May 26, 2025 • 22 mins
The Paradox of Progress: Why We Forget What Works
In this episode of PsyberSpace, host Leslie Poston digs into the 'Paradox of Progress,' a psychological phenomenon explaining why society and individuals often dismantle the systems that made their successes possible. The episode explores this paradox in various realms including public health, civil rights, economics, and climate policy. The discussion reveals how our brains' tendency to forget problems once they are resolved leads to cyclical issues, like the resurgence of diseases or the rollback of civil protections. It emphasizes the importance of active memory and systemic maintenance to prevent the recurrence of past mistakes and underscores the universal challenge of sustaining progress.
00:00 Introduction to the Paradox of Progress
01:18 The Measles Comeback: A Case Study
03:55 Civil Rights and the Illusion of Finality
06:41 Economic Amnesia: The 2008 Financial Crisis
15:43 The Environmental Protection Challenge
18:37 The Psychology Behind Forgetting Success
20:28 Personal Reflection and Conclusion
VOTE FOR PSYBERSPACE THIS MONTH! I'm nominated for a Women in Podcasting award! Voting is open during the month of May - I'd love your support. Note: You don't have to vote for every category, just look for PsyberSpace in Science Podcasts at this link https://www.womenpodcasters.com/awards-voting?sc=27127076032d7fd70ddcab921ce8652fb78353d03
Research
Andersson, O., Campos-Mercade, P., Meier, A., & Wengström, E. (2020). Anticipation of COVID-19 vaccines reduces willingness to socially distance. Journal of Health Economics, 75, 102406.
Bonilla-Silva, E. (2017). Racism without racists: Color-blind racism and the persistence of racial inequality in America (5th ed.). Rowman & Littlefield.
Castel, A. D., & Rhodes, M. G. (2020). The role of memory confidence and overconfidence in cognitive aging. In The Wiley Encyclopedia of Health Psychology (pp. 287-294). Wiley.
Kruger, D. J., Fernandes, H. B. F., Cupal, S., & Homish, G. G. (2019). Life history variation and the preparedness paradox. Evolutionary Behavioral Sciences.
Lifchits, G., Saucet, M., & Propose, J. (2021). Success narratives and attribution errors in organizational settings. Applied Psychology Review, 43(2), 156-172.
Loužek, M. (2021). Negativity bias and its impact on risk perception in modern society. European Journal of Social Psychology, 51(4), 678-691.
Luz, P. M., Nadanovsky, P., & Leask, J. (2020). Cognitive biases and vaccination decisions: A systematic review. Vaccine, 38(21), 3743-3751.
Meyer, R., & Kunreuther, H. (2017). The Ostrich Paradox: Why We Underprepare for Disasters. Wharton School Press
O'Brien, L. T. (2022). Incremental versus categorical change: Public perception and policy implications. Journal of Social Issues, 78(3), 445-462.
O'Reilly, C. A., & Hall, D. T. (2020). Grandiose narcissism, decision making, and leadership effectiveness. Leadership Quarterly, 31(4), 101-117.
Weber, E. U. (2006). Experience-based and description-based perceptions of long-term risk: Why global warming does not scare us (yet). Climatic Change, 77(1-2), 103-120.
★ Support this podcast ★Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Leslie Poston (00:11):
Welcome to PsyberSpace. I'm your host,
Leslie Poston. Today we'rediving into one of the most
maddening quirks of humanpsychology, a paradox that
explains everything from whymeasles is making a comeback to
why we keep repeating the sameeconomic mistakes. It's called
the paradox of progress, andhere's how it works: The better
(00:33):
we get at solving a problem, themore we forget the problem ever
existed in the first place. Thisis not about nostalgia or
wanting to return to the goodold days.
This is about a specificpsychological blind spot that
causes societies and individualsto systematically dismantle the
very things that made theirsuccess possible. We'll explore
(00:55):
how this shows up in publichealth, civil rights, economic,
climate policy, and even ourpersonal lives. And more
importantly, we'll talk aboutwhether there's anything we can
do to outsmart our ownforgetting. Because here's the
thing (01:09):
this pattern is so predictable, so universal, that
once you start seeing it, you'llrecognize it everywhere. So
let's start with a story that'sprobably playing out in your
community right now, whether yourealize it or not.
If you're 40, you might notremember measles as a serious
(01:30):
threat. And that's exactly theproblem. Measles was declared
eliminated in The United Statesin the year February.
Eliminated. Gone.
Wiped out by one of the mostsuccessful public health
campaigns in human history. Buthere we are in 2025, dealing
with outbreaks that would havebeen unthinkable just two
(01:51):
decades ago. What happened? Theanswer isn't just misinformation
or social media echo chambers,though those play a role. The
deeper issue is that successcreated an illusion of safety.
When parents today considervaccination, they're not
weighing the risk of vaccinesagainst the memory of children
(02:11):
dying from measles encephalitisor being left deaf or brain
damaged. They're weighingvaccine risk against nothing
because in their livedexperience, measles doesn't
exist. This connects to researchon how our risk perception
changes when we anticipate goodnews. During the early part of
the COVID-nineteen pandemic,researchers found that as soon
(02:35):
as people heard vaccines were onthe horizon, many started
abandoning safety measures likemasking or social distancing,
not because they were alreadyvaccinated, the vaccines weren't
out, but because the mereprospect of protection made the
current risk feel less real.It's the same psychological
mechanism in both cases.
(02:57):
When the threat becomesinvisible, whether through
successful vaccination programsor the promise of future
vaccines, our brains treat it asif it never existed. This
happens because our amygdala,the brain's alarm system, is
designed to respond to immediateand present dangers. So when a
threat disappears from ourenvironment, the amygdala stops
(03:19):
firing those warning signals,and without that emotional
arousal, the prefrontal cortexdoesn't prioritize story or
retreatment memories about whythe threat mattered in the first
place. We're just not wired tomaintain vigilance against
dangers we can't see, even whenthat invisibility is the direct
result of our vigilance working.This is the paradox of progress
in its purest form (03:42):
The better we get at preventing something
bad, the less real that badthing feels, which makes us less
motivated to keep preventing it.
Now, let's look at how thisplays out in social progress.
We've made measurable advancesin civil rights over the past
(04:02):
century. Voting rights,workplace protections, marriage
equality, disability rights.These weren't abstract policy
changes. They represented theend of real documented suffering
for millions of people, or closeto the end.
And yet, we're watching many ofthese gains erode in real time.
Voting rights protections thatstood for decades are being
(04:25):
rolled back. Affirmative actionprograms are being dismantled.
LGBTQ plus protections are underconstant legal challenge. The
persuasion rhetoric for thesechanges is often, oh, we've made
enough progress, or Theseprotections aren't needed
anymore.
Part of what's happening to makethis regression palatable to
(04:45):
voters is psychologicaldistance. Neuroscientists have
found that our brains processdistant events, whether distant
in time, space, or personalexperience using the same neural
pathways we use for abstractthinking. This means historical
injustices literally feel lessreal to us than immediate
(05:07):
experiences, even when theconsequences of those injustices
are still shaping the present.Basically, our brains have a
hard time treating recenthistory as recent if we didn't
personally experience it. TheCivil Rights Act was 1964.
The Americans with DisabilitiesAct was 1990. Marriage equality
(05:28):
was 2015. In historical terms,those are yesterday. But in
psychological terms, they feelancient to people who didn't
live through the struggle.There's also the phenomenon that
sociologists call colorblindracism, the belief that if we
stop acknowledging inequality,it will somehow magically
(05:48):
disappear.
But this goes deeper thanwillful denial. It's about how
our minds process progressitself. When overt
discrimination decreases, wetend to assume the underlying
problem is solved, not justmanaged. Success in civil rights
creates an illusion of finality.We tell ourselves the work is
(06:10):
done.
The battle is won and theproblem is solved, but rights
aren't like vaccinations. Theydon't provide permanent
immunity. Rights requireconstant maintenance, constant
reinforcement, and constantremembering of why they were
necessary in the first place.When that memory fades, old
problems don't just return theyoften come back in more
(06:32):
sophisticated forms, dressed upas progress themselves. Let's
talk money.
After the two thousand and eightfinancial crisis nearly broke
the global economy, governmentsand banks implemented strict new
regulations. Dog Frank in The U.S, Basel III internationally,
(06:54):
stress tests for banks,restrictions on risky trading.
For a while, measures worked.The financial system stabilized
and the crisis was averted.
But then came the inevitablepushbackclaims that regulations
were stifling innovation,preventing growth, or were
unnecessary bureaucracy.Gradually, many protections were
(07:15):
stripped away. By 2018, keyparts of Dodd Frank had been
rolled back, including stresstesting requirements for mid
sized banks. Fast forward to2023, Silicon Valley Bank
collapses in a matter of days,followed by Credit Suisse,
creating exactly the kind ofsystemic risk the post 02/2008
(07:35):
regulations had been designed toprevent. The bank runs, the
panic, the government bailouts.
It was like watching a slowmotion replay of mistakes we
thought we'd learned from. Thisis economic amnesia in action.
We have this pattern thatrepeats with almost mechanical
precision. Crisis leads toregulation. Regulation leads to
(07:56):
stability.
Stability leads to complacency.Complacency leads to
deregulation, and deregulationleads us once again back to
crisis. Research shows thatpeople tend to dismiss
incremental progress asinsufficient, always demanding
sweeping changes that oftendiscard the safeguards that
(08:17):
we're working. It's not thatgradual improvement is boring,
although it can be. It's thatour brains are literally wired
to seek dramatic solutions,especially when the original
problem no longer feels urgent.
We also have a tendency tocreate simplified success
stories after the fact. The2010s economic recovery often
(08:38):
gets attributed to innovation orentrepreneurship and not to the
regulatory framework thatprevented another financial
meltdown. Those boring,invisible safeguards get written
out of the narrative entirely.This reflects what psychologists
call the generation effect. Weremember information better when
we actively generate itourselves rather than when it's
(09:00):
given to us.
Success stories that emphasizeindividual agency feel more
memorable and true to our brainsthan complex explanations
involving multiple systems, evenwhen the complex explanations
are accurate. So why do weforget what worked? It starts
(09:21):
with overconfidence in our ownmemory. Research consistently
shows that people overestimatetheir ability to remember
important information,especially when that information
feels meaningful or significant.We think, Of course, I'll
remember why this policy exists,but then we don't.
There's also something calledthe forgetting curve, a
(09:42):
measurable decline in memoryretention over time. Without
regular reinforcement, most ofwhat we learn fades rapidly. And
here's the key (09:51):
information that isn't tied to strong emotional
experiences fades even faster.The hippocampus, which
consolidates memories for longterm storage, prioritizes
information that's emotionallysignificant or frequently
rehearsed. Policy successesrarely trigger strong emotions,
(10:12):
and we don't rehearse thedetails of how they work, so
they fade from collective memorymuch faster than the problems
they solved.
Reading about bankingregulations doesn't create the
same memorable imprint as livingthrough a bank run. And then
there's cognitive ease. When asystem is working smoothly, we
assume it requires nomaintenance. That's like
(10:33):
assuming your car never needsoil changes because the engine
runs fine until it doesn't.Success creates a blind spot
where we see the results butforget the ongoing effort
required to maintain them.
This is compounded by whatpsychologists call the illusion
of knowledge. When systems workwell, they become invisible to
us. We stop noticing theinfrastructure that makes our
lives possible (10:57):
The food safety inspections, the building codes,
the air traffic control systems,the financial regulations fade
into the background of ourawareness, which makes them feel
less important than theyactually are. This invisibility
problem is compounded by whatneuroscientists call
habituation. When our brainsencounter the same stimulus
(11:20):
repeatedly, they literally stopresponding to it.
The neural pathways that oncefired in response to clean air
or safe drinking watereventually go quiet, making
these benefits psychologicallyinvisible even as they remain
physically essential. Here'sanother piece of the puzzle:
(11:41):
We're natural storytellers, andwe like our stories clean and
simple. Research shows thatpeople consistently create
oversimplified narratives abouthow success was achieved,
emphasizing individual traitswhile downplaying systems and
structures. The entrepreneur whomade it through hard work never
(12:02):
mind the small businessadministration loans, the
university research that createdtheir technology, or the legal
framework that protected theirintellectual property, or the
city that turned itself aroundto strong leadership, never mind
the federal investment, thedemographic changes, or the
broader economic trends. Thesetidy success stories are
(12:24):
psychologically satisfying, butthey're dangerous because they
shift our focus away from theactual mechanisms that create
success.
When we attribute progress toindividual characteristics
rather than systemic factors, westart to believe that
maintaining those systems isunnecessary. This shows up
constantly in public policy.People vote against social
(12:46):
safety nets because they believesuccess stories about pulling
yourself up by your bootstraps,not recognizing how much those
stories depend on the veryprograms they're voting to
eliminate. Media reinforces thisthrough what researchers call
the fundamental attributionerror. We attribute success to
personal qualities and failureto circumstances, when the
(13:08):
reality is usually much morecomplex.
Hollywood loves stories aboutindividual heroes overcoming the
system, not stories about welldesigned systems that prevent
problems from occurring in thefirst place. This preference for
simple narratives reflects howour brains evolve to process
information. The default modenetwork, active when we're not
(13:30):
focused on the outside world,naturally seeks patterns and
creates coherent stories fromfragmented information. Complex
systemic explanations requiremore cognitive effort than our
brains want to spend.Personality traits play a role
here too, particularlynarcissism.
(13:51):
Research shows that people withgrandiose narcissistic traits
are more likely to ignore expertadvice, make impulsive
decisions, and believe they knowbetter than collective wisdom or
historical precedent. Soundfamiliar? We've seen this in
corporate leadership, wheresuccessful companies bring in
disruptors who gut establishedsafety protocols or quality
(14:14):
controls in the name ofinnovation. We've seen it in
politics, where leaders dismissscientists, historians, and
career civil servants as theswamp or the establishment. This
isn't just egoalthough ego ispart of it.
Narcissistic traits activelycorrelate with overconfidence,
reduced openness to feedback,and increased risk taking,
(14:37):
especially after experiencing asuccess. The very success that
should teach humility insteadbreeds arrogance. In
organizations, this manifests asinstitutional memory loss.
Companies grow rapidly and thenreplace experienced back with
newcomers who don't understandwhy certain systems exist. The
knowledge about what works andwhy it works gets lost in
(14:59):
layoffs, reorganizations, andcultural shifts.
This connects to the DunningKruger effect: people with less
competence often feel mostconfident about discarding
historical best practices. Theydon't know enough to know that
they don't know, so they assumeexisting systems are just
bureaucratic bloat rather thanaccumulated wisdom. Brain
(15:23):
imaging studies show thatoverconfident individuals have
reduced activity in the anteriorcingulate cortex, the region
responsible for monitoringconflicts and errors. This means
they're literally less likely tonotice when their decisions
contradict established knowledgeor when their assumptions might
be wrong. Climate change mightbe the ultimate test case for
(15:46):
the paradox of progress.
Every success in environmentalprotection creates its own
backlash. Cities that implementclean air policies suddenly face
questions about whether suchstrict rules are still needed.
Regions that invest in renewableenergy see voters rolling back
these investments to save money,forgetting why they were
(16:07):
implemented. This connects toresearch on risk perception and
temporal distance. Peoplestruggle to take action against
threats that are slow moving,abstract, or distant in time.
Climate change checks all threeboxes. And the more successful
we are at mitigating itseffects, the more invisible the
threat becomes. And when the airis clean and the storms aren't
(16:31):
catastrophic this year, peopletune out. It's a visibility
problem. Success becomes the newbaseline, rather than evidence
of what could happen withoutcontinued effort.
We forget that environmentalprotection is like taking
medicine for a chroniccondition. You feel fine while
you're taking it, but that doesnot mean you're cured. The
(16:52):
psychological challenge is thatenvironmental success looks like
nothing happening. No oilspills, no smog alerts, no
species extinction. Happening isboring to the human brain, and
boredom doesn't motivatecontinued vigilance.
Here's where things get reallytwisted. Even when objective
(17:16):
measures show improvement,people often believe things are
getting worse. This is due tonegativity bias, our built in
tendency to focus more onnegative information than
positive information. Crimestatistics can be down, but
people feel less safe.Educational outcomes can be
improving, but everyone stillthinks schools are failing.
(17:40):
Economic inequality can bedecreasing in some measures, but
the perception is that it'sgetting worse. This matters
because when people perceivedecline, they seek dramatic
changes, even when those changesmight undo actual progress. They
elect reactionary leaders. Theycut essential programs. They
(18:00):
abandon functioning systems infavor of something that promises
to be completely different.
Social media amplifies thisthrough what we are now calling
doomscrolling, the compulsiveconsumption of negative news and
information. The availabilitybias means we assume things are
getting worse because negativenews is more readily available
to us than positive trends,which tend to be gradual and
(18:24):
less newsworthy. This creates afeedback loop where people
forget about progress, focusingon problems, and then make
decisions that actually createthe decline they were worried
about in the first place. Sowhat can we do about this? The
paradox of progress might behardwired into human psychology,
(18:46):
but that doesn't mean we'rehelpless against it.
First, education and publicmemory matter enormously.
Countries that do a good job ofmaintaining collective memory
about why certain systems existtend to be more successful at
preserving them. Germany isoften cited as an example.
They've made remembering theconsequences of forgetting a
(19:09):
civic duty, especially aroundthe rise of fascism. We can also
build maintenance into oursystems from the beginning.
What if every new policy orprogram included a built in
review process, not to changeit, but to remind people why it
was created? Regularretrospectives, anniversary
(19:29):
commemorations, impactassessments that focus on what
would happen without theintervention. Behavioral
psychology offers tools as well.Spaced repetition, habit
stacking, environmental cues. Weknow these work for individual
learning and they can work forcollective memory as well.
On a personal level, this meansbeing intentional about
(19:52):
remembering your own successes,journaling about what worked and
why, taking photos or keepingrecords of progress, setting
calendar reminders that say,Remember why you started this?
Rather than just do this thing.Because the paradox of progress
isn't just societal, it's alsodeeply personal. We forget why
(20:14):
our diets worked, why ourtherapy helped, or why we left
that toxic job or ended thatharmful relationship. And in
forgetting, we often slidebackward into the same patterns
we worked so hard to escape.
The paradox of progress is this: when things go right, we forget (20:29):
undefined
what made them go right. Andonce we forget, we open the door
to repeat the very mistakes wethought we'd left behind.
Whether we're talking aboutvaccines or civil rights,
financial regulations orenvironmental protection,
personal growth or societalchange, forgetting what worked
(20:51):
is a universal human challenge.It's also one we can outsmart if
we're willing to be moreintentional about how we
remember success. The keyinsight is that progress doesn't
maintain itself.
It must be remembered,reinforced, and actively
protected. The systems that keepus safe, healthy, and free
(21:11):
require not just our gratitude,but our ongoing attention. So
here's a little homework. Thinkabout something in your life
that's working well, so wellthat you've stopped thinking
about it. Your health, yourrelationships, maybe your
career, your community.
And now ask yourself, what wouldhappen if you stopped doing the
(21:34):
little things that make thatwork? And what can you do to
remember why those little thingsmatter? Thanks for listening to
this episode of PsyberSpace.This is your host, Leslie
Poston, signing off. As always,until next time, stay curious
and subscribe so you never missan episode.
And a little reminder, if you'relistening to this in May 2025,
(21:55):
there are still a few days tovote for us for our nomination
for best women in podcastingscience podcast edition. There's
going to be a link in the shownotes. See you next week.
Welcome to PsyberSpace. I'm your host,
Leslie Poston. Today we'rediving into one of the most
maddening quirks of humanpsychology, a paradox that
explains everything from whymeasles is making a comeback to
why we keep repeating the sameeconomic mistakes. It's called
the paradox of progress, andhere's how it works: The better
(00:33):
we get at solving a problem, themore we forget the problem ever
existed in the first place. Thisis not about nostalgia or
wanting to return to the goodold days.
This is about a specificpsychological blind spot that
causes societies and individualsto systematically dismantle the
very things that made theirsuccess possible. We'll explore
(00:55):
how this shows up in publichealth, civil rights, economic,
climate policy, and even ourpersonal lives. And more
importantly, we'll talk aboutwhether there's anything we can
do to outsmart our ownforgetting. Because here's the
thing (01:09):
this pattern is so predictable, so universal, that
once you start seeing it, you'llrecognize it everywhere. So
let's start with a story that'sprobably playing out in your
community right now, whether yourealize it or not.
If you're 40, you might notremember measles as a serious
(01:30):
threat. And that's exactly theproblem. Measles was declared
eliminated in The United Statesin the year February.
Eliminated. Gone.
Wiped out by one of the mostsuccessful public health
campaigns in human history. Buthere we are in 2025, dealing
with outbreaks that would havebeen unthinkable just two
(01:51):
decades ago. What happened? Theanswer isn't just misinformation
or social media echo chambers,though those play a role. The
deeper issue is that successcreated an illusion of safety.
When parents today considervaccination, they're not
weighing the risk of vaccinesagainst the memory of children
(02:11):
dying from measles encephalitisor being left deaf or brain
damaged. They're weighingvaccine risk against nothing
because in their livedexperience, measles doesn't
exist. This connects to researchon how our risk perception
changes when we anticipate goodnews. During the early part of
the COVID-nineteen pandemic,researchers found that as soon
(02:35):
as people heard vaccines were onthe horizon, many started
abandoning safety measures likemasking or social distancing,
not because they were alreadyvaccinated, the vaccines weren't
out, but because the mereprospect of protection made the
current risk feel less real.It's the same psychological
mechanism in both cases.
(02:57):
When the threat becomesinvisible, whether through
successful vaccination programsor the promise of future
vaccines, our brains treat it asif it never existed. This
happens because our amygdala,the brain's alarm system, is
designed to respond to immediateand present dangers. So when a
threat disappears from ourenvironment, the amygdala stops
(03:19):
firing those warning signals,and without that emotional
arousal, the prefrontal cortexdoesn't prioritize story or
retreatment memories about whythe threat mattered in the first
place. We're just not wired tomaintain vigilance against
dangers we can't see, even whenthat invisibility is the direct
result of our vigilance working.This is the paradox of progress
in its purest form (03:42):
The better we get at preventing something
bad, the less real that badthing feels, which makes us less
motivated to keep preventing it.
Now, let's look at how thisplays out in social progress.
We've made measurable advancesin civil rights over the past
(04:02):
century. Voting rights,workplace protections, marriage
equality, disability rights.These weren't abstract policy
changes. They represented theend of real documented suffering
for millions of people, or closeto the end.
And yet, we're watching many ofthese gains erode in real time.
Voting rights protections thatstood for decades are being
(04:25):
rolled back. Affirmative actionprograms are being dismantled.
LGBTQ plus protections are underconstant legal challenge. The
persuasion rhetoric for thesechanges is often, oh, we've made
enough progress, or Theseprotections aren't needed
anymore.
Part of what's happening to makethis regression palatable to
(04:45):
voters is psychologicaldistance. Neuroscientists have
found that our brains processdistant events, whether distant
in time, space, or personalexperience using the same neural
pathways we use for abstractthinking. This means historical
injustices literally feel lessreal to us than immediate
(05:07):
experiences, even when theconsequences of those injustices
are still shaping the present.Basically, our brains have a
hard time treating recenthistory as recent if we didn't
personally experience it. TheCivil Rights Act was 1964.
The Americans with DisabilitiesAct was 1990. Marriage equality
(05:28):
was 2015. In historical terms,those are yesterday. But in
psychological terms, they feelancient to people who didn't
live through the struggle.There's also the phenomenon that
sociologists call colorblindracism, the belief that if we
stop acknowledging inequality,it will somehow magically
(05:48):
disappear.
But this goes deeper thanwillful denial. It's about how
our minds process progressitself. When overt
discrimination decreases, wetend to assume the underlying
problem is solved, not justmanaged. Success in civil rights
creates an illusion of finality.We tell ourselves the work is
(06:10):
done.
The battle is won and theproblem is solved, but rights
aren't like vaccinations. Theydon't provide permanent
immunity. Rights requireconstant maintenance, constant
reinforcement, and constantremembering of why they were
necessary in the first place.When that memory fades, old
problems don't just return theyoften come back in more
(06:32):
sophisticated forms, dressed upas progress themselves. Let's
talk money.
After the two thousand and eightfinancial crisis nearly broke
the global economy, governmentsand banks implemented strict new
regulations. Dog Frank in The U.S, Basel III internationally,
(06:54):
stress tests for banks,restrictions on risky trading.
For a while, measures worked.The financial system stabilized
and the crisis was averted.
But then came the inevitablepushbackclaims that regulations
were stifling innovation,preventing growth, or were
unnecessary bureaucracy.Gradually, many protections were
(07:15):
stripped away. By 2018, keyparts of Dodd Frank had been
rolled back, including stresstesting requirements for mid
sized banks. Fast forward to2023, Silicon Valley Bank
collapses in a matter of days,followed by Credit Suisse,
creating exactly the kind ofsystemic risk the post 02/2008
(07:35):
regulations had been designed toprevent. The bank runs, the
panic, the government bailouts.
It was like watching a slowmotion replay of mistakes we
thought we'd learned from. Thisis economic amnesia in action.
We have this pattern thatrepeats with almost mechanical
precision. Crisis leads toregulation. Regulation leads to
(07:56):
stability.
Stability leads to complacency.Complacency leads to
deregulation, and deregulationleads us once again back to
crisis. Research shows thatpeople tend to dismiss
incremental progress asinsufficient, always demanding
sweeping changes that oftendiscard the safeguards that
(08:17):
we're working. It's not thatgradual improvement is boring,
although it can be. It's thatour brains are literally wired
to seek dramatic solutions,especially when the original
problem no longer feels urgent.
We also have a tendency tocreate simplified success
stories after the fact. The2010s economic recovery often
(08:38):
gets attributed to innovation orentrepreneurship and not to the
regulatory framework thatprevented another financial
meltdown. Those boring,invisible safeguards get written
out of the narrative entirely.This reflects what psychologists
call the generation effect. Weremember information better when
we actively generate itourselves rather than when it's
(09:00):
given to us.
Success stories that emphasizeindividual agency feel more
memorable and true to our brainsthan complex explanations
involving multiple systems, evenwhen the complex explanations
are accurate. So why do weforget what worked? It starts
(09:21):
with overconfidence in our ownmemory. Research consistently
shows that people overestimatetheir ability to remember
important information,especially when that information
feels meaningful or significant.We think, Of course, I'll
remember why this policy exists,but then we don't.
There's also something calledthe forgetting curve, a
(09:42):
measurable decline in memoryretention over time. Without
regular reinforcement, most ofwhat we learn fades rapidly. And
here's the key (09:51):
information that isn't tied to strong emotional
experiences fades even faster.The hippocampus, which
consolidates memories for longterm storage, prioritizes
information that's emotionallysignificant or frequently
rehearsed. Policy successesrarely trigger strong emotions,
(10:12):
and we don't rehearse thedetails of how they work, so
they fade from collective memorymuch faster than the problems
they solved.
Reading about bankingregulations doesn't create the
same memorable imprint as livingthrough a bank run. And then
there's cognitive ease. When asystem is working smoothly, we
assume it requires nomaintenance. That's like
(10:33):
assuming your car never needsoil changes because the engine
runs fine until it doesn't.Success creates a blind spot
where we see the results butforget the ongoing effort
required to maintain them.
This is compounded by whatpsychologists call the illusion
of knowledge. When systems workwell, they become invisible to
us. We stop noticing theinfrastructure that makes our
lives possible (10:57):
The food safety inspections, the building codes,
the air traffic control systems,the financial regulations fade
into the background of ourawareness, which makes them feel
less important than theyactually are. This invisibility
problem is compounded by whatneuroscientists call
habituation. When our brainsencounter the same stimulus
(11:20):
repeatedly, they literally stopresponding to it.
The neural pathways that oncefired in response to clean air
or safe drinking watereventually go quiet, making
these benefits psychologicallyinvisible even as they remain
physically essential. Here'sanother piece of the puzzle:
(11:41):
We're natural storytellers, andwe like our stories clean and
simple. Research shows thatpeople consistently create
oversimplified narratives abouthow success was achieved,
emphasizing individual traitswhile downplaying systems and
structures. The entrepreneur whomade it through hard work never
(12:02):
mind the small businessadministration loans, the
university research that createdtheir technology, or the legal
framework that protected theirintellectual property, or the
city that turned itself aroundto strong leadership, never mind
the federal investment, thedemographic changes, or the
broader economic trends. Thesetidy success stories are
(12:24):
psychologically satisfying, butthey're dangerous because they
shift our focus away from theactual mechanisms that create
success.
When we attribute progress toindividual characteristics
rather than systemic factors, westart to believe that
maintaining those systems isunnecessary. This shows up
constantly in public policy.People vote against social
(12:46):
safety nets because they believesuccess stories about pulling
yourself up by your bootstraps,not recognizing how much those
stories depend on the veryprograms they're voting to
eliminate. Media reinforces thisthrough what researchers call
the fundamental attributionerror. We attribute success to
personal qualities and failureto circumstances, when the
(13:08):
reality is usually much morecomplex.
Hollywood loves stories aboutindividual heroes overcoming the
system, not stories about welldesigned systems that prevent
problems from occurring in thefirst place. This preference for
simple narratives reflects howour brains evolve to process
information. The default modenetwork, active when we're not
(13:30):
focused on the outside world,naturally seeks patterns and
creates coherent stories fromfragmented information. Complex
systemic explanations requiremore cognitive effort than our
brains want to spend.Personality traits play a role
here too, particularlynarcissism.
(13:51):
Research shows that people withgrandiose narcissistic traits
are more likely to ignore expertadvice, make impulsive
decisions, and believe they knowbetter than collective wisdom or
historical precedent. Soundfamiliar? We've seen this in
corporate leadership, wheresuccessful companies bring in
disruptors who gut establishedsafety protocols or quality
(14:14):
controls in the name ofinnovation. We've seen it in
politics, where leaders dismissscientists, historians, and
career civil servants as theswamp or the establishment. This
isn't just egoalthough ego ispart of it.
Narcissistic traits activelycorrelate with overconfidence,
reduced openness to feedback,and increased risk taking,
(14:37):
especially after experiencing asuccess. The very success that
should teach humility insteadbreeds arrogance. In
organizations, this manifests asinstitutional memory loss.
Companies grow rapidly and thenreplace experienced back with
newcomers who don't understandwhy certain systems exist. The
knowledge about what works andwhy it works gets lost in
(14:59):
layoffs, reorganizations, andcultural shifts.
This connects to the DunningKruger effect: people with less
competence often feel mostconfident about discarding
historical best practices. Theydon't know enough to know that
they don't know, so they assumeexisting systems are just
bureaucratic bloat rather thanaccumulated wisdom. Brain
(15:23):
imaging studies show thatoverconfident individuals have
reduced activity in the anteriorcingulate cortex, the region
responsible for monitoringconflicts and errors. This means
they're literally less likely tonotice when their decisions
contradict established knowledgeor when their assumptions might
be wrong. Climate change mightbe the ultimate test case for
(15:46):
the paradox of progress.
Every success in environmentalprotection creates its own
backlash. Cities that implementclean air policies suddenly face
questions about whether suchstrict rules are still needed.
Regions that invest in renewableenergy see voters rolling back
these investments to save money,forgetting why they were
(16:07):
implemented. This connects toresearch on risk perception and
temporal distance. Peoplestruggle to take action against
threats that are slow moving,abstract, or distant in time.
Climate change checks all threeboxes. And the more successful
we are at mitigating itseffects, the more invisible the
threat becomes. And when the airis clean and the storms aren't
(16:31):
catastrophic this year, peopletune out. It's a visibility
problem. Success becomes the newbaseline, rather than evidence
of what could happen withoutcontinued effort.
We forget that environmentalprotection is like taking
medicine for a chroniccondition. You feel fine while
you're taking it, but that doesnot mean you're cured. The
(16:52):
psychological challenge is thatenvironmental success looks like
nothing happening. No oilspills, no smog alerts, no
species extinction. Happening isboring to the human brain, and
boredom doesn't motivatecontinued vigilance.
Here's where things get reallytwisted. Even when objective
(17:16):
measures show improvement,people often believe things are
getting worse. This is due tonegativity bias, our built in
tendency to focus more onnegative information than
positive information. Crimestatistics can be down, but
people feel less safe.Educational outcomes can be
improving, but everyone stillthinks schools are failing.
(17:40):
Economic inequality can bedecreasing in some measures, but
the perception is that it'sgetting worse. This matters
because when people perceivedecline, they seek dramatic
changes, even when those changesmight undo actual progress. They
elect reactionary leaders. Theycut essential programs. They
(18:00):
abandon functioning systems infavor of something that promises
to be completely different.
Social media amplifies thisthrough what we are now calling
doomscrolling, the compulsiveconsumption of negative news and
information. The availabilitybias means we assume things are
getting worse because negativenews is more readily available
to us than positive trends,which tend to be gradual and
(18:24):
less newsworthy. This creates afeedback loop where people
forget about progress, focusingon problems, and then make
decisions that actually createthe decline they were worried
about in the first place. Sowhat can we do about this? The
paradox of progress might behardwired into human psychology,
(18:46):
but that doesn't mean we'rehelpless against it.
First, education and publicmemory matter enormously.
Countries that do a good job ofmaintaining collective memory
about why certain systems existtend to be more successful at
preserving them. Germany isoften cited as an example.
They've made remembering theconsequences of forgetting a
(19:09):
civic duty, especially aroundthe rise of fascism. We can also
build maintenance into oursystems from the beginning.
What if every new policy orprogram included a built in
review process, not to changeit, but to remind people why it
was created? Regularretrospectives, anniversary
(19:29):
commemorations, impactassessments that focus on what
would happen without theintervention. Behavioral
psychology offers tools as well.Spaced repetition, habit
stacking, environmental cues. Weknow these work for individual
learning and they can work forcollective memory as well.
On a personal level, this meansbeing intentional about
(19:52):
remembering your own successes,journaling about what worked and
why, taking photos or keepingrecords of progress, setting
calendar reminders that say,Remember why you started this?
Rather than just do this thing.Because the paradox of progress
isn't just societal, it's alsodeeply personal. We forget why
(20:14):
our diets worked, why ourtherapy helped, or why we left
that toxic job or ended thatharmful relationship. And in
forgetting, we often slidebackward into the same patterns
we worked so hard to escape.
The paradox of progress is this: when things go right, we forget (20:29):
undefined
what made them go right. Andonce we forget, we open the door
to repeat the very mistakes wethought we'd left behind.
Whether we're talking aboutvaccines or civil rights,
financial regulations orenvironmental protection,
personal growth or societalchange, forgetting what worked
(20:51):
is a universal human challenge.It's also one we can outsmart if
we're willing to be moreintentional about how we
remember success. The keyinsight is that progress doesn't
maintain itself.
It must be remembered,reinforced, and actively
protected. The systems that keepus safe, healthy, and free
(21:11):
require not just our gratitude,but our ongoing attention. So
here's a little homework. Thinkabout something in your life
that's working well, so wellthat you've stopped thinking
about it. Your health, yourrelationships, maybe your
career, your community.
And now ask yourself, what wouldhappen if you stopped doing the
(21:34):
little things that make thatwork? And what can you do to
remember why those little thingsmatter? Thanks for listening to
this episode of PsyberSpace.This is your host, Leslie
Poston, signing off. As always,until next time, stay curious
and subscribe so you never missan episode.
And a little reminder, if you'relistening to this in May 2025,
(21:55):
there are still a few days tovote for us for our nomination
for best women in podcastingscience podcast edition. There's
going to be a link in the shownotes. See you next week.
Popular Podcasts
United States of Kennedy
United States of Kennedy is a podcast about our cultural fascination with the Kennedy dynasty. Every week, hosts Lyra Smith and George Civeris go into one aspect of the Kennedy story.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
Bookmarked by Reese's Book Club
Welcome to Bookmarked by Reese’s Book Club — the podcast where great stories, bold women, and irresistible conversations collide! Hosted by award-winning journalist Danielle Robay, each week new episodes balance thoughtful literary insight with the fervor of buzzy book trends, pop culture and more. Bookmarked brings together celebrities, tastemakers, influencers and authors from Reese's Book Club and beyond to share stories that transcend the page. Pull up a chair. You’re not just listening — you’re part of the conversation.