Talk:Declinism

Declinism was nominated as a Social sciences and society good article, but it did not meet the good article criteria at the time (February 11, 2017). There are suggestions on the review page for improving the article. If you can improve it, please do; it may then be renominated.

Sociology Low‑importance

	Society portal This article is within the scope of WikiProject Sociology, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of sociology on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.SociologyWikipedia:WikiProject SociologyTemplate:WikiProject Sociologysociology
Low	This article has been rated as Low-importance on the project's importance scale.

Anthropology Low‑importance

	This article is within the scope of WikiProject Anthropology, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of Anthropology on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.AnthropologyWikipedia:WikiProject AnthropologyTemplate:WikiProject AnthropologyAnthropology
Low	This article has been rated as Low-importance on the importance scale.

Economics Low‑importance

	Business and economics portal This article is within the scope of WikiProject Economics, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of Economics on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.EconomicsWikipedia:WikiProject EconomicsTemplate:WikiProject EconomicsEconomics
Low	This article has been rated as Low-importance on the project's importance scale.

Business Low‑importance

	Business portal This article is within the scope of WikiProject Business, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of business articles on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.BusinessWikipedia:WikiProject BusinessTemplate:WikiProject BusinessWikiProject Business
Low	This article has been rated as Low-importance on the project's importance scale.

Psychology Low‑importance

	Psychology portal This article is within the scope of WikiProject Psychology, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of Psychology on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.PsychologyWikipedia:WikiProject PsychologyTemplate:WikiProject Psychologypsychology
Low	This article has been rated as Low-importance on the project's importance scale.

Politics Low‑importance

	Politics portal This article is within the scope of WikiProject Politics, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of politics on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.PoliticsWikipedia:WikiProject PoliticsTemplate:WikiProject Politicspolitics
Low	This article has been rated as Low-importance on the project's importance scale.

Conservatism Low‑importance

	Conservatism portal This article is within the scope of WikiProject Conservatism, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of conservatism on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.ConservatismWikipedia:WikiProject ConservatismTemplate:WikiProject ConservatismConservatism
Low	This article has been rated as Low-importance on the project's importance scale.

Philosophy: Social and political Low‑importance

This article is within the scope of WikiProject Philosophy, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of content related to philosophy on Wikipedia. If you would like to support the project, please visit the project page, where you can get more details on how you can help, and where you can join the general discussion about philosophy content on Wikipedia.PhilosophyWikipedia:WikiProject PhilosophyTemplate:WikiProject PhilosophyPhilosophy

Low

This article has been rated as Low-importance on the project's importance scale.

Associated task forces:
/
	Social and political philosophy

It is requested that an image or photograph of Declinism be included in this article to improve its quality. Please replace this template with a more specific media request template where possible.
The Free Image Search Tool or Openverse Creative Commons Search may be able to locate suitable images on Flickr and other web sites.

Upload

Not a cognitive bias

I have removed the Cognitive bias link because I do not think we have grounds for labelling declinism as such. See Talk:List_of_cognitive_biases#Declinism for my reasoning. MartinPoulter (talk) 20:33, 16 February 2016 (UTC)[reply]

I don't think that including a link to Cognitive bias in the See also section here implies that Declinism is a cognitive bias. Ref [1] claims that a possible engine for Declinism may be certain cognitive biases and that's where the connection between the topics lies. I have restored the Cognitive bias link with some context to explain the connection. ~Kvng (talk) 21:51, 16 February 2016 (UTC)[reply]

I maintain that reference 1 is an inadequate source, for the reasons given at Talk:List_of_cognitive_biases#Declinism. Reference 1 is a speculative proposal, which is why I think we should uncomfortable with using it to define the topic. MartinPoulter (talk) 21:56, 16 February 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, that could be the case but there should be no problem reporting this reliably sourced information and no problem linking to Cognitive bias as part of that. ~Kvng (talk) 15:51, 17 February 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Cause / tone of article

Obviously there can be a false or exaggerated deception of decline, but the attitude of this article almost implies that all (contemporary, at least) perception of decline is irrational or illusory. One problem is that obviously decline exists. The counterbalance to this article would be that of the Idea of Progress or Chronological snobbery, whereby people tend to believe in a system of upward, continual progress. Obviously progress exists, but it is not holistic and not all change represents "progress". There are obviously tendencies to interpret info as representing either decline or progress, and I don't think it is particularly insightful to simply explain these away as total cognitive distortions or irrational or whatever. There have been some improvements in conditions after the GFC, but there have also been setbacks. Nazi Germany had less unemployment and poverty than Weimar Germany, but one would not be wrong to say that the state of Germany or of a German person's life had declined in some way - they are just valuing different attributes, not ignoring evidence of progress. BigGoyForYou (talk) 10:29, 12 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Nazism is not the only example. Global warming is another. https://conspiracy.fandom.com/wiki/Frequent_medicine_dosing_conspiracy#The_myth_of_the_declinist_%22cognitive_bias%22 185.205.225.220 (talk) 09:34, 7 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]