Podcast: Download
Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | RSS
If you’re looking to unlock the ancient memory techniques used by philosophers, mystics, and mental elites throughout history, this is the conversation for you.
In this episode of the Magnetic Memory Method Podcast, John Michael Greer returns to reveal how memory systems from thinkers like Giordano Bruno and Ramon Llull can help us reclaim our cognitive power in the AI age.
Why do these long-dead figures matter more than ever in today’s world?
For one thing, a lot of people are scrambling to work out how to survive in a world in which remembering how to think is quickly becoming as scarce as human memory.
But Greer offers hope.
As a renowned author, translator of Giordano Bruno’s On the Shadows of the Ideas, and long-time student of multiple esoteric traditions, Greer joined me again to discuss the growing importance of memory training.
But what makes this episode special is that we’re not talking about just any old kind of training.
And we’re definitely not talking about your everday, average memory tricks.
You’re about to hear about real mental training, the kind that once produced polymaths, philosophers and masters of the mind who inspired the Mentat you’ve read about in Dune.
But don’t let the fictional reference distract from the value at hand. Everything we discuss accords perfectly with memory science, particularly the science of mental imagery.
As part of this discussion, Greer and I also explore his upcoming book project on medieval and Renaissance mental disciplines, a work I’m looking forward to reading very much.
We also cover the overlap between historical mnemonic systems and why reviving these ancient practices is absolutely essential in an age increasingly dominated by machine thinking.
From the combinatorial wheels of Llull and Giordano Bruno to the forgotten discipline of syllogistic logic, we discuss:
How memory palaces can function as practical tools and metaphysical metaphors
- Bruno’s integration of memory with logic and ontology
- Why the “art of combination” might be the ultimate question-asking system
- The lost connection between Freemasonry and mnemonic training
- What a modern Mentat curriculum might look like (and why we need it sooner than later)
- Practical tips from historical and contemporary memory masters
- The real philosophical difference between tools we use and tools that use us
- Reasons for reading older memory improvement books like Rhetorica ad Herennium
- Why you should explore the Trivium and Quadrivium as tools for modern mental clarity
Greer also shares insights into his current Latin translation work, John Dee research, and what the Twilight of Pluto means for our cultural moment.
No matter what happens, Greer believes memory techniques can thrive again.
But likely not in Silicon Valley.
They will rise again in the ruins of the cultures that resist.
Why not start resisting now?
Whether you’re a memory athlete, aspiring Mentat, or simply tired of outsourcing your intelligence to devices, this episode will give you both intellectual fuel and practical direction.
Bonus: John Michael Greer on Bruno’s
On The Shadows of the Ideas
During my first discussion with Greer, we focus on Bruno’s memory systems and the nature of knowledge from what Greer calls “the rubbish heap of history.”
We also dig into Greer’s translation of On the Shadows of the Ideas by Giordano Bruno.
Finally, we discuss an old and mysterious book called The Picatrix. Like the Ars Notoria, it kind of freaks me out a bit, but Greer puts my mind at ease.
Press play and listen in as we discuss:
- The value of “intellectual dumpster diving” to preserve ancient ideas
- Why adding more to a text than a literal translation allows can be self-serving, yet somehow can’t be avoided
- The limits of historical clarity in the age of photocopies (which are often of other photocopies)
- Why Bruno’s memory theory remains of great importance to the art of memory
- The reason subject/abject memorization is the most sophisticated method to memorize text
- The deep mystery behind why alphabet-based mnemonics fell out of favor in modern times
- And why overwhelm can occur, even when using a sequence as simple as the alphabet
- Why memory, secrecy and initiation were inseparable in Bruno’s world
- The reason Frances Yates’ ideas about Bruno should be viewed with discernment
- The delusion of treating history as a straight line, and why this idea is wildly inaccurate, given the way the universe operates
Giordano Bruno
Further Resources on the web, the Magnetic Memory Method Podcast and blog:
John Michael Greer’s Ecosophia Blog (Toward an Ecological Spirituality)
John Michael Greer’s Amazon author page
John Michael Greer Presents: Masonry and the Secret Societies
Frances Yates’s Giordano Bruno and the Hermetic Tradition
The Illustrated Picatrix: The Complete Occult Classic of Astrological Magic
My How to Think and Remember Like the Mentat video on YouTube:
6 Responses
In answer to your question about the title, Latin translators get to pick and choose when to put in “the”, as there’s not a corresponding definite article. So, “On Shadows of the Ideas” and “On the Shadows of Ideas” and “Regarding Shadows of Ideas” are all legitimate translations of “De Umbris Idearum.”
That is great to know, Scott. Many thanks.
Using “the” in both instances seems particularly rich to me when thinking of Platonic and Neo-Platonic ramifications. It’s as though it adds an extra emphasis to the plurals.
Refreshing to listen to this . . .
Thanks for stopping by to check it out. Have you read any Greer or this translation?
Hello Anthony,
thank you for sharing this highly intruiging interview with John Michael Greer On Giordano Bruno, Memory and Time.
Hello Mr. Greer,
unfortunately I couldn´t quite understand some words. There is a name of a book which soundet like the paper tricks…
which you speak of during the interview and Mr. Greer alludes it to the necronomicon. It sounded like a book one should at least have heard of and be able to pronounce or spell – hoping that the spelling alone does not cast a spell upon you!
And in Minute 16:30 I didn’t get another expression: Where exactly does Mr. Greer recommend to start getting into Plato?
I was only reading the Dialogues of Protagoras (which deals with the question) if virtue is teachable or not and I heard the state as an audiobook.
P.s.: Some of my own experiences on the art of memory…:
Unfortunately my latin is cloes to being nonexistent and therefore as a native speaker
of the German language I was reading some of the translations available from a Lady called Erika Rojas. Unfortunately again she did not cover ,,de umbris idearum” in her translations and what I was most interested in at that time was Bruno´s art of memory.
So your translation is a kind of desideratum for me, since my English is fluent enough to read even philosophical literature (at least I hope so and if not I can look things up quite easily).
Inspired by the interviewer (Anthony Metivier) and his enthusiasm for the art of memory I came up with some original ideas on how to build an almost unlimited memory palace.
But my own motivation is kind of “blunt” at the moment cause a depression came kicking in. At least one of my little results was to learn the complete chemical periodic (118) table by ordinal numbers. -> Well at least that´s a start for chemistry -> alchemy or the material sciences!
Some fifteen years ago I came across an online school called Giordano Memorisation System or school of phenomenal memory. Very dogmatic – some people call them the scientology of memory techniques.
And I can say that they clearly mystify some elements of their teachings. It was a severe brain wash to me – but I´d say in a rather good way cause I was reading Bruno at the time and he said similar to the Buddha: Examine everything that you hear or read with your own mind! So I came across some of their faults!
Their alphanumeric system did not work as well in the German language and other languages which do not strongly use the letter “c”. Thus I kept searching the “ancient” German memory market and came up with a better solution (a more universal Code). But I knew that they have put a lot of effort into their teachings and their material is quite good and unbelievably revealing for a beginner.
Since I know that Mr. Anthony Metivier is learning Chinese and German – how is your learning German progressing, Sir?
Best regards
Sincerely,
Killian
May the good, true and just be with ya all!
Thanks for your thoughts and questions, Killian.
Either the Dialogues or specifically The Republic is where I would get started with Plato. I started with Ion myself, followed by The Republic and then the Dialogues.
There are indeed many dogmatic teachings out there. A discerning mind knows to milk the best from them and leave the rest.
As for ‘c’ in German, I think that is missing the point. Many other languages have many words that start with ‘c,’ so a devoted German mnemonist is not going to lean on the characteristics of this or that language. It’s about the nature of language itself and realizing more about the nature of representation in both the broadest and most specific senses.
I still speak and read German at least once a week. I passed level III in Mandarin last year and would be attending level IV now, but everything has been cancelled. Thanks for asking and posting. 🙂