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Life was dirty, difficult, and dangerous for almost everyone who ever existed

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Re: Life was dirty, difficult, and dangerous for almost everyone who ever existed

#21

Post by DaoVeles »

mathieuh wrote: post #9

So what, we should just sit back and not try to improve things? I’ve never understood this perspective. It just seems like a way to try for people who have done well in the current system to justify to themselves the fact that in reality people in wealthy countries do still struggle with poverty. There are millions of people living hand-to-mouth. Not to mention the fact that the reason wealthy countries have got to t…

Exactly. My (mild) fear it that we ignore those kinds of issues and they blow back on us to start doing real harm to the overall system. To ignore the externalities like running up a credit card.

As to the second point, this is what empires do. They pump wealth away for their own gain until they are almost completely drained. And there still many countries that are empires in everything but name.

Re: Life was dirty, difficult, and dangerous for almost everyone who ever existed

#22

Post by downvotetruth »

gazook89 wrote: post #4
qarl wrote: post #3

And it would be extremely naive to think that people 100 years from now won't think our lives were dirty, difficult, and dangerous too.

On the other hand, this may be the cleanest we will ever be

On the contrary, our civilization has never before had to deal with so much shit.

Re: Life was dirty, difficult, and dangerous for almost everyone who ever existed

#24

Post by tempestn »

mathieuh wrote: post #9

So what, we should just sit back and not try to improve things? I’ve never understood this perspective. It just seems like a way to try for people who have done well in the current system to justify to themselves the fact that in reality people in wealthy countries do still struggle with poverty. There are millions of people living hand-to-mouth. Not to mention the fact that the reason wealthy countries have got to t…

No, the opposite. We should appreciate all the marvels that progress has brought us, and use that as motivation to bring about more. That was the conclusion of the piece, and I agree. Progress has gained a negative connotation to many people in recent times, and I take it that the author is pushing back against that sentiment.

Re: Life was dirty, difficult, and dangerous for almost everyone who ever existed

#25

Post by tempestn »

qarl wrote: post #20
Jcowell wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> But my point is, essays like these assume we are peak humanity. Do they? the might assume we’re peak humanity right now but they don’t make the claim that we’re are the peak there ever will be

Seems like his argument is about now . The truth is that every now has been the peak so far, so his words apply to all points in time. It seems to me he's missing that. Does it sound like he's urging people 2000 years ago to appreciate how clean their lives are? No?

This is the conclusion of the article:

> This world and the standard of living we enjoy are the gift they left us. We can never pay it back. But we can pay it forward: we can keep progress going, and build an even better world for the generations to come.

Re: Life was dirty, difficult, and dangerous for almost everyone who ever existed

#26

Post by DaoVeles »

tonygrue wrote: post #12
mathieuh wrote: post #9

So what, we should just sit back and not try to improve things? I’ve never understood this perspective. It just seems like a way to try for people who have done well in the current system to justify to themselves the fact that in reality people in wealthy countries do still struggle with poverty. There are millions of people living hand-to-mouth. Not to mention the fact that the reason wealthy countries have got to t…

For me the point of thinking like this is to remain centered and not freak out. I see some people who feel like ‘everything is going downhill and this is the worse time ever’ and that’s just not very grounded. The benefit is that you can be optimistic that the hard work we’re putting in, more likely than not, might continue the progress. Even if there are blips along the way.

I was just talking about this today. There was a political comedy TV show here in Oz 'Shaun Micallefs : Mad as Hell'.

I cannot remember the details exactly but the general idea was something like this.

There was a dinner party with all these people talking about how bad they have things. One was complaining about how they had poor service at a restaurant. The next talked about the pain of the Covid lockdowns. The next spoke of rationing in the war time of the 1940's. The last one was a 10th century peasant that goes on about how "the skies turned dark and winter came and it never left. All the crops died and then the people. And then came the plagues..."

It was done as a way of saying, yes, we have issues but put into context, we are still doing fairly well.

Re: Life was dirty, difficult, and dangerous for almost everyone who ever existed

#27

Post by shizcakes »

mathieuh wrote: post #9

So what, we should just sit back and not try to improve things? I’ve never understood this perspective. It just seems like a way to try for people who have done well in the current system to justify to themselves the fact that in reality people in wealthy countries do still struggle with poverty. There are millions of people living hand-to-mouth. Not to mention the fact that the reason wealthy countries have got to t…

The essay ends

> But we can pay it forward: we can keep progress going, and build an even better world for the generations to come.

Re: Life was dirty, difficult, and dangerous for almost everyone who ever existed

#28

Post by qarl »

tempestn wrote: post #25
qarl wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Seems like his argument is about now . The truth is that every now has been the peak so far, so his words apply to all points in time. It seems to me he's missing that. Does it sound like he's urging people 2000 years ago to appreciate how clean their lives are? No?

This is the conclusion of the article: > This world and the standard of living we enjoy are the gift they left us. We can never pay it back. But we can pay it forward: we can keep progress going, and build an even better world for the generations to come.

I guess I'm put off by how horrible he repeatedly describes the past, seemingly ignoring that those people of the past had it extremely well compared to the people of their past.

And how people of the future will look at us with that same horror.

Re: Life was dirty, difficult, and dangerous for almost everyone who ever existed

#29

Post by DaoVeles »

qarl wrote: post #3

And it would be extremely naive to think that people 100 years from now won't think our lives were dirty, difficult, and dangerous too.

Why would they think that? Please ignore all the microplastics, ecological destruction and wildly altered climate due tot dumping 2 trillion tons of carbon in the atmosphere.

Re: Life was dirty, difficult, and dangerous for almost everyone who ever existed

#30

Post by DaoVeles »

atleastoptimal wrote: post #18
jellicle wrote: post #10

When you're an empire being supported on the labor of a couple billion people in other parts of the world, yes, life for you and yours can be pretty okay. Not as okay for the imperial periphery, the sacrifice zones, but they don't really count. > You can amass a closet full of outfits, in a variety of styles and colors, with no knowledge of the spinning machines, the dyeing vats, the automatic looms, the sewing machi…

Industrial revolution and automation still makes amenities far more accessible for all. The material conditions of the average factory worker in Thailand is still miles ahead of the condition of someone of that percentile of the worldwide socioeconomic strata in any other period of history.

Its complicated. If you are on the very lowest rung of the industrial structure, you are probably in worst conditions that working on the family farm with the local village. Things will look better monetarily, but the overall life quality will be diminished.

There would be a point that as your wealth grows it does get better but that is depended on there being others to fill the lower rung to support that.

You aren't wrong but there is also additional nuance. Clothes for everyone on the planet is just so simple nowadays due to massive excess for instance.

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