Against the Survival of the Prettiest
2 days ago
- #survivorship bias
- #architecture
- #urban aesthetics
- The article discusses the perception that modern buildings are often uglier than older, traditional ones, challenging the survivorship bias theory that suggests only beautiful old buildings survive.
- Evidence against survivorship bias includes old photographs and paintings showing few ugly buildings, and the high survival rates of 19th and early 20th-century urban architecture, indicating ugliness was not prevalent.
- Exceptions to high survival rates include war damage, commercial redevelopment, and slum clearance, but these do not account for the scarcity of ugly old buildings, as even demolished areas were not notably ugly.
- For pre-1850 architecture, survivorship bias may play a role, especially for poor housing, but surviving examples like medieval churches and preserved towns often remain beautiful, not ugly.
- The article concludes that while survivorship bias has some effect, it is not the primary reason; old buildings were generally less ugly than modern ones, suggesting a real trend of increasing ugliness in contemporary architecture.