Has the World Improved?

[semlogo]

Semlogo, I understand your argument, you make a convincing point. However, it reflects an incorrect view of the world's progression as constant, forward and upward, from day 1 until today. Do you realise how simplistic that is?

Have you never studied the rise and fall of nations? The quotes you give are great, thanks for sharing, but do they not give us indications of behavioural "markers" heralding the moral decay of that specific civilisation?

Would you say that, for the inhabitants of Sodom and Gomorrah, the "world" was a better place the day previous to its destruction than 50 years earlier?

What about the world just previous to the flood? Had it been continuously improving in a linear fashion since the fall of Adam?

Assuming you accept the cyclic nature of the moral state of entire civilisations, are you still willing to hold onto your assertion that, today, the world is a better place than any other time in its history, in every possible regard?

Please also respond to my rebuttals in my earlier post.

I would never assert that there haven't been any steps backwards, but the direction of movement, on the whole, had been to go forwards.

It has been asserted that moral decay was responsible for the collapse of the Roman Empire, for example, but I think that's a case of correlation being confused with causation. I don't pretend to be an expert on the subject, but I think you can see throughout history that empires of any sort are simply very difficult to sustain from a political and military standpoint, regardless of individual morality.

I'm not convinced that Sodom and Gomorrah is much more than a fable. I am convinced that the flood story and creation stories are allegorical, perhaps based on more mundane real stories.

Could you expand upon the "cyclic nature of the moral state of entire civilizations"? Where are you getting that and what do you mean by it?

In response to your other post, I don't know that we have any data regarding the rate of adultery and fornication in the population over time. Obesity is a problem of wealthy nations. It's a problem, but preferable to starvation.

[nicolasconnault]

Yes, I do realize that I am on a religious board (though I'm not religious). If all you want to hear is a cacophony of agreement in this echo-chamber of religous self-gratitude, then why come to a discussion board? You can get that at church each Sunday. I thought that this board was an instrument for discussion, debate and critical thought.....seems you prefer one in which everyone just tows the party line and nods with one another in agreement.

You seem to equate "happiness" with a single-minded, Christian morality, one in which "goodness" can only be achieved through the narrow confines of Christian acceptance.

Yes, the world still has evil and corruption, as it has for centuries, and as it will for centuries to come. Is it more evil than centuries past? My argument is that it is not.

You flippantly discard the educational, technological, medical, political and social advances that we have achieved in the past century alone in order to push your agenda that the world is in peril because of the growing disenchantment with "Christian morality." Forget the billions of people who have prospered from these advances, but gays just got rights to get married in another state, so the world is coming to an end.....that's your argument? Please.

Christian morality, not the world, is what is coming to an end. You can continue to run around telling everyone how the sky is falling, but the rest of the world will continue to move forward to usher in even greater advances over the next centuries, by which time Christianity will be a thing of the past.

You adroitly and dexterously side-step the argument, congratulations. I have to assume from this that you actually support the fallacious reasoning I described in my post. Your rhetoric still fails to convince or impress me.

[nicolasconnault]

I would never assert that there haven't been any steps backwards, but the direction of movement, on the whole, had been to go forwards.

I maintain that you don't have enough data to make such a judgment.

It has been asserted that moral decay was responsible for the collapse of the Roman Empire, for example, but I think that's a case of correlation being confused with causation. I don't pretend to be an expert on the subject, but I think you can see throughout history that empires of any sort are simply very difficult to sustain from a political and military standpoint, regardless of individual morality.

That's a matter of opinion, and mine differs from yours. I am convinced that the loss of morality and virtue, or the failure to obey God's commandments, has caused and will yet cause the destruction of entire nations.

I'm not convinced that Sodom and Gomorrah is much more than a fable. I am convinced that the flood story and creation stories are allegorical, perhaps based on more mundane real stories.

Even if these are fables, I used them to illustrate a point that progress isn't linear and continuous. I think you agree with that, even though you are very attached to the idea that "the direction of movement, on the whole, had been to go forwards".

Could you expand upon the "cyclic nature of the moral state of entire civilizations"? Where are you getting that and what do you mean by it?

I am referring to the cycle of pride illustrated in the Old testament and the Book of Mormon. I can expand further if you are not familiar with the concept, but there are many resources online on the subject.

In response to your other post, I don't know that we have any data regarding the rate of adultery and fornication in the population over time. Obesity is a problem of wealthy nations. It's a problem, but preferable to starvation.

It would be difficult to obtain rates of adultery and fornication in a society that no longer considers them to be crimes, let alone sins. In fact many consider them to be "good", indicators of a society that has freed itself from the shackles of Christian morality. Psychologists frequently prescribe depressed patients with a treatment of one-night-stands, for example. I consider that an example of the world not becoming so good as you would like it to be.

[Walden]

You adroitly and dexterously side-step the argument, congratulations. I have to assume from this that you actually support the fallacious reasoning I described in my post. Your rhetoric still fails to convince or impress me.

I'm not sure what you are congratulating; I have not side-stepped any argument. The original argument is whether or not the world has improved.

I have shown that from a social, political, economic, educational, medical and human rights standpoint, the world has most definitely improved.

You have argued that because of the decay in Christian morality, the world has not improved. While I agreed with your assessment that Christian morality is in decline, I argue that it does not mean the world is in decline, just Christianity.

Not sure what is so difficult to understand here.

And no, your arguments that some boogey man in the sky is going to come down and unleash wrath on all us sinners is speculative and fanciful, and not based in fact.

[semlogo]

I maintain that you don't have enough data to make such a judgment.

Any data that we CAN track tells us things are getting better.

That's a matter of opinion, and mine differs from yours. I am convinced that the loss of morality and virtue, or the failure to obey God's commandments, has caused and will yet cause the destruction of entire nations.

How would you go about demonstrating such a thing? China's morality, after all, is not superior to Rome's, and they've lasted for many thousands of years.

Even if these are fables, I used them to illustrate a point that progress isn't linear and continuous. I think you agree with that, even though you are very attached to the idea that "the direction of movement, on the whole, had been to go forwards".

If they're fables they don't really tell us anything about the morality of the entire world.

I am referring to the cycle of pride illustrated in the Old testament and the Book of Mormon. I can expand further if you are not familiar with the concept, but there are many resources online on the subject.

I'm aware of the concept in the BOM, though I confess to being ignorant of it in the OT. Can you find examples of this outside those two nations?

It would be difficult to obtain rates of adultery and fornication in a society that no longer considers them to be crimes, let alone sins. In fact many consider them to be "good", indicators of a society that has freed itself from the shackles of Christian morality. Psychologists frequently prescribe depressed patients with a treatment of one-night-stands, for example. I consider that an example of the world not becoming so good as you would like it to be.

Even when they were crimes, I contend it would be impossible to get any sort of data on them. People have been doing that sort of thing in the dark ever since humanity began.

[Questing Beast]

Hopefully this doesn't break a cross-posting thread, but the Mormon Transhumanist Association* has an interesting thread that might pose interest to some here:

Has the world improved?

Basically, several posters point to quite a bit of evidence suggesting general improvement in the world and not decay. What say you?

* Disclaimer: I'm loosely associated with the group. In generalities I can find several points of agreement, but in specifics, especially with respect to doctrinal interpretations, I find significant variance.

Absolutely the world has improved steadily in the last couple hundred years. Even before that the groundwork was laid for this improvement beginning with the "enlightenment", which was in full career when the LDS faith was started. But religionists cannot accept this and believe in a looming apocalypse and "compete separation of the righteous and the wicked", with the latter far outnumbering the former group of people.

I weary every Sunday, to hear the assertion that "the world sure is a terrible and wicked place, getting worse and worse every day", etc. I disbelieve this as much as anything "taught" in the Church that I cannot believe; and there is a lot of that. Religion requires modernizing, imho. What is taught is not very applicable today, vis-a-vis prophesy of doom and gloom and "last days" exegesis. I have believed for many years, that the primitive Church's teachings of the coming apocalypse and Second Coming of Christ were understood to be imminent c. 2K years ago. Throughout the medieval period millenarian anarchists expected the end of the world at any moment and lived accordingly. Time and again "prophetae" have arisen with the timing all figured out; only to have the time come and go without a flicker of acknowledgment from the heavens (unless it is an amused sigh that the "noise" in the dark energy is making). Fewer people in modern times actually believe that a literal Second Coming will occur along with the so-called apocalypse. But enough do believe it, especially in the LDS faith, to make it a commonplace staple for Sunday lessons, over and over ad nauseam....

[Questing Beast]

It's the best of times and the worst of times, depending on what we are talking about. Certainly our standard of living has improved, and with the internet we have access to things we never dreamed of even in my lifetime. But at the same time it opens up doors to things that can be very destructive to individuals and families (ie, pornography). Has the world improved? Some countries are still in the dark ages so as a whole no.

The number of places that "are still in the dark ages" have diminished considerably in the last century. They are almost like "holdouts" of backwardness, often religiously based (i.e. Islamist thinking predominates here).

So to assert that "as a whole no", i.e. the world has not improved, is denying evidence everywhere. You mention the Internet: this alone provides any of us with a much clearer and holistic view of the world and the conditions of its denizens: and everywhere improvements are being made. Even in those regions where "the dark ages" yet hold sway, the battle against the continuing "dark ages" is going on and is increasing. And light and truth will win. To assert instead that most people are wicked and will be destroyed is the worst kind of denial and negativity. It is anti-faith and promoting darkness and the worst form of "us and them" attitude.

That is my main beef with dogmatic, organized religion, BTW: the promotion and defense of an "us and them" perspective....

[Questing Beast]

People who have lived through most of the last century are better placed to tell us what the world was like back then. I have spoken to many, and almost unanimously they say that, though it had many problems which are being resolved today (e.g. in science), there is a definite moral decay. Each general conference our prophets and apostles repeat over and over that the moral fabric of society is falling apart. Those who disagree are well described in 2 Nephi 28:20-23.

Trying to use a single scale to measure the world's state is foolish, simplistic and useless. One might as well say: "The universe is better today than it was yesterday". You just don't know.

Isn't it you that is using "a single scale to measure the world's state"? Repeating twice a year how bad the world is getting from the perspective of Salt Lake City is hardly applying comprehensive evidence! It is repeating the same tired prophecies of doom from a Bronze Age book and its descendants. You study the OT and it becomes manifestly clear that the prophecies were ONLY about Jews surrounded by more powerful enemies: there is no "last days" dual fulfillment about any of it: that's just apologetics to keep the old scripture viable in an age where it has become largely irrelevant.

One consistent feature of the "older generation" is that the younger generation is always going to wrack and ruin. So change cannot be held to be de facto bad just because the older generation compares the new ways with the old ways they think are "the" right ways.

If justice is improving; if material abundance is reaching more people; if education is too; if people that you meet every day seem to be on the whole good; if the worst in the world reaches you 99.9% of the time via the Media and not through empirical experience: then I say that to continue to deny improvement is to be delusional....

[SilverKnight]

Certainly technology, medicine, life expectancy, information, quality of life, have all improved, and will likely continue to improve, as time goes on.

So is the world is getting "worse"?

Who knows how to even measure such a thing.

But here is my anecdotal evidence that American Society at least is indeed on a downward trajectory in certain areas.

Here are the aspects of society that I perceive have gotten "worse":

- The pornification of America.

- More drug addiction and related problems than ever before.

- Meth as a particularly insidious new drug epidemic.

- Teens becoming sexually active at progressively younger ages.

- Fathers absent from families.

- Higher rates of divorce.

- More children raised in broken homes.

- The objectification of young women as sexual objects.

- Less importance placed on education.

- Less parental involvement in childrens' lives.

- Less moral instruction for children.

- Youth becoming more disrespecful, dishonest and dishonorable.

- Less compassion, charity and unselfish service.

- People in general being more selfish, immoral, lazy and cowardly.

This is just a short list, rattled off the top of my head. If I thought further I imagine I could fill pages with similar ways the society I live in is becoming "worse"

I also expect that every claim I just made is probably backed up by real studies and data.

The stark fact is the society my children are going to grow up in is, in many ways, more perilous than the one I grew up in - despite advances in other areas.

[Questing Beast]

Why am I getting the increasingly clear picture that the majority of posters here are actually commenting on "Has the USA improved?".

Besides, the "really big sins" include adultery and fornication, do they not? Do you think these are becoming "much less"?

I have read this thread up to this point and I don't get that from the posters who advocate the view that the world has greatly improved. What part of "the WORLD is better than it has ever been" are you having trouble with?

As for sexual sins being "the really big" ones, hardly. Sex is the whipping boy of religious control. It is made out to be this great forbidden thing; thus driving young and old to seek after what is forbidden even more; thus giving the religionists MORE "work" to do. It is a self-perpetuating system. And it's obvious why sex is the tool - it is as common as sunlight, water, air and dirt.

One of the ways that THIS country has improved, is to become less obsessed with sex as some kind of forbidden and heavily controlled thing. In my generation many kids went to the other extreme showing their independence: the 60's would have resulted in complete destruction of the nation if sex (and drugs, alcohol, etc.) were the grand evils as portrayed in religious preaching. But instead, MOST hippies (wannabes, anyway) threw away their tie-dyed shirts and torn jeans, cut their hair, went back to school and got married and had kids. The Baby Boomers grew up. Oh the shock! The end of days did not happen. I doubt that ever at any other time did General Conference addresses moan more about the decaying condition of the world all around us: quoting scripture taken to be describing the "last days", etc. Yet it all went away, life continued and people remained normal in spite of their hedonistic youthful unwisdom. The natural consequences were (and are being) paid: broken health, marred offspring, broken marriages increasing. Yet through it all, we arrive at a point where MOST people are angry with the graft, corruption and dishonesty in our Gov't; most kids are in school and intent on making something of their lives. Most are not immoral, either sexually or ethically. MOST people are GOOD. There have been experiments done on this on TV: where someone will pretend to drop a couple of paper dollars by accident, to see what the people near them will do: and overwhelmingly someone will pick the money up and give it back. Sure, ONLY in America, huh?...

Let's also talk about behaviour, shall we not? Is the obesity epidemic an improvement over any previous age in recorded history? What about the related diabetes epidemic?

Pick on the non sequiturs, go ahead. Diabetes is caused to increase through obesity; so when you get rid of one the other will also go away. The sole reason why obesity exists in the general population is precisely BECAUSE food is plentiful. In earlier ages, only the rich had an excess, and only the rich were obese as a result. So you are saying that an over abundance of food is somehow more evil than subsistence level existence?? Give everyone some time: the obesity problem will diminish through self-imposed discipline. Those that die off will be "out of the gene pool". Simple solution.

Here's another nail in this coffin: how can anyone here possibly know enough about history to know that no previous period of time was "better" than the current one? Is recorded history objective, accurate and complete?

EVIDENCE, the best application of what we DO have, says that there has never been another era when mankind enjoyed a broader prosperity than today. If you want to assert that our ignorance is somehow an excuse for believing that there MIGHT have once-upon-a-time been a "golden age" or prosperity for the whole earth, I can play the same game, and say that our ignorance is evidence enough to believe that this planet is actually an insane asylum where the universe dumps its genetic freaks. Our history shows that "aliens" have probably visited us repeatedly in the past; and I say they were just dropping off the next "inmates".

I have already said this in a similar earlier thread: shouldn't we commenting on how much happier people actually are, instead of discussing how much happier they ought to be considering how the world has so dramatically improved?

And you think that hungry, insecure, down-trodden masses are happier? Were they ever happier? Today we have other concerns that threaten happiness. But on the whole they are both less serious and less numerous than the constant threat of death that people lived under in all other periods and places in history.

I'm not trying to make a point that the world is worse, or that it is better. My point is that, even if it were possible to gauge the overall state of the world using a single-dimension scale (which it isn't), no one on this planet could possibly have enough information to formulate an accurate comparison of our current world's state with any previous state.

Unless he is a true prophet, of course...

Or unless s/he operates "Snopes" What you say is true of EVERY previous time, but is true no longer. Even an African village of mud huts has its access to the Internet, via the UN or other "Western" do-gooders living there with their computers. Many or most villages have an actual computer or three because of the cast-offs that have been imported into that place. The world is ALL getting hooked up and talking. And by talking they are planning and cooperating. So the Internet IS a single-dimension scale that makes the difference; and as long as it expands to include everyone the world will see itself improve: because the VAST MAJORITY of people are as good as or better than you and me....

[caudicus]

Ideals have become better. Technology has become better. The spectrum of human behavior hasn't changed a bit.

[Questing Beast]

... This is not about doomsday prophecies. This is about attempts to justify self-destructive, immoral behaviour by proclaiming that none of what we are doing is wrong because our world is getting so much better despite our behaviour! Essentially, the ridiculous argument being made here, as subtle as it may be, is this:

1. Technology, science, education opportunities, equality of rights and other such indicators are valid indicators of overall world "goodness"

2. A good world is an indication that we're doing the right thing, overall

3. The world is better today on all the indicators mentioned in #1 than it was 100 years, 200 years, 1,000 years ago

4. Therefore the world, overall, is better today than it was 100 years, 200 years, 1,000 years ago

5. Therefore we're doing "the right thing", overall

6. Therefore our society is not in moral decay and we shouldn't worry about any prophecies regarding our destruction because of our supposed wickedness

You can't divorce the perspective that the world is NOT better today from the so-called doomsday prophecies, especially on an LDS forum! Of course the reason why any TBM would believe that the separation of the righteous from the wicked is an ongoing process is precisely BECAUSE the prophets have said it would happen, and are saying it IS happening. So "doomsday prophecies" remain an integral part of the reason why religious people see the world as getting worse instead of steadily improving.

Less today than some years ago, believers could speculate that WW2 was "Armageddon" to us. It was by far the most destructive episode in our shared history. Yet we have learned a few things from it and moved on. That war, still in living memory, was so horrible that almost no one today even thinks of reaching for their big weapons as any kind of solution. Instead, we have a huge momentum of civil rights recognition sweeping the planet; we want fairness for everyone. That there are still despots, tyrants and wannabe world conquerors in our company is to be expected: human evil will never disappear. But as it is rare even at the worst of times is shown by human progress. And yes, it has been steady, transcending the crash of whole nations in the past. These destructive episodes seem far worse in looking back than they were in reality. As I said, WW2 was the worst. The destruction of entire regions of Germany was total. Yet less than ten years later almost all of it had vanished in the rebuilding that occurred; the Allies funded it and even helped do it. Germany today no more resembles the mindset of their grandfathers than they do the medieval thinking of the Teutonic Knights. That kind of progress belies the prophecies of doomsday.

So you see an increased exposure of the "rot" through the media? Pornography has been a hidden "industry" since forever. That it is available in every home via the Net is the new thing; not the existence of sexuality! Our children learn of things at an earlier age than their ancestors did; or rather kids today learn in a different way. I don't see it rotting away in my society: and Utah is purported to be the highest per capita State for sexual abuse (and prescription drug abuse too, but that's another subject). Yet I don't see it increasing, but rather by being exposed to more awareness it is being arrested.

If there IS one "prophecy" that seems to be fulfilled, it's the one goes something like, "Their sins shall be broadcast from the rooftops". Nothing is hidden anymore. And if you have anything to hide then I expect the natural consequence will be exposure. Even this is an improvement, since it levels everyone to the same scrutiny. And candor was a virtue, last time I went over the list of virtues....

[nicolasconnault]

What is funny is that, though I have been accused of it several times on this thread, I have never at any point proclaimed that the world is getting worse. That invalidates many (though not all) of the responses I have received.

[Questing Beast]

...

- The pornification of America.

- More drug addiction and related problems than ever before.

- Meth as a particularly insidious new drug epidemic.

- Teens becoming sexually active at progressively younger ages.

- Fathers absent from families.

- Higher rates of divorce.

- More children raised in broken homes.

- The objectification of young women as sexual objects.

- Less importance placed on education.

- Less parental involvement in childrens' lives.

- Less moral instruction for children.

- Youth becoming more disrespecful, dishonest and dishonorable.

- Less compassion, charity and unselfish service.

- People in general being more selfish, immoral, lazy and cowardly.

This is just a short list, rattled off the top of my head. If I thought further I imagine I could fill pages with similar ways the society I live in is becoming "worse"

I also expect that every claim I just made is probably backed up by real studies and data.

The stark fact is the society my children are going to grow up in is, in many ways, more perilous than the one I grew up in - despite advances in other areas.

Seems pretty close to being comprehensive as a list of vices to me. I know you couldn't "fill pages" with more.

And your list is like an echo from any philosopher complaining from his era in history about the evils of the world and the waywardness of the rising generation.

From my more than half a century I see: more drug abuse awareness, Meth as just a come-lately problem with addiction which will always be with us, teens just as prone to sexual activity as always, no increase in absent fathers in the last half a generation or more, divorce rates as steady at just over 50% (and that includes all divorces, i.e. first-time marriages holding steady at a c. 75% success rate, with second marriages at c. 50% failure rate, and marrieds more often than that at c. 80% failure rate), fewer children raised in broken homes except Black American ones, the objectification of SEX (period - girls are largely escaping from some special sexual objectification as they continue to become more emancipated), more importance than EVER on education, as much parental involvement in kids' lives as ever, a variety of ways of defining "morality" that are more ecumenical and tolerant instead of ONE dogmatic religious definition (with a greater focus on justice being equal despite the many differences in all of us), youth seemingly better on the whole than they were when I was young, more charity and compassion especially in the USA for the disadvantaged in other countries, more compassion for animals even and not just people, and people leaping in to help those in distress (it happens almost every time there is a disaster), and finally people ARE lazy by nature: we only move as much as we have to, work as hard as we have to and we definitely don't put ourselves into danger if we don't have to; how are we different than our ancestors were?...

[Questing Beast]

What is funny is that, though I have been accused of it several times on this thread, I have never at any point proclaimed that the world is getting worse. That invalidates many (though not all) of the responses I have received.

"What part of "the WORLD is better than it has ever been" are you having trouble with?"

I don't think that I saw anyone saying that you have argued the world is worse or even the same. Some others have asserted that the world IS getting worse. You seem to be arguing that we can't know that it is better....

[nicolasconnault]

"What part of "the WORLD is better than it has ever been" are you having trouble with?"

I don't think that I saw anyone saying that you have argued the world is worse or even the same. Some others have asserted that the world IS getting worse. You seem to be arguing that we can't know that it is better....

I have a problem with measuring the "goodness" of the world, yes. I think it's being used to justify the faulty reasoning I highlighted earlier, to which no one has yet replied. Until someone does, I have to assume that proponents of the "world is better" idea support each of its 6 premises and conclusions.

Questing beast, you have quoted me, but have not addressed whether or not you support this reasoning.

[nicolasconnault]

Let me add here that I agree that the world has greatly improved in many areas. In a way, I would say that the world in general is more hospitable for humans to thrive intellectually, physically and, to a lesser extent, socially (although that particular advantage is rapidly disappearing with the advent of instant, "disconnected" communication). I don't believe it is a much better place for them to thrive spiritually. That is precisely the point that is being scorned and snarled at by many posters here, and they equate spirituality with "Christian morality" that is, apparently thankfully, on its way to extinction. I do not agree with that equation.

[Walden]

Let me add here that I agree that the world has greatly improved in many areas. In a way, I would say that the world in general is more hospitable for humans to thrive intellectually, physically and, to a lesser extent, socially (although that particular advantage is rapidly disappearing with the advent of instant, "disconnected" communication). I don't believe it is a much better place for them to thrive spiritually. That is precisely the point that is being scorned and snarled at by many posters here, and they equate spirituality with "Christian morality" that is, apparently thankfully, on its way to extinction. I do not agree with that equation.

I think that the point that is being disputed is your continued insistence that the great advances in technology, medicine, education, politics and freedom, social justice, communication, etc that have spread throughout the world and directly improved the lives of billions of people somehow pale in comparison to the "spiritual" decline of mankind.

[BookofMormonLuvr]

I think that the point that is being disputed is your continued insistence that the great advances in technology, medicine, education, politics and freedom, social justice, communication, etc that have spread throughout the world and directly improved the lives of billions of people somehow pale in comparison to the "spiritual" decline of mankind.

It does...

Mark 8:36

For what shall it profit a man, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul?

[nicolasconnault]

I think that the point that is being disputed is your continued insistence that the great advances in technology, medicine, education, politics and freedom, social justice, communication, etc that have spread throughout the world and directly improved the lives of billions of people somehow pale in comparison to the "spiritual" decline of mankind.

You are making an inference from my posts that doesn't actually reflect my views. I haven't tried to compare these different "measures" of world goodness, because I don't believe they are comparable. Apples and oranges. You talk about improved quality of life, I talk about decreased righteousness. These are not mutually exclusive, but you and others entirely discount righteousness as one of the indicators of world "goodness", while I do not discount any.

[Walden]

You are making an inference from my posts that doesn't actually reflect my views. I haven't tried to compare these different "measures" of world goodness, because I don't believe they are comparable. Apples and oranges. You talk about improved quality of life, I talk about decreased righteousness. These are not mutually exclusive, but you and others entirely discount righteousness as one of the indicators of world "goodness", while I do not discount any.

I do not discount "righteousness," I just think that the declines in righteousness are vastly outweighed by the very real, very tangible and very beneficial advancements that the world has made in all other areas.

[nicolasconnault]

I do not discount "righteousness," I just think that the declines in righteousness are vastly outweighed by the very real, very tangible and very beneficial advancements that the world has made in all other areas.

I understand your view, and you're completely entitled to it. However, for me, righteousness cannot be weighed on the same scales as other beneficial advancements. The comparison seems spurious to me.

It's like saying "I'm a better person today than I was 10 years ago, because despite being more selfish, greedy, hedonistic and ill-tempered, I'm more educated, wealthy, healthy and free to enjoy my inalienable rights, which latter improvements vastly outweigh the former." I simply don't see how you can compound these things together into one aggregate "goodness" score. Righteousness and quality of life are two separate measures, they cannot be reduced to a single dimension. Because of this, I don't believe it's useful to try to measure the "goodness" of the world.

If you equate "goodness" with quality of life, then I agree that the world is better today than it probably ever has been. But surely you can see that righteousness and happiness should also matter in such a measure.

[Yirgacheffe]

Psychologists frequently prescribe depressed patients with a treatment of one-night-stands, for example.

Do you have references for this?

[nicolasconnault]

Do you have references for this?

No, this kind of "professional behaviour" isn't particularly well documented. I'm speaking from experience and some anecdotal evidence. At least this occurs in Australia, not sure about the rest of the world.

[Jeff K.]

Looking at the history of the world on a very landscape basis. The world hasn't improved the human condition along spiritual or moral lines. It has merely become more efficient in dessiminating information and our ability to do things. Sure we live longer, but for many our lives are just as empty and unfulfilling. We tend to fill the void with video games, television, and other low level gladiatorial pleasures. We value sports heroes above other types, we still worry about what the neighbors think and we obsess about ourselves instead of others. We have not changed from the aerite of the Greeks or gravitas of the Romans, we do not view the world holistically but compartmentally, and we watch TV and think that makes us learned of things in the world.

The more I learn the more mankind and society (both now and in the past) the more it appears cyclical and not necessarily a reflection of the furtherance of mankind in meaningful ways.