Brain Attic

In the last post, the term “brain attic” was mentioned. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle briefly quoted on how a brain can be compare to a house attic in “A Study in Scarlet”. His quote goes:

“I consider that a man’s brain originally is like a little empty attic, and you have to stock it with such furniture as you choose. A fool takes in all the lumber of every sort that he comes across, so that the knowledge which might be useful to him gets crowded out, or at best is jumbled up with a lot of other things, so that he has a difficulty in laying his hands upon it. Now the skillful workman is very careful indeed as to what he takes into his brain-attic. He will have nothing but the tools which may help him in doing his work, but of these he has a large assortment, and all in the most perfect order. It is a mistake to think that that little room has elastic walls and can distend to any extent. Depend upon it there comes a time when for every addition of knowledge you forget something that you knew before. It is of the highest importance, therefore, not to have useless facts elbowing out the useful ones.”

–  Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, A Study in Scarlet

The latter suggests that we mustn’t go on filling our brain with knowledge that are deemed to be unimportant or useless as to our needs and career. For our brain has a limited capacity and these information may get in the way for the transcription of the valuable information.

Of course, we all know that science disapproves of this thinking. But, considering to apply the method in our daily activities, it will be helpful in weighing the value of information we tend to absorb. We would know which things are important and those that are not. Crowding out our brain with useless information may affect our perspective on things and especially when making a decision or judgement.

A valuable idea can be much harder to grasp for there are many factors affecting the judgement of a crowded out brain. A crowded brain attic suggests a doubtful person.

Learning to weigh out the value of information also tends to cut out legwork for us. Knowing how to select which things are important and which lessons are worth it creates a more-efficient method of learning.