New research brings important caveats to any discussion of "moral decline."
 | By Eliza Barclay Climate Editor, Opinion |
Does it ever feel like people used to be kinder, more honest and more moral than they are now? If you're afflicted with nostalgia for better days, you are very much not alone. |
Yet while people the world over may share this sense of moral decline, it doesn't actually reflect reality; it is instead likely the work of two powerful cognitive biases in the human mind, hijacking our memory and making us pay closer attention to certain kinds of negative information about others. |
This is the remarkable discovery of two psychologists, Adam Mastroianni and Daniel Gilbert, who recently published their research findings in the journal Nature. I saw Mastroianni tweeting about it last week, and was especially struck by how the research showed that people are wrong about their fellow humans growing less kind over time. |
In a guest essay published yesterday, Mastroianni showed how the myth of a golden age has been a powerful piece of political rhetoric over the centuries, from the ancient Romans to President Biden. |
As long as we believe in the illusion of moral decline, he wrote, "we are susceptible to the promises of aspiring autocrats who claim they can return us to a golden age that exists in the only place a golden age has ever existed: our imaginations." |
Here's what we're focusing on today: |
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