[dr_dshiv]

Memorizing is a lost art. It breeds understanding, because the symbolic surface makes itself apparent to the mind so readily—and without understanding, the symbolic surface has no grounding.

Only once the lines are memorized can you say them with feeling. And, when you know the feeling, you can make up new lines.

Understanding and memorization should not be seen as opposites.

[johtso]

This resonates with me and my experience of memorisation in the context of botany. A few years back I started going on urban plant survey walks with my local natural history society. The process of learning and memorising the names of the different plants, and then feeling the patterns start to take shape and the flow of recognition on the following walks was so rewarding. It starts to change the way you see things around you. Rather than just being arbitrary bits of data that you're memorising, names become like markers that amplify the unique aspects (however minuscule) between the different living things that surround us.