Theos-Talk Archives (August 1997 Message tl00649)

K. Paul Johnson wrote:
> 
> One important appearance of 7 in "nature" is that it has been
> determined by psychologists that 7 is the limit of items that
> can be retained in short term memory.  I illustrated this last
> week when I had 7 things in my car to take to work, and in the
> process of collecting them all forgot to take my keys out of
> the ignition before slamming the locked door.  Merde!  $25 for
> 25 seconds of work by the locksmith.

	Irrelevent, but useful: Carry a spare key on you in some way (such as
in a shoe, or a pocket of a belt) that if your pocket is picked or you
are mugged, your key will probably be safe.

> And isn't there some sense to the claim that ages 7, 14, 21,
> 28, 35, 42 are all somehow turning points?

	It originated with Aristotle, who probably got it from astrology.

> there was a well-known article called something like "The Magic
> 5 and 7" discussing all the appearances of these numbers in
> human psychology.  That was many years ago; I could ask her
> about it if you're interested.

	I will try to look it up, myself, first.

	Bart Lidofsky