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The Guardian of All Things: The Epic Story of Human Memory
A fascinating exploration of the history of memory and human civilization Memory makes us human. No other animal carries in its brain so many memories of such complexity nor so regularly revisits those memories for happiness, safety, and the accomplishment of complex tasks. Human civilization continues because we are able to pass along memories from one person to another, from one generation to the next. The Guardian of All Things is a sweeping scientific history that takes us on a 10,000-year-old journey replete with incredible ideas, inventions, and transformations. From cave drawings to oral histories to libraries to the internet, The Guardian of All Things is the history of how humans have relentlessly pursued new ways to preserve and manage memory, both within the human brain and as a series of inventions external to it. Michael S. Malone looks at the story of memory, both human and mechanical, and the historic turning points in that story that have not only changed our relationship to memory, but have also changed our human fabric. Full of anecdotes, history, and advances of civilization and technology, The Guardian of All Things is a lively, epic journey along a trajectory of history no other book has ever described, one that will appeal to the curious as well as the specialist.
304 pages, Paperback
First published August 21, 2012
43 people are currently reading
1216 people want to read
About the author
Michael S. Malone
47 books63 followersMichael S. Malone is a journalist and author who has been nominated for the Pulitzer price twice for his investigative journalism contributions. He has a regular column Silicon Dreams in Forbes (previosuly Silicon Insider for ABC)
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Displaying 1 - 29 of 29 reviews
June 3, 2012
This was one of the best books I have read in a long while. The title, from a quote attributed to Cicero, tells us that the human perception of the importance of memory is very old. Think for a moment about what distinguishes us , as humans, from other creatures. Is it not our consciousness, not only of ourselves, but of the place we hold in the time/space continuum? Is it not also the fact that we can remember a past and contemplate a future? The author takes us on a fascinating journey through time, showing how humans have grappled with how we can maintain our memories, not only individual, but cultural. Covering numerous disciplines, he begins in anthropology with a description of the evolution of language in early humans. Without language, there is no way to name and store memory. Early man may, he says, have lived very intensely in the present moment, in a way no longer possible to us. Living and working in groups was made possible by, or perhaps led to, the development of spoken language. Once humans had language, how could they keep memories through generations, in order to build on knowledge? At first, and for many thousands of years thereafter, it was through development of natural human memory. The author tells wonderful stories of ancient attempts at enhancing memory, such as through "theaters of memory", specific places with provocative statuary and aids to moving memories from short-term to long-term storage. Systems of writing were a great leap forward in storing memory, and man has ever since developed artificial means to storing memory in preference to strengthening natural memory. Mr. Malone spends the majority of his book taking us on a tour of the development of artificial memory storage, and such a tour guide he is! This is an engrossing tale that winds its way through the Middle Ages, the Renaissance,the Enlightenment, the Industrial Age, right up to the age of computers and artificial intelligence. He tells us of early computer pioneers, leaving us with recent speculations of what the future may hold (Ray Kurzweil's "Singularity" perchance?). He leaves us with a warning, a warning not to place all of our eggs in one memory basket. He notes that current means of memory storage do degrade, and that unimaginable disasters have been unavoidable throughout history. Could all of our electronic systems be destroyed, and with them our national memory? It could happen. He juxtaposes this possibility with a reminder of a 5,000 year old scroll left by one TK from ancient Egypt. The scroll now resides in a museum in California. He reminds us as well of the vellum Bodley 764 bestiary from the 1200s, now quietly resting in a library at Oxford University in England. In our all of our technological hubris, Mr. Malone quietly reminds us, "Still,there is.....a thread that reaches back through the history of mankind to a dream even older than that of immortality. It is for one's brief time on this earth to have meaning, for it to echo down through history if only as the faintest memory. It is the oldest human voice on earth whispering, Don't forget me."
Working in a library, as I do, this is my favorite quote from this amazing book:
"Meanwhile, as all of your magnetic memory erases itself under this onslaught [from a solar storm], the world's books, quietly resting on shelves in private dens and public libraries (at least those that survived de-accessioning and pulping to make way for computers), will be undisturbed other than by flickering lights and the angry shouts of hobos doing online gambling."
I read this book, which is due to be published this August,as an uncorrected proof, in ebook format, kindly provided by the publisher, St. Matin's Press, through Netgalley. Being an old-fashioned book lover, I plan to buy the actual book when it appears in paper and ink, and to read it again. It is that good.
Working in a library, as I do, this is my favorite quote from this amazing book:
"Meanwhile, as all of your magnetic memory erases itself under this onslaught [from a solar storm], the world's books, quietly resting on shelves in private dens and public libraries (at least those that survived de-accessioning and pulping to make way for computers), will be undisturbed other than by flickering lights and the angry shouts of hobos doing online gambling."
I read this book, which is due to be published this August,as an uncorrected proof, in ebook format, kindly provided by the publisher, St. Matin's Press, through Netgalley. Being an old-fashioned book lover, I plan to buy the actual book when it appears in paper and ink, and to read it again. It is that good.
October 9, 2012
I won this book on first reads, and thus really wanted to like it. I ended up being disappointed.
The title is a little misleading -- it's more of a book on the technology of preserving memory, rather than the science of memory itself; more pop-history than pop-sci. That was fine by me. It's also incredibly ethnocentric. It starts almost entirely about Europe and North Africa, narrows down to America once it is established, and then narrows even further to just Silicon Valley with only brief mentions of other peoples.
Aside from being generally ignorant, it gets infuriating at parts. For instance, in a chapter on the iPod, the author builds up how difficult it would be to build a device that was cheap and would still carry "thousands of songs in your pocket". He goes on to say how the guy Jobs tasked with building this was laughed at, dismissed, etc, etc for paragraphs and then concludes with a SINGLE SENTENCE "Fortunately for Rubinstein, Toshiba delivered the new little minidisks on time". That's it. Nothing on how they did it or why a company with no reputation for memory development pulled it off. Malone has no interest in Japan.
He presents the history of memory as a great march forward to FREEDOM(!). He claims that the reason we find cave paintings in caves is because of shamans jealously guarding them and using them to spook the common man. The much more likely explanation, as explained in Werner Herzog's documentary, The Cave of Forgotten Dreams, is simply that caves are way better preserved than most environments. In the case of the Chauvet Caves in France, a landslide or volcano actually covered the entrance, protecting the art inside. Malone glosses over the part of medieval history were the Church purposely tries to guard holy books by keeping them in Latin and away from the general populace, both because it hurts his premise of endless progress, and maybe for other reasons as well -- he celebrates the middle ages as the last time man could unabashedly and unreservedly believe in god, as opposed to the modern, soulless, purposeless world.
The section on the bestiaries claims the world gets its modern version of a dragon from them. Even as a not-terribly-worldly kid (who loved dragons), I knew Asian dragons existed and looked different. He even says the Alien from the movie Alien was likely influenced by it. Yes, the penis monster alien looks just like Smaug.
Perhaps most damning of all was the actual way the book was written. I feel like this sort of book lives and dies on its tone as much as anything else. Think Sagan's sense of wonder or Bryson's goofiness/humor. Malone just comes of as incredibly bland. Despite the title, the book rarely comes off as "epic" at all. He reminds me of equally bland sports writer, Peter King.
There were a few parts of this book I did enjoy. Bestiaries are pretty cool, and the part on parchment and vellum was fascinating. I had no idea they were made from animal skin. I do give points for name dropping Pynchon's Mason & Dixon and the mechanical duck chapter wasn't bad. I was expecting the concluding chapters on the singularity, transhumanism, etc to be stupid based on what had come before, but they were actually solid. But still, meh to this disappointing book. It took me over a month to read like 250 pages and that is saying something for me.
The title is a little misleading -- it's more of a book on the technology of preserving memory, rather than the science of memory itself; more pop-history than pop-sci. That was fine by me. It's also incredibly ethnocentric. It starts almost entirely about Europe and North Africa, narrows down to America once it is established, and then narrows even further to just Silicon Valley with only brief mentions of other peoples.
Aside from being generally ignorant, it gets infuriating at parts. For instance, in a chapter on the iPod, the author builds up how difficult it would be to build a device that was cheap and would still carry "thousands of songs in your pocket". He goes on to say how the guy Jobs tasked with building this was laughed at, dismissed, etc, etc for paragraphs and then concludes with a SINGLE SENTENCE "Fortunately for Rubinstein, Toshiba delivered the new little minidisks on time". That's it. Nothing on how they did it or why a company with no reputation for memory development pulled it off. Malone has no interest in Japan.
He presents the history of memory as a great march forward to FREEDOM(!). He claims that the reason we find cave paintings in caves is because of shamans jealously guarding them and using them to spook the common man. The much more likely explanation, as explained in Werner Herzog's documentary, The Cave of Forgotten Dreams, is simply that caves are way better preserved than most environments. In the case of the Chauvet Caves in France, a landslide or volcano actually covered the entrance, protecting the art inside. Malone glosses over the part of medieval history were the Church purposely tries to guard holy books by keeping them in Latin and away from the general populace, both because it hurts his premise of endless progress, and maybe for other reasons as well -- he celebrates the middle ages as the last time man could unabashedly and unreservedly believe in god, as opposed to the modern, soulless, purposeless world.
The section on the bestiaries claims the world gets its modern version of a dragon from them. Even as a not-terribly-worldly kid (who loved dragons), I knew Asian dragons existed and looked different. He even says the Alien from the movie Alien was likely influenced by it. Yes, the penis monster alien looks just like Smaug.
Perhaps most damning of all was the actual way the book was written. I feel like this sort of book lives and dies on its tone as much as anything else. Think Sagan's sense of wonder or Bryson's goofiness/humor. Malone just comes of as incredibly bland. Despite the title, the book rarely comes off as "epic" at all. He reminds me of equally bland sports writer, Peter King.
There were a few parts of this book I did enjoy. Bestiaries are pretty cool, and the part on parchment and vellum was fascinating. I had no idea they were made from animal skin. I do give points for name dropping Pynchon's Mason & Dixon and the mechanical duck chapter wasn't bad. I was expecting the concluding chapters on the singularity, transhumanism, etc to be stupid based on what had come before, but they were actually solid. But still, meh to this disappointing book. It took me over a month to read like 250 pages and that is saying something for me.
Read
July 23, 2012A detailed study of the history of human memory which reads more like an historical narrative than a self-help guide. It incorporates a history of many forms of human communication: symbol creation and writing, politics and official record keeping, different schools of philosophy and historical theory, a history of attitudes towards God and religion, printing, sound and film recording, digital data collection, memory loss and the future possibility of memory implants.
August 5, 2014
I found this book to be almost unreadable even though the topic appeals to me. Mr. Malone needs to EDIT himself. The book suffers incredibly from the overwhelming number of tangents (a few are interesting, but belong in an Afterward or as footnotes. The book is actually fatiguing to read: his prose is repetitive - he has little confidence that the audience caught on the first three times he states the same fact. The section on the history of human memory, and the psychology/anthropology regarding how memory and speech enabled humans to develop, build communities, increase skill-sets, and are ultimately the drivers of empathy, is fascinating. Mr. Malone seems to have crammed 5-6 different books into one and included every thought that popped into his head rather than present a cohesive narrative and argument. Also, in a book that discusses the history of "external" memory - from hieroglyphics and cave drawings to the computers of today - it's striking, and odd, that he spends almost no time on the Old and New Testament, the basis of so much shared context regardless of anyone's personal religion and beliefs. The creation of these texts were hugely impacted by just this idea: updates in technology affect the way history is remembered and told. Oral stories passed through generations were written on long scrolls as the Old Testament. Later, when religious scholars set about writing the New Testament, a new invention, the book form, was available, and therefore they first transferred the scrolls of the Old Testament into book form. These texts are a case in point of a discussion on this exact topic and yet the link is completely omitted. Again, I'm thinking of them in a secular way, NOT as any part of personal religious beliefs.
The book just doesn't work, although not for lack of trying. Malone is overly enthusiastic and invested, if anything. The topic is interesting and there are passages that are incredible - but it doesn't deliver on the promise of it's Forward: the anecdote regarding the WWII plane mechanics. I so wish that the promise of that passage was fulfilled. Maybe there are other books that get closer.
The book just doesn't work, although not for lack of trying. Malone is overly enthusiastic and invested, if anything. The topic is interesting and there are passages that are incredible - but it doesn't deliver on the promise of it's Forward: the anecdote regarding the WWII plane mechanics. I so wish that the promise of that passage was fulfilled. Maybe there are other books that get closer.
July 13, 2012
This book is a fascinating survey of the history of mankind's attempts to immortalize human knowledge. From the birth of communication to the advent of the Internet, Malone touches on all methods of documentation and recording. Despite the huge scope of the topic, this book did not seem neglectful or too ponderous when discussing details. I file this book alongside Bill Bryson's A Short History of Nearly Everything in terms of edutainment value.
Highly recommended!
Highly recommended!
February 28, 2013
So...this book, it's full of errors. Ridiculously full of errors, so much so it was like watching a movie so bad that it's enjoyable. I can only speak to the section where I already knew something, which are those furthest from the authors expertise in modern technology (and I expect he knows those better) but boy do the pseudo-facts come fast and furious.
In just the first few chapters, Malone gives far too much credence to reconstructions of the history and use of cave paintings, talking about them as guarded by a shaman and the artist (who has received a long training, of which he has somehow managed to divine the number of years required). Perhaps, here, he is just too credulous in buy what the archaeologists put out. Either way, it is beyond belief what he writes without caveat. He and/or the archaeologists base this reconstruction on the fact that most of the art we see is in caves (except in desert regions, like australia, where it's found on stone exteriors. Which just makes me wonder if the reason that in Europe and in some other areas this type of early art is found in caves doesn't have more to do with the survival of art rather than its production. You can bet exterior art in Europe wouldn't withstand the climate. Hell, cave art is already suffering after being exposed to tourists for less than a century)
And here's another one, more minor but a sticking point that kind of points out the little things that Malone is missing. Malone points out that history is divided between the written era, and prehistory (correctly). He ascribes this to the changes writing made available to the society, transforming the way those societies worked. But the real reason for the divide? Prehistory is that part of the human saga that we really don't know much about (assumptions about the shamanic role of cave art included) because there is no written record, only artifacts and guesses.
His discussion of the first written languages is plagued by dating errors and even apparent confusion between thousands of years ago and thousands of years bc. Gah! Pheonician script is not the same as the Greek script. They're related. But they're not the same.
He quotes Herodotus talking about Cicero, 400 years after his death and Plutarch 1st-2nd century, coining 'dark ages' to refer to the period 500-1000 AD.
Even when he gets into more recent times there are still plenty of errors. He talks about the presidential election of Novemeber 1861. Really? 1861? He is American, he shouldn't even have to fact check this to know that Presidential Elections occur in even number years and inaugurations in odd ones.
THis is more a gripe than a fact check, but he's awfully quick to take Edison's side when it comes to intellectual property disputes. Poor old Edison, he says, beset by lawsuits from people whose ideas he has stolen. Boo hoo. And there are factual error in his recitation of at least one of the court cases.
And here's a tip, don't just refer to someone as "a white" because unless you know the context you might think it's a racial description, rather than a political one during the Russian Revolution.
And for a book about memory (okay, despite the cover print, this book isn't really about natural memory, he clearly hasn't done the reading. He discusses how someone can carry memories from the crib to their grave. Which is amazing in the face of what people who study memory refer to as childhood amnesia, the fact that we DO NOT remember any autobiographical details from before about 2.
So yeah, those are just a selection of what I noticed, there are many more. And I expect there are plenty that I didn't notice.
Really, I think this book had NO fact checking whatsoever. If I wanted to be uncharitable, I would say the he is trolling his readers. If I wanted to be charitable, I would say that some of the people he talked to while researching this book decided to troll him with ridiculous factual errors once they realized he wasn't going to do any real research. (It's shocking how many of his citations are to websites. That's a good source, I'm sure, for tech history and news, but it's less so for ancient history. And on that, I'm amazed that in one case where I looked (being curious and also somewhat dubious about a fact he presented) I checked one of the citations for an academic study. Except the citation wasn't to the academic article, it was to a very brief press release about the article and I would not be the least bit surprised if he never bothered reading the article itself.
Anyway, even if he had a fact checker, this would be a disappointing book. It's supposed to be the study of human memory via the interaction between natural and artificial memory, about how humans have made use of artificial memory. But we don't see much of that at all. There's a bit in the early chapters, some glance at society in the final, speculative chapter. But a lot of this book is just a quick run through of technological advances, some of which don't have much clear relationship to artificial memory. Where he talks about the interaction of society and artificial memory, in many cases we see more about how societies demands drove new technology, not what society did with that technology. In fact, the subtitles to the chapters provided in three words at a time more analysis than those chapters.
So, this is a dangerous book first because many people won't realize they're looking at a steaming pile of lies, a bad book second.
In just the first few chapters, Malone gives far too much credence to reconstructions of the history and use of cave paintings, talking about them as guarded by a shaman and the artist (who has received a long training, of which he has somehow managed to divine the number of years required). Perhaps, here, he is just too credulous in buy what the archaeologists put out. Either way, it is beyond belief what he writes without caveat. He and/or the archaeologists base this reconstruction on the fact that most of the art we see is in caves (except in desert regions, like australia, where it's found on stone exteriors. Which just makes me wonder if the reason that in Europe and in some other areas this type of early art is found in caves doesn't have more to do with the survival of art rather than its production. You can bet exterior art in Europe wouldn't withstand the climate. Hell, cave art is already suffering after being exposed to tourists for less than a century)
And here's another one, more minor but a sticking point that kind of points out the little things that Malone is missing. Malone points out that history is divided between the written era, and prehistory (correctly). He ascribes this to the changes writing made available to the society, transforming the way those societies worked. But the real reason for the divide? Prehistory is that part of the human saga that we really don't know much about (assumptions about the shamanic role of cave art included) because there is no written record, only artifacts and guesses.
His discussion of the first written languages is plagued by dating errors and even apparent confusion between thousands of years ago and thousands of years bc. Gah! Pheonician script is not the same as the Greek script. They're related. But they're not the same.
He quotes Herodotus talking about Cicero, 400 years after his death and Plutarch 1st-2nd century, coining 'dark ages' to refer to the period 500-1000 AD.
Even when he gets into more recent times there are still plenty of errors. He talks about the presidential election of Novemeber 1861. Really? 1861? He is American, he shouldn't even have to fact check this to know that Presidential Elections occur in even number years and inaugurations in odd ones.
THis is more a gripe than a fact check, but he's awfully quick to take Edison's side when it comes to intellectual property disputes. Poor old Edison, he says, beset by lawsuits from people whose ideas he has stolen. Boo hoo. And there are factual error in his recitation of at least one of the court cases.
And here's a tip, don't just refer to someone as "a white" because unless you know the context you might think it's a racial description, rather than a political one during the Russian Revolution.
And for a book about memory (okay, despite the cover print, this book isn't really about natural memory, he clearly hasn't done the reading. He discusses how someone can carry memories from the crib to their grave. Which is amazing in the face of what people who study memory refer to as childhood amnesia, the fact that we DO NOT remember any autobiographical details from before about 2.
So yeah, those are just a selection of what I noticed, there are many more. And I expect there are plenty that I didn't notice.
Really, I think this book had NO fact checking whatsoever. If I wanted to be uncharitable, I would say the he is trolling his readers. If I wanted to be charitable, I would say that some of the people he talked to while researching this book decided to troll him with ridiculous factual errors once they realized he wasn't going to do any real research. (It's shocking how many of his citations are to websites. That's a good source, I'm sure, for tech history and news, but it's less so for ancient history. And on that, I'm amazed that in one case where I looked (being curious and also somewhat dubious about a fact he presented) I checked one of the citations for an academic study. Except the citation wasn't to the academic article, it was to a very brief press release about the article and I would not be the least bit surprised if he never bothered reading the article itself.
Anyway, even if he had a fact checker, this would be a disappointing book. It's supposed to be the study of human memory via the interaction between natural and artificial memory, about how humans have made use of artificial memory. But we don't see much of that at all. There's a bit in the early chapters, some glance at society in the final, speculative chapter. But a lot of this book is just a quick run through of technological advances, some of which don't have much clear relationship to artificial memory. Where he talks about the interaction of society and artificial memory, in many cases we see more about how societies demands drove new technology, not what society did with that technology. In fact, the subtitles to the chapters provided in three words at a time more analysis than those chapters.
So, this is a dangerous book first because many people won't realize they're looking at a steaming pile of lies, a bad book second.
November 10, 2012
For a book and an idea, it held alot of promise but was in the end disappointing. There's some fascinating information in the early chapters on the evolution of man and memory both biological and anthropological thats worth the time to read. However, as one progresses through the book, the reader perceives an author who's not terribly comfortable with some of the topics especially the medieval era. Its only when the author enters the late 19th century and focuses on American business and technology does the writing improve. Looking at his past books, its easy to understand this is his comfort zone.
Thus, there's some interesting facts and anecdotes in the early stretch but then it trails off and losses the readers in a repetitive mess somewhere between Egypt and the Renaissance, finishing with a standard business history. Not an epic story.
Thus, there's some interesting facts and anecdotes in the early stretch but then it trails off and losses the readers in a repetitive mess somewhere between Egypt and the Renaissance, finishing with a standard business history. Not an epic story.
November 7, 2020
I confess I began this book expecting to be neck-deep in the language of neuroscience by chapter one—neurons, cells, dendrites, axons, synapses, and so on. I was wrong! While The Guardian of All Things: The Epic Story of Human Memory, does indeed tell an epic story, author Michael S. Malone quickly defines the two dimensions of his narrative: human memory and its extraordinary raw power to memorize all manner of things; and the 10,000-year journey of innovation in augmenting human memory with external artificial mechanisms.
There was a time when primitive man was so primitive that humans had no conscious sense of a past or a future. Accordingly, Malone tells us, “If you have almost no sense of a future, and can’t extrapolate from what is and what will be, then you have little incentive to memorialize.” Brain development, accompanied by language evolution, changed all that. And it wasn’t a big jump for spoken language to foster the need to record language. Malone does an exhaustive job of covering the relentless search for media on which to record language…to create memories.
The breadth of coverage of topics in The Guardian of All Things will satisfy the hungriest of readers. As well as the book having a subtitle, Malone cleverly gives each chapter a subtitle. For example, early chapters include Finding a Voice: Memory as Word; and Clay, Reeds, and Skin: Memory as Medium. Later chapters include Tick, Talk: Memory as Recording; and The Persistence of Memory: Memory as Existence.
Technology clearly plays a vital role in artificial memory, and the narrative discusses the joys of inventions such as punched paper tape and magnetic tape, followed quickly by laments over limitations of the linear access provided by these media. As linear access gave way to random access, Malone also notes the declining costs of external storage; clunky devices as big as desks or suitcases evolve to microcomputers and cell phones—smaller, yet with increased memory capacity.
The book is replete with trivia that will generate pleasant “I-never-knew-that” reactions as readers connect dots that were hitherto unconnected: the rescue of the 1890 U.S. census by Herman Hollerith and his punched card invention, for example; and the mass production of quality paper having as much to do with the success of Gutenberg’s printing press as moveable type did; and when Russell S. Ohl gave the name “semiconductor” to an experimental slab of silicon (glass) infused with impurities, glass ordinarily being an insulator rather than a conductor of electricity.
The pace of Malone’s narrative quickens considerably to keep up with advancing technology, which inevitably leads to the fusing of natural and artificial memory. However, as this fusion increases, he does offer a cautionary note about there being “some kind of reckoning” a generation or two ahead. The reckoning will result in one of three scenarios, Malone says: living machines, assisting machines, and human machines. This last outcome leads to the concept of transhumanism, which sees “…the use of machines and computers not as a last-ditch effort to restore a failed biological system but rather as a means to enhance human existence.”
Transhumanism inevitably leads to the vision of singularity, which Malone defines in the context of technology as follows: “It will transform the meaning of what it is to be human or a machine, of natural and artificial memory, life and death, and ignorance and knowledge so completely that, from this side of that event it is literally impossible to predict what will take place on the other side.”
This is an extraordinarily lively and engaging book, which will leave readers in awe of both the beautiful, natural workings of human memory, as well as the limitless ability of human inventiveness in expanding memory by artificial means.
There was a time when primitive man was so primitive that humans had no conscious sense of a past or a future. Accordingly, Malone tells us, “If you have almost no sense of a future, and can’t extrapolate from what is and what will be, then you have little incentive to memorialize.” Brain development, accompanied by language evolution, changed all that. And it wasn’t a big jump for spoken language to foster the need to record language. Malone does an exhaustive job of covering the relentless search for media on which to record language…to create memories.
The breadth of coverage of topics in The Guardian of All Things will satisfy the hungriest of readers. As well as the book having a subtitle, Malone cleverly gives each chapter a subtitle. For example, early chapters include Finding a Voice: Memory as Word; and Clay, Reeds, and Skin: Memory as Medium. Later chapters include Tick, Talk: Memory as Recording; and The Persistence of Memory: Memory as Existence.
Technology clearly plays a vital role in artificial memory, and the narrative discusses the joys of inventions such as punched paper tape and magnetic tape, followed quickly by laments over limitations of the linear access provided by these media. As linear access gave way to random access, Malone also notes the declining costs of external storage; clunky devices as big as desks or suitcases evolve to microcomputers and cell phones—smaller, yet with increased memory capacity.
The book is replete with trivia that will generate pleasant “I-never-knew-that” reactions as readers connect dots that were hitherto unconnected: the rescue of the 1890 U.S. census by Herman Hollerith and his punched card invention, for example; and the mass production of quality paper having as much to do with the success of Gutenberg’s printing press as moveable type did; and when Russell S. Ohl gave the name “semiconductor” to an experimental slab of silicon (glass) infused with impurities, glass ordinarily being an insulator rather than a conductor of electricity.
The pace of Malone’s narrative quickens considerably to keep up with advancing technology, which inevitably leads to the fusing of natural and artificial memory. However, as this fusion increases, he does offer a cautionary note about there being “some kind of reckoning” a generation or two ahead. The reckoning will result in one of three scenarios, Malone says: living machines, assisting machines, and human machines. This last outcome leads to the concept of transhumanism, which sees “…the use of machines and computers not as a last-ditch effort to restore a failed biological system but rather as a means to enhance human existence.”
Transhumanism inevitably leads to the vision of singularity, which Malone defines in the context of technology as follows: “It will transform the meaning of what it is to be human or a machine, of natural and artificial memory, life and death, and ignorance and knowledge so completely that, from this side of that event it is literally impossible to predict what will take place on the other side.”
This is an extraordinarily lively and engaging book, which will leave readers in awe of both the beautiful, natural workings of human memory, as well as the limitless ability of human inventiveness in expanding memory by artificial means.
February 5, 2017
1.5 stars really. This book is about the history of the external storage of human memory, not history about the evolution of memory itself. I expected a completely different book, and even after I adjusted my expectations and (for some reason) finished it, I didn't like it. There were grammatical errors ("It's echoes," really??), for one. Also, after talking about papyrus in Egypt and paper in China, the book completely centers on Europe and the US, narrowing later to exclusively the Silicon Valley. Anyway, I wouldn't recommend that anyone spend the time or money on this, especially if you're looking for a book more focused on science than history, since all you'll get is a bunch of stories that show that memory is ~!~freedom~!~.
August 8, 2016
Occasionally a book turns out to be nothing like I imagined. However, unlike other such books, this had delightful and unintended consequences that did not disappoint. The title is quite descriptive of the author's intent, but the message is surprising. The author's style reminds me of the late 1980's James Burke BBC series, "The Day the Universe Changed," by which he captures you with the main element and then by deliberate, intriguing stories of numerous chronological historical events, proceeds to tie everything together. This author goes one step further by projecting into the future in a manner that the reader can find both compelling and credible. 5 Stars.
June 6, 2012
For full review, see blog - http://tinyurl.com/7pa2yp8
Really enjoyed this book. Fascinating and far-ranging history of human memory, from hominid days to the gabillion gabillion links of the Internet, and everything in between. Made me want to print my own novels on vellum because it appears the most durable.
Because Malone's book covers such a giant subject, he touches on everything imaginable: clay tablets, print, automatons, film, sound, computers, you name it.
I've already put this on my hub's to-read list. Excellent.
Really enjoyed this book. Fascinating and far-ranging history of human memory, from hominid days to the gabillion gabillion links of the Internet, and everything in between. Made me want to print my own novels on vellum because it appears the most durable.
Because Malone's book covers such a giant subject, he touches on everything imaginable: clay tablets, print, automatons, film, sound, computers, you name it.
I've already put this on my hub's to-read list. Excellent.
December 18, 2015
A poor choice of title and an ultimately flawed book. It's not about human memory, it's about the devices we've created to store information for us. I wanted to title it "From Stones to Skins to Silicon: the epic story of our mnemonic devices." As a reporter in Silicon Valley, he had a great seat for the development of computers. He's a little shaky on history.
Want to read
August 9, 2012So anxious to read this!!! My mom has Alzheimer's and I'm so interested in our Memory! It's hard to see her through this disease.
April 5, 2013
I love books on the subject of memory, but this was tedious and unreadable.
October 28, 2025
Entertaining book on the role of memory in human history, from prehistory to modern computing, with a title taken from Cicero (De Oratore, Book 1, part 5).
July 20, 2015
This was a really fascinating new take on the reasons for progress of early hominids - I found it insightful and revelatory as an explanation for the development of our species over those competing and cohabiting with us.
The speculation on the nature and purpose of the paintings at Lascaux was also new for me and very interesting. Then the story of literacy and illumination and scrolls of papyrus to paper and the value of the early repositories of papyrus and paper, and the power and dominance they offered the cities in which they dwelt just all seemed like a natural continuum, fitting so well with what had come before. By now I was thinking I'd have to buy a copy of this book for myself, as I couldn't part with it.
Unfortunately, though, for me, interest waned when we got onto computer and digital memory - RAM and ROM and floppies and Hard discs, CDs and magnetic tape and film. So the last third or so of the book was a bit of a chore to get through, and I began to see it as a bit of a schizophrenic work, pulling together too much diverse information, too much history and not all equally entertainingly told. Somehow the concept of memory just couldn't meld all that diverse observation together.
This is probably more indicative of my tastes than the worth of the book, but I'd be interested to know if anyone else has felt the same way. I pretty much skimmed through the last third of the book.
The speculation on the nature and purpose of the paintings at Lascaux was also new for me and very interesting. Then the story of literacy and illumination and scrolls of papyrus to paper and the value of the early repositories of papyrus and paper, and the power and dominance they offered the cities in which they dwelt just all seemed like a natural continuum, fitting so well with what had come before. By now I was thinking I'd have to buy a copy of this book for myself, as I couldn't part with it.
Unfortunately, though, for me, interest waned when we got onto computer and digital memory - RAM and ROM and floppies and Hard discs, CDs and magnetic tape and film. So the last third or so of the book was a bit of a chore to get through, and I began to see it as a bit of a schizophrenic work, pulling together too much diverse information, too much history and not all equally entertainingly told. Somehow the concept of memory just couldn't meld all that diverse observation together.
This is probably more indicative of my tastes than the worth of the book, but I'd be interested to know if anyone else has felt the same way. I pretty much skimmed through the last third of the book.
August 24, 2014
This is a good book, but not a great book. There are several inconsistencies - and that to me always damages the credibility of the rest of the book. For example, in one chapter the author says "In the beginning was the Word" are the first words in the opening of the Bible. Those words ARE the opening words of the book of John, but they are NOT the opening words of the Bible. And there are other similar inconsistencies. None of them are huge, but they each little by little damage the credibility of the book.
Writing a book on a topic like this is a Herculean task - it covers a time span from the very beginning of humanity until today, documenting how various technical advances have allowed humans to continually advance - and also discuss those times when humanity slipped backwards due to wars, famine, disease and pestilence. In attempting to push a slice of all human history into 270 pages . . . it can be challenging. I enjoyed the last 70 pages the most, possibly because I could relate most readily to the time frame.
I wrestled as to how many stars this book deserved; this is a frailty of "Good Reads" in that the book is better than a 3 but not quite a 4. Ideally I would give it a 3.8
Writing a book on a topic like this is a Herculean task - it covers a time span from the very beginning of humanity until today, documenting how various technical advances have allowed humans to continually advance - and also discuss those times when humanity slipped backwards due to wars, famine, disease and pestilence. In attempting to push a slice of all human history into 270 pages . . . it can be challenging. I enjoyed the last 70 pages the most, possibly because I could relate most readily to the time frame.
I wrestled as to how many stars this book deserved; this is a frailty of "Good Reads" in that the book is better than a 3 but not quite a 4. Ideally I would give it a 3.8
March 22, 2015
I mistakenly assumed this book was about the brain. Rarely do I not first read the cover jacket of a book, but fascinated with the brain as I am, I read this book without really knowing what it is about. I am not disappointed. Malone takes us on a long tour of human memory, memory stored OUTSIDE the brain. From the first scribbling and art by early humans on rocks and cave walls, to the millions of trillions of bytes of information (memory) we now have at our fingertips on the WWW, and everything in between, this is a most interesting read. It incorporates various philosophical schools, politics, religion, the evolution of writing and other forms of communicating, and much, much more. This is a great read for anyone interested in human history and technology.
January 3, 2013
I enjoyed the book very much (although I found it to be hard to read) and was fascinated by the examples of memory through out history. I do not agree that people will one day be replaced or enhanced by technological in the sense of memory. All we, as people can do, is record and share our accumulated memory (or wisdom) with the next generation. Much in the same way as the people of the past. Yes technology has improved the memory and knowledge of all of mankind and will continue to do so; we must reach out and touch other people's lives and thus be touched ourselves. Memory is the guardian of all things, but we must share our memory to remain human.
June 17, 2016
Like James Burke's Connections, this book magically connects innovations over hundreds of years (one innovation leads to another and to yet another) to describe how we've evolved the capture of human memory. From cave painting, to tablet carving, to writing, to paper, to quills, to pen, and so on to computer RAM. The marvelous connection of a 1600 automaton duck created for the French court (it consumed food and pooped duck scat) leading to the creation of computer tabular cards was particularly memorable.
February 3, 2013
The Guardian of All Things is the fascinating story of humanity's quest to record its memories for the future. From cave paintings to microchips and beyond, with detours for the "memory theatres" of the Renaissance and modern studies of the brain, Malone mostly examines the exterior technology of memory, but his reflections on the implications of those technologies are thoughtful and insightful. I would actually give this book 3-1/2 if it were allowed, because I found the part on computers to be somewhat dry, but on the whole it was a very worthwhile read.
August 29, 2012
I was so happy when I received this book from Netgalley as I consider myself a little bit of a Neuropsychologist so memory held a big part of my interest. This is a well written essay that covers more or less everything there is to know about memory, from an anthropological and linguistic point of view also and this journey is very interesting and well written.
THANKS TO NETGALLEY AND ST.MARTIN'S PRESS FOR THE PREVIEW
THANKS TO NETGALLEY AND ST.MARTIN'S PRESS FOR THE PREVIEW
September 28, 2012
I enjoyed this book more than I thought I would. If you like Malcolm Gladwell, it reads a little bit like his books. It's all about the human brain and memory and how we can store what our memories in things like books, computers, etc. I found it quite fascinating as the author stepped through the history of memory. I learned so much about things I didn't anticipate. I would highly recommend this book. It got me motivated to write my own memories down.
Want to read
October 26, 2012Wall Street Journal, October 25, 2012 - "How to Avoid a Bonfire of the Humanities 'English majors are exactly the people I'm looking for,' one successful Silicon-Valley entrepreneur recently told me" by Michael S. Malone
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10000...
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10000...
November 4, 2015
I really did not know what to expect from this book. I will say it did an excellent job of overturning every single aspect of human memory, from our perspective as its users. Not a lot of neuroscience. Still a great read.
September 9, 2012
Love this book, I'm fascinated by the brain and the way it works and this book explains it all really well.
September 11, 2014
Very interesting. Had never thought about memory in
quite this way. Malone has presented his subject in a
very broad, but detailed and easy to understand manner.
quite this way. Malone has presented his subject in a
very broad, but detailed and easy to understand manner.
Want to read
September 6, 2012Could not find a copy (hardback or e-book).
October 14, 2012
Not really what I was expecting, but still pretty interesting.
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