Try doing it as a whisper, it sounds freaky! Another anchor help. Number 3 is the “Il” linking with number rhyme 3 - tree. So I start to walk away from the shoe and walk straight into a tree! I look up and notice that instead of a tree trunk it is a giant fat eel! (the eel reminds me of il - French for He He looks at me and says “Do you mind, I am trying to eat” I look down and notice the Eel is using a knife and fork and eating snails!! The snails remind me of “e”, the ending of the verb. Number 4, door is linked with Nous. After walking away from the tree I walk to the entrance of a shop near to where the Christmas tree is… But I can’t open the door. Someone has thrown a cowboy lasso to make a noose (Nous)and it has wrapped around my hand! I can’t grab the door handle! But luckily my friend “the Fonz” (from Happy Days TV comedy!! Fonz reminds me of ons) rescues me! 5 is hive and links with vous which reminds me of Poo as in Whinnie the Poo (the bear, check Google if you are unfamiliar). So I manage to get into the shop and walk straight over to the sweets section. There I see some lovely looking honey coming straight fresh out of the bee hive!! And who better to be eating all the honey than Poo Bear!! But he is jammed inside the bee hive and I ask him how he got in there. He replies “it was EEEEZZZZZZ” (sounds like easy). This lets you know that the ending for Vous verbs is ez. I walk past Poo Bear and hear a cracking sound… I realise I am standing on lots of sticks (sounds like 6). I look down and see that there are lots of eels (ils in the bunch of sticks too! Eels remind me of Ils. I ask them what on earth they are doing down there and they respond “We are pitching a tent. Go away!”. The ENT of tent lets you know the ending of the verb for Ils. This method is easy. It lets you memorise the present tense endings very well. But like everything else you need to go over it again and again. I suggest doing it out once, then after half an hour do it again in your head, then an hour later, then when in bed, then in the morning, then when in bed, then once every couple of days. Believe me after a week or so of this it will stick. But whatever you do DO NOT miss going over it on a regular basis. I know what happens as I have done it myself. I say “Ah, I know it, I don’t need to go over it again!”. This is the time when it get's lost in your memory banks! Happy memorising!
Mental Shopper
Introduction
This is a great effect by Doug Canning, and is presented here with his permission. Practicing and performing it will help you to learn the basics of the Phonetic Alphabet system so that you know it cold. In the original write-up of this effect (May 1993 Linking Ring), Doug mentions that many people say he just memorized all the prices, but are amazed how he could add them so fast. He doesn't mind, because they're still giving him more credit than he deserves for the work in this effect!
Effect
You hand the spectator 5 cards with 6 grocery item and their 3-digit prices on each one. The spectator calls out one item from each card, but not the price. Thanks to your powerful mind, you are able to not only recall the prices of the items, but add them up quickly in your head, as fast as a calculator!
Mental Shopper
Prerequisite: (This link opens in a new window)Phonetic alphabet
Set-up
On a separate page, I have included a PDF File (opens in a new window) for you to download, which lists the items and their prices. If you print this file, and use pre-perforated business card (10 to a sheet) stock, you can simply pop out each card individually. Otherwise, just cut up the paper so that you have 10 individual cards. You should now have two complete sets of cards, with cards labeled A through E in each set. One you'll use in the effect, and the other can be a back-up set.
Method
You are going to have your spectator(s) give you one item off of each card, from which you will determine the answer. There are two methods here, one mathematical and the other mnemonic. First I'll explain the mathematical method. Instead of adding five 3-digit numbers, you're simply going to add five 1-digit numbers. If the spectator were to choose, say, Maalox, Crackers, Bacon, Slimfast, and Tupperware (see PDF File, which opens in a new window), you would simply add the last digit in each price. In this example, you would add 3 plus 7 (which makes 10), plus 9 (making 19), plus 0 (which keep the total at 19), plus 1 (for a final total of 20. This “20” will be the total number of cents in the price.
To find out the number of dollars in the price, simply subtract the number of cents from 50. In the example above, this would mean that the final total is 30 dollars and 20 cents ($30.20). If the final total of the single digits had been, say, 22 cents, the final total would have been $28.22 (because 50-22=28). You'll get prices ranging from $11.39, up to $45.05 in this effect.
Since you're only given the product names, though, how do you know what numbers to add? This is where the basics of the Peg system are going to be put to use. Look carefully at the PDF file (opens in a new window). The phonetic sound that represents the last digit in each price in the peg system (the only number you need to know) is the first sound in the name of the product! For example, the “mmm” sound represents 3 in the phonetic Peg system, so you should instantly know that when the spectator says “Maalox” (which begins with the “mmm” sound) you know to add 3 to your running total. Quick, without looking, can you tell me how much “Vitamins” equals?
Definitions
3. EukaryoteThis word can be separated as follows: Eu - karyo - te. Eu - means true, karyo - means nucleus. A eukaryote is an organism whose cells contain a "true" membrane bound nucleus. 4. HeterozygousThis word can be separated as follows: Hetero - zyg - ous. Hetero - means different, zyg - means yolk or union, ous - means characterized by or full of. Heterozygous refers to a union characterized by the joining of two different alleles for a given trait. 5. Hydrophilic This word can be separated as follows: Hydro - philic.Hydro - refers to water, philic - means love. Hydrophilic means water-loving. 6. OligosaccharideThis word can be separated as follows: Oligo - saccharide. Oligo - means few or little, saccharide - means sugar. An oligosaccharide is a carbohydrate that contains a small number of component sugars. 7. OsteoblastThis word can be separated as follows: Osteo - blast. Osteo - means bone, blast - means bud or germ (early form of an organism). An osteoblast is a cell from which bone is derived. 8. Tegmentum This word can be separated as follows: Teg - ment - um. Teg - means cover, ment - refers to mind or brain. The tegmentum is the bundle of fibers that cover the brain.2. CytokinesisThis word can be separated as follows: Cyto - kinesis.Cyto - means cell, kinesis - means movement. Cytokinesis refers to the movement of the cytoplasm that produces distinct daughter cells during cell division. Rotational Motion
Rotational Inertia: That property of an object to resist any change in its state of rotation. If at rest the body tends to remain at rest; if rotating, it tends to remain rotating and will continue to do so unless acted upon by a net external torque.
Torque: The product of force and lever-arm distance, which tends to produce rotation.
Center of Mass: The average position of mass or the single point associated with an object where all its mass can be considered to be concentrated.
Center of Gravity: The average position of weight or the single point associated with an object where the force of gravity can be considered to ace. Usually the same place as the center of mass.
Equilibrium: The state of an object when not acted upon by a net force or net torque. An object in equilibrium may be at rest or moving at uniform velocity; that is, not accelerating.
Centripetal Force: A center-seeking force that causes an object to follow a circular pathF = (mv`2)/r
Centrifugal Force: An outward force that is due to rotation. In an inertial frame of reference, it is fictitious in the sense that it doesn't act on the rotating object but on whatever supplied the centripetal force; it is the reaction to the centripetal force. In a rotating frame of reference, it does act on the rotating body and is fictitious in the sense that it is not an interaction with an agent or entity such as mass or charge but is a force in itself that is solely a product of rotation; it has no reaction-force counterpart.
Angular Momentum: A measure of an object's rotation about a particular axis; more specifically, the product of its rotational inertia and rotational velocity. For an object that is small compared to the radial distance, it is the product of mass speed, and radial distance of rotation.Angular Momentum = rotational inertia x rotational velocity (mvr)
Conservation of Angular Momentum: When no external torque acts on an object or a system of objects, no changes of angular momentum takes place. Hence, the angular momentum before an event involving only internal torques is equal to the angular momentum after the event
Gravity
Kepler's Laws of Planetary Motion:1] Each planet moves in an elliptical orbit with the sun at one focus2] The line form the sun to any planet sweeps out equal areas of space in equal time intervals3] The squares of the times of revolution (days, months or years) of the planets are proportional to the cubes of their average distances from the sun.
Law of Universal Gravitation: Every mass in the universe attracts every other mass with a force that for two masses is directly proportional to the product of their masses and inversely proportional to the square of the distance separating themF = (G(m1*m2))/d^2
Inverse-Square Law: A law relating the intensity of an effect to the inverse square of the distance from the cause. Intensity ~ 1/distance`2Gravity follows an inverse-square law, as do the effects of electric, magnetic, light, sound, and radiation phenomena
Weightlessness:condition wherein gravitational pull appears to be A lacking.
Spring Tide: A high or low tide that occurs when the sun, earth, and moon are all lined up so that the tides due to the sun and moon coincide, making the high tides higher than average and the low tides lower than average
Neap Tide: A tide that occurs when the moon is midway between new and full, in either direction. Tides due to the sun and moon partly cancel, making the high tides lower and the low tides higher than average.
Gravitational Field: The space surrounding a massive body in which another mass experiences a force of attraction
Black Hole: The configuration of a massive star that has undergone gravitational collapse, in which gravitation at the surface is so intense that even the star's own light cannot escape.
Big Bang: The primordial explosion that is thought to have resulted in the expanding universe
Stability: In order for an object to be stable, its center of gravity must lie directly above a point of support
The state of motion of the center of mass in a system can only be changed by forces outside the system
Escape Speed: That speed which is sufficient to propel an object away from a planet, or any object
Tides: Tides are caused by the variation of force on the earth exerted by the moon (and the sun)The effect of the moon is about 4 times greater than that of the sun.
Vibrations and Waves
Summary of Terms:
Sine Curve: A wave form traced by simple harmonic motion that is uniformly moving in a perpendicular direction, like the wavelike path traced on a moving conveyor belt by a pendulum swinging at right angles about the moving belt.
Amplitude: For a wave or vibration, the maximum displacement on either side of the equilibrium (midpoint) position.
Wavelength: the distance between successive identical parts of a wave
Frequency: For a body undergoing simple harmonic motion, the number of vibrations it makes per unit time. For a series of waves, the number of waves that pass a particular point per unit time.Frequency = 1/Period -or- Period = 1/Frequencyhertz (Hz): unit of frequency; one vibration per second is 1Hz
Period: The time required for a vibration or a wave to make a complete cycle
Wavespeed: The speed with which waves pass by a particular point frequency x wavelength
Sound
Summary of Terms
Infrasonic: A sound frequency too low to be heard by the normal human ear. i.e. below 20Hz
Ultrasonic: A sound frequency to high to be heard by the normal human ear. i.e. about 20kHz
Compression: Condensed region of the medium through which a longitudinal wave travels.
Rarefaction: Rarefied region, or region of lessened pressure, of the medium throughout which a longitudinal wave travels.
Reverberation: Re-echoed sound.
Refraction: The bending of a wave through either a nonuniform medium or from one medium to another, caused by differences in wave speed.
Forced Vibration: The setting up of vibrations in an object by a vibrating force.
Natural Frequency: A frequency at which an elastic object naturally tends to vibrate, so that minimum energy is required to produce a forced vibration or to continue vibration at that frequency.
Resonance: The result of forced vibrations in a body when an applied frequency matches the natural frequency of the body.
Beats: A series of alternate reinforcements and cancellations produced by the interference of two sets of superimposed waves of different frequencies, heard as a throbbing effect in sound waves.
Carrier Wave: The wave, usually of radio frequency, whose characteristics are modified in the process of modulation.
Modulation: The process of impressing one wave system upon another of higher frequency.
Amplitude Modulation: A type of modulation in which the amplitude of the carrier wave is varied above and below its normal value by an amount proportional to the amplitude of the impressed wave.
Frequency Modulation: A type of modulation in which the frequency of the carrier wave is varied above and below its normal frequency be an amount that is proportional to the amplitude of the impressed signal. In this case, the amplitude of the modulated carrier wave remains constant.
Transverse Wave: A wave in which the individual particles of a medium vibrate from side to side perpendicularly to the direction in which the wave travels. (Strings)
Longitudinal Wave: A wave in which the individual particles of a medium vibrate back and forth in the direction in which the wave travels. (Sound)
Interference Pattern: The pattern formed by superposition of different sets of waves that produces mutual reinforcement in some places and cancellation in others.
Standing Wave: A stationary wave pattern formed in a medium when two sets of identical waves pass through the medium in opposite directions.
Doppler Effect: Change in frequency of sound or lighter due to relative motion of source and receiver.
Bow Wave: The V-shaped wave made by an object moving across a liquid surface at a speed greater than the wave velocity.
Shock Wave: The cone-shaped wave made by an object moving at supersonic speed through a fluid.
Sonic Boom: The loud sound resulting from the incidence of a shock wave.
Satellite Motion
Summary of Terms:
Satellite: A projectile or small celestial body that orbits a larger celestial body.
Ellipse: The closed oval-like curve wherein the sum of the distances from any point on the curve to both foci is a constant. When the foci are together at one point, the ellipse is a circle. The farther apart the foci, the more eccentric the ellipse.
Escape Speed: The speed that a projectile, space probe, or similar object must reach to escape the gravitational influence of the earth or celestial body to which it is attracted.
Equations, Equivalences, and Concepts:
The sum or KE and PE for a satellite is a constant at all points along its orbit.
For a satellite in circular orbit, it is always moving perpendicularly to the earth’s gravitational field.
Because a satellite moves at right angles to the earth’s gravitational field, no change in speed occurs - only a change in direction.
The higher the orbit of a satellite, the less it’s speed and the longer it’s period.
Electricity
The force between two electrically charged objects is
F=(Kq1q2)/r^2 (r=distance, q=charges, k=proportionality constant)
E = Elemental electric charge (-1.6 x 10-19 Coulombs)
Conductor - allows electric charge to move thru it
Insulator - materials in which the electrons are tightly bound
E=F/q F=Eq A=F/M=Eq/M W=FD=EqD
1 Volt=1 Joule/1 Coulomb
Ampere=Coulombs/Second (A=q/s)
1 Amp=6.25 x 1018 electrons/second
1 Amp(120V)=120W
P=VI
Electromotive Forces: Battery, Thermoelectric, Electromagnetism
Fluorescent lights - 1 amp
Motor starter - 100 amp
Head Llights - 2 or 3 amp
Resistance:
Friction in a conductor, resists the movement of electrons, limits the amount of potential current that can pass.
R=V/A A=current
V=AR R=resistance
A=V/R V=voltage
What determines resistance?
Type of material, shape and size ; like a hose-bigger means less R, longer means more R
Electric current flows from high potential to low potential (volts)
Thus in a -12v DC battery the current travels from - to +
How are electricity and gravity the same?
They both a forces, and follow the inverse-square law
How are they different?
Electricity is a much stronger force
Gravity is exclusively attractive, while electricity is both repellant and attractive
Does current flow thru or across a resistor? Thru
Is voltage established thru or across a resistor? Across
Ohms law: Amps=Volts/Resistance (A=V/R)
Definitions:
Electrostatics: The study of electric charges at rest relative to one another
Capacitor: An electrical device, in its simplest form a pair of parallel conducting plates separated by a small distance, that stores electric charge.
Coulomb’s Law: the relationship among electrical force, charge, and distance.
Coulomb: the SI unit of electrical charge.
Conductor: any material thru which charge easily flows when subject to an external force.
Insulator: any material that resists charge flow thru it when subject to an external force.
Semiconductor: a poorly conducting material, such as crystalline silicon or germanium, that can be made a better-conducting material by the addition of certain impurities or energy.
Charging by contact: the transfer of charge from one substance to another by physical contact between substances.
Charging by induction: the change in charge of a grounded object, caused by the electrical influence of electric charge close by but not in contact.
Electrically polarized: term applied to an atom or molecule in which the charges are aligned so that one side is slightly more positive or negative than the opposite side.
Electric field: the energetic region of space surrounding a charged object. About a charged point, the field decreases with distance according to the inverse- square law.
Electric potential energy: the energy a charge possesses by virtue of its location in an electric field.
Electric potential: the electric potential energy per amount of charge, measured in volts, and often called voltage.
Potential difference: the difference in voltage between two points, measured in volts.
Electric current: the flow of electric charge that transports energy from one place to another. Measured in amperes, where 1A is the flow of 6.25 x 1018 electrons per second.
Electrical Resistance: the property of a material that resists the flow of an electric current thru it. (ohms).
Superconductor: a material in which the electrical resistance to the flow of electric current drops to near zero or zero under special circumstances that usually include low temperatures.
Direct Current: an electric current flowing in one direction only.
Alternating Current: electric current that repeatedly reverses its direction; the electric charges vibrate about relatively fixed points. In the U.S. the vibrational rate is 60Hz.
Electric Power: the rate of energy transfer, or the rate of doing work; the amount of energy per unit time, which electrically can be measured by the product of current and voltage. Measured in watts or kilowatts.
Series circuit: an electric circuit with devices having resistances arranged in such a way that the same electric current flows through all of them.
Parallel circuit: an electric circuit with two or more resistances arranged in branches in such a way that any single one completes the circuit independently of all the others.
Notes:
Electrons can be forced into vibration by the vibration electric fields of electromagnetic waves
Color
At the resonant frequencies where the amplitudes of oscillation are large, light is absorbed. But at frequencies below and above the resonant frequencies, light is re- emitted (reflected)
An object can only reflect frequencies that are present in the illuminating light.
A red piece of glass appears red because it absorbs all the colors that compose white light, except red, which it transmits.
The energy of the absorbed frequencies increase the kinetic energy of the molecules and the glass is warmed.
Any of the three additive primaries can be produced by a combination of any two of cyan, magenta, or yellow pigments. The latter three are called subtractive primary colors.
A color plus its opposite (complementary) produce white.
The tinier the particle, the higher the frequency of light it will scatter.
Of the visible frequencies violet light is scattered the most, followed by blue, green, yellow, orange, and red.
When white light passes through a thick atmosphere, the higher frequencies are scattered the most while the lower frequencies are transmitted with minimal scattering.
As the day progresses and the sun is lower in the sky, the path through the atmosphere is longer, and more blue is scattered from the sunlight. The removal of blue (through scattering) leaves the transmitted light more reddish in appearance.
Water is transparent to nearly all the visible frequencies of light, but strongly absorbs infrared waves.
Water molecules very weakly resonate in the visible red, which causes a slight absorption of red light in water. Red light is reduced to a quarter of its initial brightness by 15 meters of water.
Terms:
Additive primary colors: The three colors, red, blue, and green, that when added in certain proportions will produce any color in the spectrum.
Subtractive primary colors: The three colors of absorbing pigments-magenta, yellow, and cyan- that when mixed in certain proportions will reflect any color in the spectrum.
Complementary colors: Any two colors that when added produce white light.
Reflection and Refraction
Fermat’s Principle: Out of all possible paths that light might take, to get from one point to another, it takes the path that requires the shortest time.
Law of Reflection: The angle of incidence equals the angle of reflection.
Plane mirrors: The observer sees the image of a candle at a point behind the mirror. The light rays do not actually come from this point, so the image is called a virtual image.
Causes of refraction: the bending is caused by a change in speed.
Dispersion: Violet light travels about one percent slower in ordinary glass than does red light.
Terms:
Reflection: the return of light rays from a surface in such a way that the angle at which a given ray is returned is equal to the angle at which it strikes the surface. When the reflecting surface is irregular, light is returned in irregular directions; this is diffuse reflection.
Refraction: the bending of an oblique ray of light when it passes from one transparent medium to another.
Critical angle: the minimum angle of incidence at which a light ray is totally reflected within a medium.
Total internal reflection: the total reflection of light traveling in a medium when it strides on the surface of a less dense medium at an angle greater than the critical angle.
Converging lens: A lens that is thicker in the middle than at the edges and refracts parallel rays passing through it to a focus.
Diverging lens: A lens that is thinner in the middle than at the edges, causing parallel ray passing through it to diverge.
Virtual image: an image formed by light rays that do not converge at the location of the image. A virtual image is that reflected by a mirror; it cannot be displayed on a screen.
Real image: An image formed by light rays that converge at the location of the image. A real image can be displayed on a screen.
Aberration: a limitation on perfect image formation inherent, to some degree, in all particle systems.
Light Waves
A soap bubble appears iridescent in white light when the thickness of the soap film is about the same as a wavelength of light.
Bright fringes occur when waves (from both slits) arrive in phase; dark areas result from the overlapping of waves that are out of phase.
Diffraction grating disperses white light into colors, and are used in spectrometers.
The amount of diffraction depends on the wavelength of the wave compared to the size of the obstruction that casts the shadow. The longer the wave compared to the obstruction, the more the diffraction occurs.
Terms:
Huygens’ principle: the theory by which light waves spreading out from a point source can be regarded as the superposition of tiny secondary wavelets.
Diffraction: the bending of light around an obstacle or through a narrow slit in such a way that fringes of light and dark or colored bands are produced.
Interference: the superposition of waves producing regions of reinforcement and regions of cancellation. Constructive interference refers to regions of reinforcement; destructive interference refers to regions of cancellation. The interference of selected wavelengths of light produces colors known as interference colors.
Polarization: the alignment of the electric vectors that make up electromagnetic radiation. Such waves of aligned vibrations are said to be polarized.
Hologram: a two dimensional microscopic diffraction pattern that shows three dimensional optical images.
Light Emission
Summary of terms:
Excitation: the process of boosting electrons in an atom or molecule from a lower to a higher energy level.
Emission Spectrum: the distribution of wavelengths in the light from a luminous source.
Spectroscope: an optical instrument, separates light into its constituent frequencies in the form of spectral lines
Incandescence: the state of glowing while at a high temperature, caused by electrons in vibration atoms and molecules that are shaken in and out of their stable energy levels, emitting radiant energy in the process. The peak frequency of radiant energy is proportional to the absolute temperature of a heated substance; f ~ t
Absorption Spectrum: a continuous spectrum, like that of white light, interrupted by dark lines or bands that result from the absorption of certain frequencies of light by a substance through which the radiant energy passes.
Fluorescence: the property of absorbing radiant energy of one frequency and re-emitting radiant energy of lower frequency. Part of the absorbed radiant energy goes into heat and the other part into excitation; hence the emitted radiant energy has a lower energy and therefore a lower frequency than the absorbed radiant energy.
Phosphorescence: a type of light emission that is the same as fluorescence except for a delay between excitation and de-excitation, which provides an afterglow. The delay is caused by atoms being excited to energy levels that do not decay rapidly. The afterglow may last from fractions of a second to hours, or even days, depending on the type of material, temperature, and other factors.
Laser (light amp. by stimulated emission of radiation): an optical instrument that produces a beam of coherent monochromatic light.
Notes:l=c/f
The temperature of incandescent bodies, whether they be stars or blast-furnace interiors, can be determined by measuring the peak frequency of radiant energy they emit.
Incoherent white light contains waves of many frequency (and wavelengths) that are out of phase with one another
Light of a single frequency and wavelength is still out of phase
Coherent light: all the waves are identical and in phase.
Light Quanta
When the energy of a photon is divided by its frequency, the single number that results is the proportionality constant, called Planck’s constant, h (6.6 x 10-34 joule- sec)
Observations contrary to the wave picture for the analysis of photoelectricity:
1] the time lag between turning on the light and the ejection of the first electrons was not affected by the brightness or frequency of the light. 2] the effect was easy to observe with violet or ultraviolet light, but not with red light. 3] the rate at which electrons were ejected was proportional to the brightness of the light. 4] the maximum energy of the ejected electrons was not affected by the brightness of the light, but there were indications that the energy did depend on the frequency of the light.
-one photon is completely absorbed by each electron ejected from the metal.(all or nothing)
-the energy of each photon is proportional to the frequency of light, while the number of photons has to do with its brightness.
-light travels as a wave and hits as a stream of photons
The act of observing something as tiny as an electron produces a considerable uncertainty in either its position or its motion.
Summary of terms:
Complementarity: (Bohr) the principle that wave and particle models of either matter or radiation complement each other and when combined provide a fuller description of either one.
The Atom and the Quantum
Notes:
The electron doesn’t radiate light while it accelerates around the nucleus in a single orbit, but that radiation of light takes place only when the electron jumps orbit from a higher energy level to a lower energy level.
Color depends on the (distance of) jump. Bohr’s views explained the regularities being found in atomic spectra.
Summary of terms:
Ritz combination principle: the theory that the spectral lines of the elements have frequencies that are either the sums or the differences of the frequencies of two other lines.
de Broglie matter waves: the associated wave properties of all particles of matter. The wavelength of a particle wave is related to its momentum and Planck’s constant, l=h/momentum
Shrodinger’s wave equation: the fundamental equation of quantum mechanics, which interprets the wave nature of material particles in terms of probability wave amplitudes.
Correspondence principle: the rule that a new theory is valid provided that, when it overlaps with the old, it agrees with the verified results of the old theory.
Rotational Inertia: That property of an object to resist any change in its state of rotation. If at rest the body tends to remain at rest; if rotating, it tends to remain rotating and will continue to do so unless acted upon by a net external torque.
Torque: The product of force and lever-arm distance, which tends to produce rotation.
Center of Mass: The average position of mass or the single point associated with an object where all its mass can be considered to be concentrated.
Center of Gravity: The average position of weight or the single point associated with an object where the force of gravity can be considered to ace. Usually the same place as the center of mass.
Equilibrium: The state of an object when not acted upon by a net force or net torque. An object in equilibrium may be at rest or moving at uniform velocity; that is, not accelerating.
Centripetal Force: A center-seeking force that causes an object to follow a circular pathF = (mv`2)/r
Centrifugal Force: An outward force that is due to rotation. In an inertial frame of reference, it is fictitious in the sense that it doesn't act on the rotating object but on whatever supplied the centripetal force; it is the reaction to the centripetal force. In a rotating frame of reference, it does act on the rotating body and is fictitious in the sense that it is not an interaction with an agent or entity such as mass or charge but is a force in itself that is solely a product of rotation; it has no reaction-force counterpart.
Angular Momentum: A measure of an object's rotation about a particular axis; more specifically, the product of its rotational inertia and rotational velocity. For an object that is small compared to the radial distance, it is the product of mass speed, and radial distance of rotation.Angular Momentum = rotational inertia x rotational velocity (mvr)
Conservation of Angular Momentum: When no external torque acts on an object or a system of objects, no changes of angular momentum takes place. Hence, the angular momentum before an event involving only internal torques is equal to the angular momentum after the event
Gravity
Kepler's Laws of Planetary Motion:1] Each planet moves in an elliptical orbit with the sun at one focus2] The line form the sun to any planet sweeps out equal areas of space in equal time intervals3] The squares of the times of revolution (days, months or years) of the planets are proportional to the cubes of their average distances from the sun.
Law of Universal Gravitation: Every mass in the universe attracts every other mass with a force that for two masses is directly proportional to the product of their masses and inversely proportional to the square of the distance separating themF = (G(m1*m2))/d^2
Inverse-Square Law: A law relating the intensity of an effect to the inverse square of the distance from the cause. Intensity ~ 1/distance`2Gravity follows an inverse-square law, as do the effects of electric, magnetic, light, sound, and radiation phenomena
Weightlessness:condition wherein gravitational pull appears to be A lacking.
Spring Tide: A high or low tide that occurs when the sun, earth, and moon are all lined up so that the tides due to the sun and moon coincide, making the high tides higher than average and the low tides lower than average
Neap Tide: A tide that occurs when the moon is midway between new and full, in either direction. Tides due to the sun and moon partly cancel, making the high tides lower and the low tides higher than average.
Gravitational Field: The space surrounding a massive body in which another mass experiences a force of attraction
Black Hole: The configuration of a massive star that has undergone gravitational collapse, in which gravitation at the surface is so intense that even the star's own light cannot escape.
Big Bang: The primordial explosion that is thought to have resulted in the expanding universe
Stability: In order for an object to be stable, its center of gravity must lie directly above a point of support
The state of motion of the center of mass in a system can only be changed by forces outside the system
Escape Speed: That speed which is sufficient to propel an object away from a planet, or any object
Tides: Tides are caused by the variation of force on the earth exerted by the moon (and the sun)The effect of the moon is about 4 times greater than that of the sun.
Vibrations and Waves
Summary of Terms:
Sine Curve: A wave form traced by simple harmonic motion that is uniformly moving in a perpendicular direction, like the wavelike path traced on a moving conveyor belt by a pendulum swinging at right angles about the moving belt.
Amplitude: For a wave or vibration, the maximum displacement on either side of the equilibrium (midpoint) position.
Wavelength: the distance between successive identical parts of a wave
Frequency: For a body undergoing simple harmonic motion, the number of vibrations it makes per unit time. For a series of waves, the number of waves that pass a particular point per unit time.Frequency = 1/Period -or- Period = 1/Frequencyhertz (Hz): unit of frequency; one vibration per second is 1Hz
Period: The time required for a vibration or a wave to make a complete cycle
Wavespeed: The speed with which waves pass by a particular point frequency x wavelength
Sound
Summary of Terms
Infrasonic: A sound frequency too low to be heard by the normal human ear. i.e. below 20Hz
Ultrasonic: A sound frequency to high to be heard by the normal human ear. i.e. about 20kHz
Compression: Condensed region of the medium through which a longitudinal wave travels.
Rarefaction: Rarefied region, or region of lessened pressure, of the medium throughout which a longitudinal wave travels.
Reverberation: Re-echoed sound.
Refraction: The bending of a wave through either a nonuniform medium or from one medium to another, caused by differences in wave speed.
Forced Vibration: The setting up of vibrations in an object by a vibrating force.
Natural Frequency: A frequency at which an elastic object naturally tends to vibrate, so that minimum energy is required to produce a forced vibration or to continue vibration at that frequency.
Resonance: The result of forced vibrations in a body when an applied frequency matches the natural frequency of the body.
Beats: A series of alternate reinforcements and cancellations produced by the interference of two sets of superimposed waves of different frequencies, heard as a throbbing effect in sound waves.
Carrier Wave: The wave, usually of radio frequency, whose characteristics are modified in the process of modulation.
Modulation: The process of impressing one wave system upon another of higher frequency.
Amplitude Modulation: A type of modulation in which the amplitude of the carrier wave is varied above and below its normal value by an amount proportional to the amplitude of the impressed wave.
Frequency Modulation: A type of modulation in which the frequency of the carrier wave is varied above and below its normal frequency be an amount that is proportional to the amplitude of the impressed signal. In this case, the amplitude of the modulated carrier wave remains constant.
Transverse Wave: A wave in which the individual particles of a medium vibrate from side to side perpendicularly to the direction in which the wave travels. (Strings)
Longitudinal Wave: A wave in which the individual particles of a medium vibrate back and forth in the direction in which the wave travels. (Sound)
Interference Pattern: The pattern formed by superposition of different sets of waves that produces mutual reinforcement in some places and cancellation in others.
Standing Wave: A stationary wave pattern formed in a medium when two sets of identical waves pass through the medium in opposite directions.
Doppler Effect: Change in frequency of sound or lighter due to relative motion of source and receiver.
Bow Wave: The V-shaped wave made by an object moving across a liquid surface at a speed greater than the wave velocity.
Shock Wave: The cone-shaped wave made by an object moving at supersonic speed through a fluid.
Sonic Boom: The loud sound resulting from the incidence of a shock wave.
Satellite Motion
Summary of Terms:
Satellite: A projectile or small celestial body that orbits a larger celestial body.
Ellipse: The closed oval-like curve wherein the sum of the distances from any point on the curve to both foci is a constant. When the foci are together at one point, the ellipse is a circle. The farther apart the foci, the more eccentric the ellipse.
Escape Speed: The speed that a projectile, space probe, or similar object must reach to escape the gravitational influence of the earth or celestial body to which it is attracted.
Equations, Equivalences, and Concepts:
The sum or KE and PE for a satellite is a constant at all points along its orbit.
For a satellite in circular orbit, it is always moving perpendicularly to the earth’s gravitational field.
Because a satellite moves at right angles to the earth’s gravitational field, no change in speed occurs - only a change in direction.
The higher the orbit of a satellite, the less it’s speed and the longer it’s period.
Electricity
The force between two electrically charged objects is
F=(Kq1q2)/r^2 (r=distance, q=charges, k=proportionality constant)
E = Elemental electric charge (-1.6 x 10-19 Coulombs)
Conductor - allows electric charge to move thru it
Insulator - materials in which the electrons are tightly bound
E=F/q F=Eq A=F/M=Eq/M W=FD=EqD
1 Volt=1 Joule/1 Coulomb
Ampere=Coulombs/Second (A=q/s)
1 Amp=6.25 x 1018 electrons/second
1 Amp(120V)=120W
P=VI
Electromotive Forces: Battery, Thermoelectric, Electromagnetism
Fluorescent lights - 1 amp
Motor starter - 100 amp
Head Llights - 2 or 3 amp
Resistance:
Friction in a conductor, resists the movement of electrons, limits the amount of potential current that can pass.
R=V/A A=current
V=AR R=resistance
A=V/R V=voltage
What determines resistance?
Type of material, shape and size ; like a hose-bigger means less R, longer means more R
Electric current flows from high potential to low potential (volts)
Thus in a -12v DC battery the current travels from - to +
How are electricity and gravity the same?
They both a forces, and follow the inverse-square law
How are they different?
Electricity is a much stronger force
Gravity is exclusively attractive, while electricity is both repellant and attractive
Does current flow thru or across a resistor? Thru
Is voltage established thru or across a resistor? Across
Ohms law: Amps=Volts/Resistance (A=V/R)
Definitions:
Electrostatics: The study of electric charges at rest relative to one another
Capacitor: An electrical device, in its simplest form a pair of parallel conducting plates separated by a small distance, that stores electric charge.
Coulomb’s Law: the relationship among electrical force, charge, and distance.
Coulomb: the SI unit of electrical charge.
Conductor: any material thru which charge easily flows when subject to an external force.
Insulator: any material that resists charge flow thru it when subject to an external force.
Semiconductor: a poorly conducting material, such as crystalline silicon or germanium, that can be made a better-conducting material by the addition of certain impurities or energy.
Charging by contact: the transfer of charge from one substance to another by physical contact between substances.
Charging by induction: the change in charge of a grounded object, caused by the electrical influence of electric charge close by but not in contact.
Electrically polarized: term applied to an atom or molecule in which the charges are aligned so that one side is slightly more positive or negative than the opposite side.
Electric field: the energetic region of space surrounding a charged object. About a charged point, the field decreases with distance according to the inverse- square law.
Electric potential energy: the energy a charge possesses by virtue of its location in an electric field.
Electric potential: the electric potential energy per amount of charge, measured in volts, and often called voltage.
Potential difference: the difference in voltage between two points, measured in volts.
Electric current: the flow of electric charge that transports energy from one place to another. Measured in amperes, where 1A is the flow of 6.25 x 1018 electrons per second.
Electrical Resistance: the property of a material that resists the flow of an electric current thru it. (ohms).
Superconductor: a material in which the electrical resistance to the flow of electric current drops to near zero or zero under special circumstances that usually include low temperatures.
Direct Current: an electric current flowing in one direction only.
Alternating Current: electric current that repeatedly reverses its direction; the electric charges vibrate about relatively fixed points. In the U.S. the vibrational rate is 60Hz.
Electric Power: the rate of energy transfer, or the rate of doing work; the amount of energy per unit time, which electrically can be measured by the product of current and voltage. Measured in watts or kilowatts.
Series circuit: an electric circuit with devices having resistances arranged in such a way that the same electric current flows through all of them.
Parallel circuit: an electric circuit with two or more resistances arranged in branches in such a way that any single one completes the circuit independently of all the others.
Notes:
Electrons can be forced into vibration by the vibration electric fields of electromagnetic waves
Color
At the resonant frequencies where the amplitudes of oscillation are large, light is absorbed. But at frequencies below and above the resonant frequencies, light is re- emitted (reflected)
An object can only reflect frequencies that are present in the illuminating light.
A red piece of glass appears red because it absorbs all the colors that compose white light, except red, which it transmits.
The energy of the absorbed frequencies increase the kinetic energy of the molecules and the glass is warmed.
Any of the three additive primaries can be produced by a combination of any two of cyan, magenta, or yellow pigments. The latter three are called subtractive primary colors.
A color plus its opposite (complementary) produce white.
The tinier the particle, the higher the frequency of light it will scatter.
Of the visible frequencies violet light is scattered the most, followed by blue, green, yellow, orange, and red.
When white light passes through a thick atmosphere, the higher frequencies are scattered the most while the lower frequencies are transmitted with minimal scattering.
As the day progresses and the sun is lower in the sky, the path through the atmosphere is longer, and more blue is scattered from the sunlight. The removal of blue (through scattering) leaves the transmitted light more reddish in appearance.
Water is transparent to nearly all the visible frequencies of light, but strongly absorbs infrared waves.
Water molecules very weakly resonate in the visible red, which causes a slight absorption of red light in water. Red light is reduced to a quarter of its initial brightness by 15 meters of water.
Terms:
Additive primary colors: The three colors, red, blue, and green, that when added in certain proportions will produce any color in the spectrum.
Subtractive primary colors: The three colors of absorbing pigments-magenta, yellow, and cyan- that when mixed in certain proportions will reflect any color in the spectrum.
Complementary colors: Any two colors that when added produce white light.
Reflection and Refraction
Fermat’s Principle: Out of all possible paths that light might take, to get from one point to another, it takes the path that requires the shortest time.
Law of Reflection: The angle of incidence equals the angle of reflection.
Plane mirrors: The observer sees the image of a candle at a point behind the mirror. The light rays do not actually come from this point, so the image is called a virtual image.
Causes of refraction: the bending is caused by a change in speed.
Dispersion: Violet light travels about one percent slower in ordinary glass than does red light.
Terms:
Reflection: the return of light rays from a surface in such a way that the angle at which a given ray is returned is equal to the angle at which it strikes the surface. When the reflecting surface is irregular, light is returned in irregular directions; this is diffuse reflection.
Refraction: the bending of an oblique ray of light when it passes from one transparent medium to another.
Critical angle: the minimum angle of incidence at which a light ray is totally reflected within a medium.
Total internal reflection: the total reflection of light traveling in a medium when it strides on the surface of a less dense medium at an angle greater than the critical angle.
Converging lens: A lens that is thicker in the middle than at the edges and refracts parallel rays passing through it to a focus.
Diverging lens: A lens that is thinner in the middle than at the edges, causing parallel ray passing through it to diverge.
Virtual image: an image formed by light rays that do not converge at the location of the image. A virtual image is that reflected by a mirror; it cannot be displayed on a screen.
Real image: An image formed by light rays that converge at the location of the image. A real image can be displayed on a screen.
Aberration: a limitation on perfect image formation inherent, to some degree, in all particle systems.
Light Waves
A soap bubble appears iridescent in white light when the thickness of the soap film is about the same as a wavelength of light.
Bright fringes occur when waves (from both slits) arrive in phase; dark areas result from the overlapping of waves that are out of phase.
Diffraction grating disperses white light into colors, and are used in spectrometers.
The amount of diffraction depends on the wavelength of the wave compared to the size of the obstruction that casts the shadow. The longer the wave compared to the obstruction, the more the diffraction occurs.
Terms:
Huygens’ principle: the theory by which light waves spreading out from a point source can be regarded as the superposition of tiny secondary wavelets.
Diffraction: the bending of light around an obstacle or through a narrow slit in such a way that fringes of light and dark or colored bands are produced.
Interference: the superposition of waves producing regions of reinforcement and regions of cancellation. Constructive interference refers to regions of reinforcement; destructive interference refers to regions of cancellation. The interference of selected wavelengths of light produces colors known as interference colors.
Polarization: the alignment of the electric vectors that make up electromagnetic radiation. Such waves of aligned vibrations are said to be polarized.
Hologram: a two dimensional microscopic diffraction pattern that shows three dimensional optical images.
Light Emission
Summary of terms:
Excitation: the process of boosting electrons in an atom or molecule from a lower to a higher energy level.
Emission Spectrum: the distribution of wavelengths in the light from a luminous source.
Spectroscope: an optical instrument, separates light into its constituent frequencies in the form of spectral lines
Incandescence: the state of glowing while at a high temperature, caused by electrons in vibration atoms and molecules that are shaken in and out of their stable energy levels, emitting radiant energy in the process. The peak frequency of radiant energy is proportional to the absolute temperature of a heated substance; f ~ t
Absorption Spectrum: a continuous spectrum, like that of white light, interrupted by dark lines or bands that result from the absorption of certain frequencies of light by a substance through which the radiant energy passes.
Fluorescence: the property of absorbing radiant energy of one frequency and re-emitting radiant energy of lower frequency. Part of the absorbed radiant energy goes into heat and the other part into excitation; hence the emitted radiant energy has a lower energy and therefore a lower frequency than the absorbed radiant energy.
Phosphorescence: a type of light emission that is the same as fluorescence except for a delay between excitation and de-excitation, which provides an afterglow. The delay is caused by atoms being excited to energy levels that do not decay rapidly. The afterglow may last from fractions of a second to hours, or even days, depending on the type of material, temperature, and other factors.
Laser (light amp. by stimulated emission of radiation): an optical instrument that produces a beam of coherent monochromatic light.
Notes:l=c/f
The temperature of incandescent bodies, whether they be stars or blast-furnace interiors, can be determined by measuring the peak frequency of radiant energy they emit.
Incoherent white light contains waves of many frequency (and wavelengths) that are out of phase with one another
Light of a single frequency and wavelength is still out of phase
Coherent light: all the waves are identical and in phase.
Light Quanta
When the energy of a photon is divided by its frequency, the single number that results is the proportionality constant, called Planck’s constant, h (6.6 x 10-34 joule- sec)
Observations contrary to the wave picture for the analysis of photoelectricity:
1] the time lag between turning on the light and the ejection of the first electrons was not affected by the brightness or frequency of the light. 2] the effect was easy to observe with violet or ultraviolet light, but not with red light. 3] the rate at which electrons were ejected was proportional to the brightness of the light. 4] the maximum energy of the ejected electrons was not affected by the brightness of the light, but there were indications that the energy did depend on the frequency of the light.
-one photon is completely absorbed by each electron ejected from the metal.(all or nothing)
-the energy of each photon is proportional to the frequency of light, while the number of photons has to do with its brightness.
-light travels as a wave and hits as a stream of photons
The act of observing something as tiny as an electron produces a considerable uncertainty in either its position or its motion.
Summary of terms:
Complementarity: (Bohr) the principle that wave and particle models of either matter or radiation complement each other and when combined provide a fuller description of either one.
The Atom and the Quantum
Notes:
The electron doesn’t radiate light while it accelerates around the nucleus in a single orbit, but that radiation of light takes place only when the electron jumps orbit from a higher energy level to a lower energy level.
Color depends on the (distance of) jump. Bohr’s views explained the regularities being found in atomic spectra.
Summary of terms:
Ritz combination principle: the theory that the spectral lines of the elements have frequencies that are either the sums or the differences of the frequencies of two other lines.
de Broglie matter waves: the associated wave properties of all particles of matter. The wavelength of a particle wave is related to its momentum and Planck’s constant, l=h/momentum
Shrodinger’s wave equation: the fundamental equation of quantum mechanics, which interprets the wave nature of material particles in terms of probability wave amplitudes.
Correspondence principle: the rule that a new theory is valid provided that, when it overlaps with the old, it agrees with the verified results of the old theory.
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