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Magical Number Seven


Magical Number Seven 7
Photo by Alistair MacRobert on Unsplash

Miller, a Harvard Professor, in the 1950s conducted experiments to know maximum items or things a normal person can remember. It turns out an average person can remember 7 items. Miller called it “Magical Number Seven”. Come to think of it, humans have utilized number 7 to the fullest. There are 7 wonders in the world. There are 7 colours in the rainbow, or at least only 7 colours are visible to us, humans. Then there is Steven Covey’s bestselling book “7 Habits of Highly Effective People”. A google search on basically any self-help topic redirects us to a blog or website that more often than not has “Here are 7 ways or steps to achieve whatever you want” listed somewhere in the page. And then we have M.S Dhoni whose jersey number is, well, you guessed, 7. Totally unrelated fact, but ok. And surely there are more than 7 ways to help me remember grocery items but none came to my rescue when I needed them the most. You see, I had listed items I need to buy, in an app. Unfortunately, my smartphone ran out of battery. But yours truly took pride and relied on his extraordinary mental capability. I grabbed packets after packets from the display aisle and stuffed in my basket. 17 items. I bought chocolates and candies as a reward for my achievement. Off the 17 items, 8 matched the actual list. You might be thinking, “Eight? Not 7, the magical number?” Sorry I missed to say, Miller’s paper was titled “Magical Number Seven, Plus or Minus 2”. 


P.S Why didn’t I use the store’s telephone or some happy to help fellow shopper’s mobile? Short answer: Corona Virus.
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Location: Chennai, Tamil Nadu, India

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