#THE OPPOSITE OF AMNESIA FULL#

But itвЂ™s a reminder to look past our own experiences when trying to get a grasp on what has changed, and how quickly. Surveys show the opposite, and young people are leading and carrying major movements around climate change, almost certainly the most important conservation issue of our time. It also shouldnвЂ™t be taken as evidence that younger people вЂњdonвЂ™t careвЂќ about saving species. ItвЂ™s hard to say why younger people were worse at this task than older ones-perhaps the perspective that comes with years helps with such judgments. This demonstrates вЂњa negative impact of generational amnesia on conservation support for species in decline,вЂќ the authors write. They found that for both the sparrow and the pipit, older participants were more likely to have an accurate sense of how these species were declining, and were more likely to support conservation action. The researchers also asked participants their opinions about how important it was to conserve the three most imperiled species in the dataset-the house sparrow, the common cuckoo, and the tree pipit. In other words, вЂњthe baseline against which participants perceive bird species abundance appears to be shifting with each successive generation.вЂќ The authors call this вЂњgenerational amnesia.вЂќ (A few participants also showed вЂњpersonal amnesiaвЂќ - even though they had a good grasp on current relative population abundance, they didnвЂ™t remember any change at all from the past.) вЂњEven though older participants had a longer time over which to remember,вЂќ the authors write, вЂњthey recall past conditions that are more consistent with the biological dataset.вЂќ Older people were better at remembering how abundant birds were when they were 18 than younger people could. They found that, while all age groups surveyed had вЂњsimilar perceptions of current ecological conditions,вЂќ their perceptions of past conditions varied. They had each person rank the birds they recognized by abundance, both at the time of the survey and when the participant was 18. They asked participants about their perceptions of the past and current populations of ten common and easily recognizable species, including the swallow, the house sparrow, and the common cuckoo.

For this study, the researchers used combined data from two bird censuses that have been going on since 1966. One reason itвЂ™s hard to study shifting baseline syndrome is a lack of reliable data-you canвЂ™t tell how knowledgeable people are about changing population levels if you donвЂ™t know what those populations were and are. And w hile they found evidence that younger people are generally less adept at recognizing biological change than their elders are, they also found that knowledge of and personal experience with nature can help overcome that age gap. They also, for the first time, connected the survey-takersвЂ™ knowledge of past and present bird abundance with their opinions about conserving those birds. For a recent paper in People and Nature, a group of researchers surveyed hundreds of UK residents about the populations of ten local bird species, and compared their knowledge with historic data. Shifting baseline syndrome and its implications are now frequently invoked by people concerned about conservation, management, and environmental education.Д«ut although itвЂ™s an intuitive concept, itвЂ™s difficult to study. In 1995, fisheries scientist Daniel Pauly used the term вЂњshifting baseline syndromeвЂќ to describe this phenomenon: each generation of fisheries scientists, he wrote, вЂњaccepts as a baseline the stock size and species composition that occurred at the beginning of their careers,вЂќ leading to вЂњa gradual accommodation of the creeping disappearanceвЂќ of species.

#THE OPPOSITE OF AMNESIA FULL#

As generations of humans empty the world, their descendants are unable to see-and so find it hard to understand-how full it once was. For many contemporary people, such scenes seem impossible, as though they should be preceded by вЂњonce upon a time.вЂќ But they did happen, mere centuries or even decades ago.

Imagine a world where flocks of birds block out the sun, millions of bison roam the Great Plains, and groupers are the size of those who catch them.

The opposite of amnesia