If it is so obvious that everything is going so great in contemporary times, why all these books about it? — WISDOMfromPO-MO
Because the idea that everything is getting worse is so widespread, not because everything is getting worse. — jamalrob
But if it is obvious that everything is great and will only get better, why write long books about it?
Like Berman said, if it's something that is obvious then writing a book about it is like writing an 800+-page book saying that the Pope is Catholic. — WISDOMfromPO-MO
βOne thing only do I know for certain and that is that man's judgments of value follow directly his wishes for happiness-that, accordingly, they are an attempt to support his illusions with arguments. [p.111]β
β Sigmund Freud, Civilization and Its Discontents
Of course it depends on how you define and measure "progress". If "progress" is material developments that make a major difference in daily life, then I think much of what is considered "progress" today is at least a century old. Some of it two centuries old. Steam power and railroads; photography; telegraphy; civil engineering and sanitation -- water and sewer systems; the germ theory; electrical generation, lighting, and motors; telephone; radio; sound recording, internal combustion engines; and steel frame buildings made a great deal of difference, and continue to influence daily life.
Since 1917, the most important material progress event has been the discovery of sulfa drugs and penicillin (and similar antibiotics).
Though ubiquitous, Computers, television, rockets, satellites, cell phones, jets, CT and MRI machines, cassettes, CDs, MP3s, atomic weapons, plastics, and so on make less difference in the experience of daily life than earlier inventions. YouTube, FaceBook and Twitter capture attention in ways that telegraphs didn't, but that doesn't make them significant samples of progress. (Abraham Lincoln liked to hang around the Army's telegraph office near the White House to read the latest dispatches from the field as soon as they arrived.)
If "progress" is defined as cultural innovation, then there is far less to report on. For cultural innovation we have to look over millennia. The major innovation that Stephen Pinker talks about (centralized governmental authority) was implemented maybe 5,000 years ago. Writing is about 5,000 years old. Language is... don't know -- scores of centuries old. Philosophy is what... 3,000 years old. The major religions are at least 2,000 years old (with the exception of johnny-come-late-islam). Agriculture is around 8,000 years old. What have we done lately (in units of centuries or millennia)? Well, there's the printing press -- fairly big deal -- 500+ years ago. Gunpowder--progress or not? Science and technology developed over the last 700 years--things like better plows and better yokes for horses made a big difference.
So in the times that everyone here has been alive, really very little "progress" has occurred. — Bitter Crank
Skeptics might say that such progress as eliminating slavery or equal rights for women were correcting errors that should not have been made in the first place. In any case, any improvements are welcome, even if the specifics are arguable. Though it somehow feels all too precarious... like everything could be lost in a flash, or like the entire culture is in a game of high-stakes poker. — 0 thru 9
This morning's traffic 'copter report... traffic is flowing smoothly, except for the backup at Center Rd and Ninth St. where a fender bender has caused a nuclear holocaust. Should delay things for at least 45 minutes, so please find alternate routes! :oAtomic powered flying cars will still be cars, and the morons driving them will still be morons. — Bitter Crank
Thanks! (Y)All true. — Bitter Crank
Likewise the wheel in the form of carts and chariots... — Bitter Crank
That strikes me as extreme ethnocentrism. — WISDOMfromPO-MO
You're basically asking mankind not to invent things or to find and exploit more resources. — VagabondSpectre
Taking exception with a handful of aspects of modern society isn't really a strong enough argument to convince everyone that "progress" is not progress. — VagabondSpectre
Nobody pretends that agriculture didn't lead to some disease or that European diseases didn't wipe out huge swaths of indigenous peoples; we know what happened and we've learned from it. If you mean to ignore all the beneficial technological and medicinal applications of modern science and focus only on it's failures and the risks, that's fine, but you're going to wind up painting a far from realistic picture of the world. (instead of the purely optimistic western liberal which you denounce, you become the exact opposite: a purely pessimistic Luddite/troglodyte). — VagabondSpectre
Let me explain what I mean:
Imagine that a small island tribe one-day discovers a new kind of fishing technique (nets) that allows them to catch more fish than they can possibly eat. As a result, let's imagine that the population of this island tribe increased by a factor of 20 in only a few generations. Once a tribe of only 300 is now a tribe of 6000, and eventually the local fish population starts to decline due to their increased fishing habits, which then poses a problem to the population that is entirely depends on that food source.
At this point, starvation could cause the island population to decline until they strike a balance with how much fish they catch and how quickly the fish population can replenish itself. That would surely be a bad thing (the starvation), but would it mean that the invention of the net ("progress") was a bad thing from the get go? Many would argue that the many extra living souls on the island are thankful for the net because it was required to bring about their very existence.
Instead of starvation occurring, it could be that the now 6000 strong island is motivated and able to build bigger and better boats which can take them further out to sea for better fishing ("more progress", or as you would put it "progress to deal with the problems caused by previous progress"). It's possible that this tribe then discovers new islands and subsequently populates them over time. Under the right conditions, these tribes could become distinct enough that violent conflict emerges between them in the form of tribal warfare. This war would likely lead to individuals traveling further afield (finding new regions to populate where territory is not contested) and cause many socio-economic developments that spur constant cultural and technological innovation and "progress" where growing powers seek to secure their long-term existence. — VagabondSpectre
New problems will always arise because we're not perfect or all-knowing, and so change can be chaotic. But to suggest that "progress as a whole is a bad thing" because of this is merely to assert "I would rather deal with the current and known problems forever rather than through changing states of affairs try to improve our conditions and risk more/greater/different problems.".
You're basically asking mankind not to invent things or to find and exploit more resources. Your attitude would have the island tribe kept at low and vulnerable population levels, forever living out the same primitive lifestyle. — VagabondSpectre
P.S: I have this sneaking suspicion that everything you say is satirical, including your name. It's a bit of an oxymoron; "wisdom" is supposed to be well tested, but the reactionary attitude that is contemporary post-modernism is a green babe compared to the values of the enlightenment which it seems to reject. Are you serious about your dedication to "post-modernism"? If so, where did you learn about your post-modernist ideas? — VagabondSpectre
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