Welcome to another edition of Cognitive Biases Bootcamp, a companion series to my Logical Fallacies Bootcamp series.
What are cognitive biases? Errors in information processing that we commit, usually unconsciously, that can affect our decision making and worldviews. Today’s cognitive bias is...Declinism!
What is declinism, you ask? Ah, back in MY day, people knew what...er, uh, wait a sec, let me try this again…
Declinism is the predisposition to see the past more favorably than the present — to see that the present is in a state of “decline” (hence the term declinism) compared to the way things used to be.
Human beings have a tendency to, upon reaching adulthood, have a selective memory of events from their childhood or early adulthood that leads them to remember positive events more clearly than negative events. There is a reason why we members of “Gen X” think that music from the 80’s was the best music, or why Boomers feel the same way about the music of the 60’s-70’s. We’ve forgotten the utter crap that played on the radio at the time, and now, 30, 40, 50 years later tend to only remember our favorites — the “good stuff.”
This leads older (as in, about 40+) adults to tend to see the past in a rosier light than actually warranted (Cold War and nuclear drills? What were those?d), with the result that they ALSO see the present as a decline from those halcyon days of old.
More than one ad campaign or political campaign has tried to take advantage of this phenomenon (“Make America Great Again,” anyone?). It’s part of why trying to roll back progress seems to appeal to the older generations — they’re being convinced that today’s progress is actually a sign of cultural decline, and the way to fix it is to roll the clock back thirty, forty, a hundred years of so...
Harumph. Pardon me a second…
And we tied an onion to our belts, which was the style at the time!
There. That’s better. Got that out of my system.
A more long-term version of declinism can be found in the old Classicism movement of the 18th century, where view was that the “Golden Age” of Ancient Greece and Rome declined into the “Dark Ages” of medieval times, and the attempt to recapture that era in art, architecture and philosophy revivals.
So, how do we avoid falling afoul of declinism? For one, just being aware that our own minds trick us by tending to remember the positive more than the negative, and to soften the impact of those negative events remembered over time so they no longer appear quite so bad as they seemed at the time.
Second, the old “take a second to stop and really think” method that is so valuable to critical thinking generally. Does it really make sense that X was better thirty or fifty years ago than today? Are we really remembering that right?
Third, use actual metrics. Things like life span, or income, increase in voting among Demographic X over time or some other actual, measurable metric that can be compared from then and now, or where trends can be discerned. Of course, this won’t stop you from thinking The Streak was the pinnacle of human musical artistry, but hey, I can’t do much about the subjective stuff, you’ll have to deal with that on your own terms.
Now, if you’ll pardon me, I have to go regale some young folk with tales of the Golden Age of the 80’s...after I yell at them to get off my lawn, that is.
Logical Fallacies Bootcamp is a twice weekly series with posts dropping on Wednesdays and Fridays. A companion series, Cognitive Bias Bootcamp, drops on Mondays. If you are new to these series and would like to catch up on past offerings of either, or just want to revisit them, the linked titles are listed below!
Logical Fallacies Bootcamp:
Logical Fallacies Bootcamp: The Strawman
Logical Fallacies Bootcamp: The Slippery Slope
Logical Fallacies Bootcamp: Begging the Question
Logical Fallacies Bootcamp: Poisoning the Well
Logical Fallacies Bootcamp: No True Scotsman!
Logical Fallacies Bootcamp: Ad Hominem
Logical Fallacies Bootcamp: False Dilemma
Logical Fallacies Bootcamp: Non Sequitur
Logical Fallacies Bootcamp: Red Herring
Logical Fallacies Bootcamp: Gamblers Fallacy
Logical Fallacies Bootcamp: Bandwagon Fallacy
Cognitive Bias Bootcamp:
Cognitive Bias Bootcamp: Bystander Effect
Cognitive Bias Bootcamp: Curse of Knowledge
Cognitive Bias Bootcamp: Barnum Effect