Procedural Memory: Definition and Examples

Procedural memory is a part of the long-term memory that is responsible for knowing how to do things, also known as motor skills. As the name implies, procedural memory stores information on how to perform certain procedures, such as walking, talking and riding a bike. Delving into something in your procedural memory does not involve conscious thought.

Procedural memory is a subset of implicit memory, sometimes referred to as unconscious memory or automatic memory. Implicit memory uses past experiences to remember things without thinking about them. It differs from declarative memory, or explicit memory, which consists of facts and events that can be explicitly stored and consciously recalled or "declared."

Examples of procedural memory

Unsolved Brain Mysteries

When you compare the brain's detectives, neuroscientists, to other detectives, the neuroscientists seem to fall short in solving mysteries. After all, Agatha Christie's Hercule Poirot and Miss Marple needed only about 250 pages each to get to the bottom of their cases. Ditto for Nancy Drew. On television, Jessica Fletcher and Kojak were all able to find their answers in an hour or less, while Veronica Mars needed only about the length of a television season. Even the pride of South Florida, Encyclopedia Brown, was able to solve his cases with little more than a casebook, his trusty sneakers and a wide variety of miscellaneous factoids. If Encyclopedia Brown only required 25 cents per day (plus expenses) to solve his cases, then what's taking neuroscientists so long to unravel the mysteries of the brain?

OK, so the brain is a bit more complex than Encyclopedia Brown's nemesis, Bugs Meany. But with the brain only weighing in at 3 pounds (1.4 kg), you could be forgiven for wondering if neuroscientists are just big slackers. As it is, mysteries galore abound in those 3 pounds, and until fairly recently, scientists lacked the equipment to accurately study the brain. With the advent of brain imaging technology, it's possible that they'll continue to learn more.

The workings of the brain, however, determine such fundamental questions about person-hood that we may never know everything about what's going on. That doesn't mean we can't speculate, though. While we may not be able to solve these capers with clues that point to Colonel Mustard in the library with a revolver, we can dive into the current thinking on some of the brain's famous unsolved mysteries. Get your casebook ready and go to the next page for our first puzzler.

Installing PHP 5.4 with Apache 2.4 in 32 bit of Windows !

Installing AMP (Apache, MySQL and PHP) have become quite easier with single wizard based installations available as a packet these days. Like using XAMPP, WAMP you can just install them and use. But with these setups, you will have (or will not have) less knowledge about configuring them each in your own way because they will present some user interface where you can directly do configurations by one click. You will not know what exactly required for changing something in Apache, PHP or MySQL. So to have knowledge on configurations on them according to your requirement, you have to install each applications individually. I always recommend to do that and configure them for your purpose.

The installation and configurations of PHP, Apache and MySQL in Windows has also become quite easier these days because they provide some default configurations. As PHP, after its latest releases i.e.5.4, does not provide the downloads of VC6 version (the PHP compiled with Visual C++ 2006 compiler) these days because it is believed that the performance of the PHP compiled with VC9 (compiled with Visual C++ 2008 or later) has improved quite a lot than the compiled with VC6. So to work with the latest VC9 version of PHP, you must have installed PHP with VC9 compiled Apache as well or you use IIS as web server. VC9 compiled Apache is provided by Apache Lounge (apachelounge.com) not the original Apache (apache.org). Since I haven’t worked yet with IIS and always work with Apache in anyway, I don’t have knowledge about the IIS & PHP. Here I am going to explain few steps on how to install PHP 5.4 and Apache 2.4 in Windows.

NFC Technology Could Rock Your World

Smartphones are no longer just fancy mobile devices that let you e-mail and surf the Web. A contemporary smartphone has more computing power than all of the computers that were at NASA's disposal back in 1969 when the United States first landed on the moon [source: PC Mag]. Although you probably won't use your phone to control your own lunar lander anytime soon, it will likely do all sorts of other nifty stuff, like replace your wallet, thanks to NFC (near-field communication)technology.

The beauty and utility of NFC -- a short-range, wireless communication standard -- can be summed up in three primary purposes: sharing, pairing and transactions. NFC can turn your phone into a digital wallet, become a master key for everything from your house to your car, or serve as a government or corporate identification badge. And that's just for starters. Check out a whole swath of other nifty uses at NFC Rumor's sprawling infographic.