What does it mean when someone says "it's a catch 22" and "hindsight is 20/20?"?

Question

I don't understand what either of those two phrases mean, but I hear them all the time.

Answer 1

Catch-22 means -
A paradoxical situation that has no happy ending. A popular movie with Alan Arkin in 1970, Catch-22 came from Joseph Heller's 1961 comical, yet gruesome, best-selling book about pilots in a fictitious World War II setting. The paradox was that no sane pilot would be crazy enough to want to continue flying dangerous missions. The only way a pilot would be grounded is if he were truly crazy, but if he asked to be grounded, he was then considered sane and would not be grounded. Sometimes, a Catch-22 is used synonymously with a "chicken-egg" dilemma (which comes first?), but it is more accurately a conundrum without a winning solution.

and

"Hindsight is 20/20: means The Ultimate Optical Illusion,- you're actually looking forward to your next examination.

Also - Hindsight bias, sometimes called the I-knew-it-all-along effect, is the inclination to see past events as being predictable and reasonable to expect, perhaps because they are more available than possible outcomes which did not occur. Subjects also tend to remember their own future predictions as being more accurate than they were after the fact. People are, in effect, biased by the knowledge of what has actually happened when evaluating its likelihood.

Hindsight bias has been demonstrated experimentally in a variety of settings, including politics, games and medicine. Prophecy that is recorded after the fact is an example of hindsight bias, given its own rubric, as vaticinium ex eventu.

It has been shown that examining possible alternatives may reduce the effects of this bias.

The Polish proverb "Mądry Polak po szkodzie", which means "A Pole is wise after damage occurred", is an example of hindsight bias.

Answer 2

I was going to write out an explanation, but Wikipedia, as usual, says it so well:

"Catch-22 is a term, coined by Joseph Heller's novel Catch-22, describing a general situation in which an individual has to accomplish two actions which are mutually dependent on the other action being completed first[1]. A familiar example of this circumstance occurs in the context of job searching. In moving from school to a career, one may encounter a Catch-22 where one cannot get a job without work experience, but one cannot gain experience without a job.

Catch-22 situations are also sometimes called the chicken or the egg problems."

20/20 vision is perfect vision, and hindsight means looking back at the past. So "Hindsight is 20/20" means that when you look back at what's already happened, you can see everything perfectly and make the perfect judgement. This is ironic (a Catch-22), because once you know everything and can make the perfect choice, the choice is already past!

Answer 3

A Catch 22 is a circumstance or rule that has no solution. A famous showbusiness example is: "If you don't have an agent, you can't get a job. If you don't have a job, you can't get an agent."

Hindsight is 20/20 means simply that you can see the solution clearly after you have been told the solution. For example, you might have no idea what the right choice is before you make a decision, but after you know the outcome, you feel as though you should have known it all along.

Answer 4

the 20/20 means that when you look back on something you know why it happened-- to dumb it down, the explanation, not you -- for example if your friend insists on driving after a few drinks and you were to let him/her and they were in an accident you could say hindsight is 20/20 meaning when you think about it you knew they would probably be in an accident if you didnt' take away the car keys. Catch 22 is sort of a "damned if you do and damned if you don't" type of thing, like my mom got fired from her job for not doing something a new employee told her to do, but my mom followed the company policy when she didn't do this thing. If she hadn't followed the policy she would have gotten fired. But because she didn't get along with her boss she got fired for not doing what this other employee told her to -- see what I mean, she was fired for following her company's policy, but if she did what this other person told her to do she would have been fired for NOT following the policy. It's also called "caught between a rock and a hard place" just FYI.

Answer 5

A catch 22 is a circular problem. In the book Catch 22, they use this scenario -- a bombardier wants to get out of combat flight duty and must be proven insane to do so. But regulations say that any sane person would naturally not want to fly combat missions because they are so dangerous. So by requesting permission not to fly combat missions, on the grounds of insanity, the bombardier demonstrates that he is in fact sane and therefore is fit to fly.

Hindsight is 20/20 means that we can see very clearly the things that have already happened to us. It's usually used when things don't turn out the way you expected them to. But after the result, you can look back and say "oh yeah" I should have seen that coming all along.

Hope that helps. It's late and I'm a little sleepy! Good night.

Answer 6

Catch 22 refers to a book from the 60s about serving in the war. Everytime someone got close to ending their tour of duty , there would be an catch to rule 22 which stated how long you had to stay, so no matter how long you were there, you had to stay longer. Hindsight is 20 20 means that you have a perfect vision of what you should have done after you did it, where as you were not seeing clearly before you did it.

Answer 7

Catch 22 comes from the book of the same name. It describes a situation from which there is no exit, no solution. An actor wants to audition, but he cannot get in without an Equity card. How does he get a card? By getting an Equity job. How does he get an Equity job? By going to to the audition. But he can't get in without an Equity card. Catch 22.

Hindsight is reflecting on things that have already happened. 20-20 is the optical measure for eyes that do not need glasses. So when we look backwards at things that have happened, our eyesight is always perfect. We always know the right thing to have said after the fact, the right thing to have done when the moment has passed - and so on.

Go and read the book - it's a great story about soldiers and war and cynicism and creativity, and it's a lot of fun.

Answer 8

catch 22 : used when talking about making a tough decision... it means that there are cons to both sides... a no-win or lose-lose situation....like the old "no matter what i decide someone'll get hurt" situation. the phrase come form the novel of the same name by Joseph Heller

hindsight is 20-20 : used when talking about what someone "should have done." 20-20 refers to perfect eye sight, and this phrase means that it's always easy to know what decision you or somone else should have made after the fact... when you look back, the answer seems obvious, though it wasn't at the time...
also known as the "hind-sight bias" it is is "the inclination to see past events as being predictable and reasonable to expect, perhaps because they are more available than possible outcomes which did not occur:" (wikipedia)

Answer 9

A catch 22 phrase from the book "Catch 22" by Joseph Heller. The phrase describes a situation where making a choice between two options is dependent on the other choice, making it impossible to do either. "Hindsight is 20/20" is a phrase describing that things are more obvious AFTER they have already happened. Hope this helps.

Answer 10

Catch 22 came from the middle ages, when citizens were only allowed to enter through the main gate after they had caught 22 dung beetles. It was a tough thing to do, and not the most pleasant, but it was the only thing that ensured them entry back home.

Hindsight is 20/20 came from the fact that hippos follow each other to water by keeping their face close to the one in front of them, focussed on the hind quarters. They tend to move in packs, usually around 20 animals, and then they would meet up with another pack at the water's edge, therefore 20/20.