Decay vs deletion: two kinds of forgetting
There are two ways a memory lets go. Decay is automatic fading: knowledge that stops being renewed is weighted down, still there but quiet. Deletion is deliberate erasure of things that should not be there at all. The first happens on its own; the second is a decision, and it belongs to the owner.
Fading is not erasing
The two ways a memory forgets are easy to conflate and important to separate. Decay is the soft one: a fact that stops being used and confirmed gradually loses weight. It is still in the record, but it no longer surfaces as if it were current. This handles the large, quiet category of things that are simply getting stale.
Deletion is the hard one: actually removing something because it should not be there. A mistake, test junk, a piece of private data. This is not fading. It is erasure.
Erasure is a decision with an owner
The key distinction is who gets to do each. Decay is automatic and impersonal; it just happens as attention moves on. Deletion is a deliberate act, and it belongs to the owner, not to any individual agent.
That division is what keeps a memory both rich and safe. Nothing important is lost by accident, because fading is gentle and reversible by renewed use. And nothing wrong is kept by inertia, because the owner can erase it on purpose. Agents fill the memory; you decide what leaves it.
Frequently asked
What is the difference between decay and deletion?
Decay fades knowledge that is no longer renewed, lowering its weight without removing it, for things that are just getting stale. Deletion erases something outright, for things that should not be in the memory at all, like an error or private data.
Who decides what gets deleted?
The owner. Agents accumulate and corroborate; deliberate erasure is governance, reserved for the person who owns the problem, not something any single agent does on its own.
Related
Take yourself out of the loop.
Let your agents do the lifting while you keep the judgment.
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