Joshua Foer (born September 23, 1982) is a freelance journalist and

author An author is the writer of a book, article, play, mostly written work. A broader definition of the word "author" states: "''An author is "the person who originated or gave existence to anything" and whose authorship determines responsibility f ...

living in Brookline, Massachusetts, with a primary focus on

science Science is a systematic endeavor that Scientific method, builds and organizes knowledge in the form of Testability, testable explanations and predictions about the universe. Science may be as old as the human species, and some of the earli ...

. He was the 2006 USA Memory Champion, which was described in his 2011 book, '' Moonwalking with Einstein: The Art and Science of Remembering Everything''. He spoke at the TED conference in February 2012.

Early life and education

Foer was born in

Washington, D.C. ) , image_skyline = , image_caption = Clockwise from top left: the Washington Monument and Lincoln Memorial on the National Mall, United States Capitol, Logan Circle, Jefferson Memorial, White House, Adams Morgan, ...

He is the younger brother of former '' New Republic'' editor

Franklin Foer Franklin Foer (; born July 20, 1974) is a staff writer at ''The Atlantic'' and former editor of ''The New Republic'', commenting on contemporary issues from a liberal perspective. Personal life Foer was born in 1974 to a Jewish family. He is t ...

and novelist

Jonathan Safran Foer Jonathan Safran Foer (; born February 21, 1977) is an American novelist. He is known for his novels ''Everything Is Illuminated'' (2002), ''Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close'' (2005), ''Here I Am (novel), Here I Am'' (2016), and for his non-fict ...

. He is the son of Esther Foer, former Director of Sixth & I Historic Synagogue, and Albert Foer, founder and former president of the think-tank American Antitrust Institute. He was born in

, and attended

Georgetown Day School Georgetown Day School (GDS) is an independent coeducational PK-12 school located in Washington, D.C. The school educates 1,075 elementary, middle, and high school students in northwestern Washington, D.C. Russell Shaw is the current Head of Sc ...

. Foer graduated with a B.A. in ecology and evolutionary biology from

Yale University Yale University is a Private university, private research university in New Haven, Connecticut. Established in 1701 as the Collegiate School, it is the List of Colonial Colleges, third-oldest institution of higher education in the United Sta ...

in 2004.

Career

In 2006, Foer won the USA Memory Championship, and set a new U.S. record in the "speed cards" event by memorizing a deck of 52 cards in 1 minute and 40 seconds. Foer's interest in competitive memory started a year earlier (2005) when he attended the USA Memory Championships as a journalist. He then studied under the British grandmaster of memory, Ed Cooke. Foer credits his sharp memory to creating memory palaces and the use of

mnemonic A mnemonic ( ) device, or memory device, is any learning technique that aids information retention or retrieval (remembering) in the human memory for better understanding. Mnemonics make use of elaborative encoding, retrieval cues, and imag ...

s, a learning technique that aids information retention or retrieval in the human memory. Foer participated only in the 2006 USA Memory Championships. Foer's first book, ''

Moonwalking with Einstein ''Moonwalking with Einstein: The Art and Science of Remembering Everything'' is a nonfiction book by Joshua Foer, first published in 2011. ''Moonwalking with Einstein'' debuted at no. 3 on the ''New York Times'' bestseller list and stayed on t ...

,'' was published by Penguin in March 2011.Third Foer brother inks Penguin deal

Crain's New York Business Crain Communications Inc is an American multi-industry publishing conglomerate based in Detroit, Michigan, United States, with 13 non-US subsidiaries. History Gustavus Dedman (G.D.) Crain, Jr. ( Gustavus Demetrious Crain, Jr.; 1885–1973), pre ...

, October 31, 2006 The book describes his journey throughout the world of competitive memory and attempts to delineate the capacity of the human mind. He received a $1.2 million advance for the book. Film rights were optioned by

Columbia Pictures Columbia Pictures Industries, Inc. is an American film production studio that is a member of the Sony Pictures Motion Picture Group, a division of Sony Pictures Entertainment, which is one of the Big Five studios and a subsidiary of the mu ...

shortly after publication. The book was a finalist for the 2012 Royal Society Winton Prize for Science Books. Foer's works have appeared in the ''

New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...

'', the ''

Washington Post ''The Washington Post'' (also known as the ''Post'' and, informally, ''WaPo'') is an American daily newspaper published in Washington, D.C. It is the most widely circulated newspaper within the Washington metropolitan area and has a large na ...

'', '' Slate'', ''

The Nation ''The Nation'' is an American liberal biweekly magazine that covers political and cultural news, opinion, and analysis. It was founded on July 6, 1865, as a successor to William Lloyd Garrison's '' The Liberator'', an abolitionist newspaper t ...

,'' and ''

The New Yorker ''The New Yorker'' is an American weekly magazine featuring journalism, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons, and poetry. Founded as a weekly in 1925, the magazine is published 47 times annually, with five of these issues ...

.'' From 2007 to 2009, the quarterly art & culture journal '' Cabinet'' published Foer's column "A Minor History Of." The column "examines an overlooked cultural phenomenon using a timeline". Foer also has an interest in wildlife journalism, and has written articles for '' National Geographic''. Foer is currently working on a book about his travels and experiences with the Mbendjele pygmies of the Congo Basin.

''Atlas Obscura''

Foer co-founded ''Atlas Obscura'' in 2009. The company's mission is to inspire wonder and curiosity about the world. Foer is also the co-author of the #1 NYT bestselling book, ''Atlas Obscura: An Explorer's Guide to the World's Hidden Wonders.''

Other organizations

Foer has founded several organizations, several of them dedicated to preserving Jewish traditions. In 2013, Foer co-founded the website Sefaria with

Google Google LLC () is an American Multinational corporation, multinational technology company focusing on Search Engine, search engine technology, online advertising, cloud computing, software, computer software, quantum computing, e-commerce, ar ...

developer Brett Lockspeiser, in order to transcribe, translate and digitize the core texts of

Judaism Judaism ( he, ''Yahăḏūṯ'') is an Abrahamic, monotheistic, and ethnic religion comprising the collective religious, cultural, and legal tradition and civilization of the Jewish people. It has its roots as an organized religion in t ...

. Since then, the website has grown to include a full digitization of the

Talmud The Talmud (; he, , Talmūḏ) is the central text of Rabbinic Judaism and the primary source of Jewish religious law ('' halakha'') and Jewish theology. Until the advent of modernity, in nearly all Jewish communities, the Talmud was the ce ...

with a focus on connecting links to related texts within the Jewish faith. The organization recently announced plans to build similar website archives, starting with the preservation of central texts surrounding the

American Revolution The American Revolution was an ideological and political revolution that occurred in British America between 1765 and 1791. The Americans in the Thirteen Colonies formed independent states that defeated the British in the American Revoluti ...

and United States democracy. Foer's other ventures include the organization of Sukkah City, a public art exhibition in Union Square, New York City that challenged artists and architects to reimagine the Jewish holiday tradition of building a sukkah in 2010. A documentary film directed by Jason Hutt was also made to depict and commemorate the event. Foer is also a board member of the Jim Joseph Foundation for Jewish education. In 2013, Foer was awarded a fellowship from the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation. In addition, Foer founded the first

Athanasius Kircher Athanasius Kircher (2 May 1602 – 27 November 1680) was a German Jesuit scholar and polymath who published around 40 major works, most notably in the fields of comparative religion, geology, and medicine. Kircher has been compared to fe ...

Society. It held only a single session in 2007, featuring Kim Peek and Col. Joe Kittinger.

Bibliography

* ''

'', Penguin Press HC, March 3, 2011,
''Atlas Obscura: An Explorer's Guide to the World's Hidden Wonders''
Workman Publishing Company, 2016, 2019 (co-written with Dylan Thuras and Ella Morton)

References

External links

* * *
"Feats of memory anyone can do" (TED2012)

Highlights from the Jan 2007 Athanasius Kircher meeting
{{DEFAULTSORT:Foer, Joshua 1982 births Living people American male journalists American mnemonists Jewish American writers Yale University alumni American people of Polish-Jewish descent People from Washington, D.C. Foer family Georgetown Day School alumni 21st-century American Jews