On 8 December 2014 at 01:30, Bruno Marchal <marc...@ulb.ac.be> wrote:
> > On 06 Dec 2014, at 10:37, LizR wrote: > > That's a curious question. The ruins and record indicate that there was no > ancient civilisation that had anything like the knowledge or resources of > modern day technology. For example, no ancient civilisation discovered the > use of fossil fuels or nuclear power. One could argue that these things > aren't in fact good for modern civilisation, but since we don't know how > things will work out that would be presumptuous. > > For the nuclear resources, I follow you. For the use of petrol (dead > plants), arguments (in favor of Hemp, 'course) already mentioned that it > was not sustainable, and that it would disrupt life equilibrium in the > middle run (a point made already by Henry Ford). > My point is that using fossil fuels MAY have bridged the gap from preindustrial society to a sustainable postindustrial one - we don't know yet. > > The fact is, all but the poorest people in the Western world has things > that would have been unimaginable to the richest people of the ancient > world. I would say that this does make our civilisation superior in > important ways; > > It makes us more competent, but plausibly less intelligent. > Yes, I agree that is at least possible. > > > > I would certain prefer to be alive now than even 100 years ago. > > May be. May be not. It is very hard to evaluate. There are no absolute > point of comparison. People from that period might get very depressed if > living in our urban cities for a while. > Yes, I have to admit I was thinking *I* would prefer it - but *I* know about life now. As someone said in a TV show once (I forget which) in which someone from the past visited the present - "So what did they bring back from the Moon? Some rocks? That doesn't sound very interesting...:" > > > > Indeed 100 years ago the routine gall bladder surgery I had a couple of > years ago would have probably killed me (always assuming I'd survived > childhood illnesses, childbirth and so on). > > > We are better for the survival, but we might be astonished for the quality > of life, even of the poors. It is very hard to judge. We have much more > depression and suicides, we have much more elderly people abandoned by > their family. We have much more fake conviviality and superficial > happiness. We have new fears and new subject of despair (like atomic bombs, > pollution, prohibition, ...). I just mean that I am not completely > persuaded that the technological progresses made us more happy. The 20th > century has also been a peak of inhumanity, notably through genocide, very > cruel wars, including the cold one, rise of unemployment, etc. So I am not > sure, I dunno, may be we can't really answer this. > > I find myself agreeing with you. I was trying to counteract the idea of a "golden age" - that the past was much better than the present. (Certainly I might well have died horribly in various ways in the past before reaching my present age, but even so... to automatically extrapolate from what I said to "we are therefore happier now" would be wrong. > > -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
