Since this is the "Devates" forum and nit the US politics Forum let us take a look to a general Question:
Did humankind progress?
Some might know the famous thought in the Hitchhiker's guide to the Galaxy I am paraphrasing here: "Chimpanzees thought that climbing form the trees was an error. While some fish considered going to land the ultimate mistake."
So indeed I think that humankind has a lot to show for the last few millenia. We developped math (though Terry Pratchett thought in "pyramids" that camels are the better mathematicians), physics, chemistry, biology, medicine,..
So the lifespan increased because there is less hunger and better medicine than a few decades ago.
Eductaion increased? We have much more factual knowledge than our ancestors, but what are we doing with that (as society and comon individuals, not as the few )?
Crime rates have decreased in the last few centuries. But did we as societies increase moral value?
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@Ponderable saidGood thread topic, Pondy.
Since this is the "Devates" forum and nit the US politics Forum let us take a look to a general Question:
Did humankind progress?
Some might know the famous thought in the Hitchhiker's guide to the Galaxy I am paraphrasing here: "Chimpanzees thought that climbing form the trees was an error. While some fish considered going to land the ultimate mistake."
So indeed ...[text shortened]...
Crime rates have decreased in the last few centuries. But did we as societies increase moral value?
The question admits of a simple answer, but not an unambiguous one: jein (German for yes-and-no).
In some respects humanity has made progress, in others not. For example, our knowledge of the material world has enabled us to improve medical care and nutrition vastly beyond that of our predecessors. We can detect, prevent, and heal diseases, and 'fix' injuries, which would have killed or maimed our ancestors; we can feed billions of people, whereas all previous millennia knew wide-spread hunger as the default. But, and it is a huge 'but': the benefits of this improvement in empirical knowledge and technique are very unevenly distributed. Moral, social, and political arrangements have not kept pace with technical ones: although we have the capacity to feed everyone on the planet, we don't, there are still millions of children dying every year of starvation and diseases directly attributable to undernourishment. We know how to fix this, and we have the technical means to fix this, yet we do not. Why do we not? Because some among us are under-evolved and can't stand the idea of giving something for free to people less fortunate than themselves ('freeloaders' ). I don't know the exact numbers, but something like the 10,000 richest people in the world control more wealth than all the African nations combined. Or something like that anyway. Something has gone seriously awry when individuals can amass literally unlimited wealth, most of it just imaginary digits in futures-stock options in a computer somewhere, while Sudan descends into an avoidable famine.
As MLK Jr. said, "we have guided missiles and misguided politicians."
@Ponderable saidThis is a 'Purpose of Life' kind of question. One can Believe Life and therefore Human Life has a Purpose, but nothing has been logically proven yet - some think it is unlikely science ever will be able to prove such a thing.
Did humankind progress?
So it depends on what you Believe 'Progress' looks like.
I'll just note that whatever you believe Human Progress is, it is unlikely that humanity has been 'trying' to do exactly that.
@Ponderable saidThere's a saying that you can judge how much progress has been made by any given society trivialness of the "problems" that are discussed at the time.
Since this is the "Devates" forum and nit the US politics Forum let us take a look to a general Question:
Did humankind progress?
Some might know the famous thought in the Hitchhiker's guide to the Galaxy I am paraphrasing here: "Chimpanzees thought that climbing form the trees was an error. While some fish considered going to land the ultimate mistake."
So indeed ...[text shortened]...
Crime rates have decreased in the last few centuries. But did we as societies increase moral value?
In years past, our society's problems focused on survival issues like finding food, water, shelter. We've solved most of those problems and around the 17th century we worked on the problems of making REASON be the primary basis for our decisions rather than basic instinct and mythology. We called this era the "enlightenment".
These days though what are the "problems" of the day? Complaining that you don't have as much money as someone else who worked much harder than you did...complaining you don't see "enough" people on TV that look like you...complaining someone said something you don't agree with.
So, i guess by that measure our society has progressed pretty far!
@spruce112358 saidThat humans want their life to have a purpse is an experimental fact.
This is a 'Purpose of Life' kind of question. One can Believe Life and therefore Human Life has a Purpose, but nothing has been logically proven yet - some think it is unlikely science ever will be able to prove such a thing.
So it depends on what you Believe 'Progress' looks like.
I'll just note that whatever you believe Human Progress is, it is unlikely that humanity has been 'trying' to do exactly that.
What do you want to prove?
Question in accordance with the op: I s a higher percentage of people happier now than have been in previous centuries/millenia?
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@Ponderable
Trump is actively working on the education part, if he wins, he will kill the department of education and banned books will be up by ten times the already disgusting level it is in right now. Some school libraries in Florida have almost no books left in their library because of the 'auditors' disguised as humans.
But we do have clearly longer average life spans, I think the count of 100 Year old's in the US surpasses 10,000 now.
My mom lived to be 100, president Carter did and my grandma and great grandpa did also.
@Ponderable saidSubjectively, everyone's life can have a different purpose - like having kids; or collecting great memories; like building a great model railroad; or writing an emmy-winning screenplay. Subjective purpose doesn't need anything other than belief to be true.
That humans want their life to have a purpse is an experimental fact.
What do you want to prove?
Question in accordance with the op: I s a higher percentage of people happier now than have been in previous centuries/millenia?
I was referring to an Objective purpose to Life itself. I don't think we will ever find that.
Re: Progress. Yes, we need to define a measure of what Progress is to determine if Progress is increasing over the centuries.
The problem with using happiness as the measure of progress is that it is, itself, very subjective. A millionaire with a yacht and a mansion might be chronically unhappy while a drug addict professes to being happy whenever he can get high - which might be most of the time.
Also, when in life are we talking about? Many people are happy in their 20's, not so happy in their 40's, and then generally speaking happy again in their later 50's.
But let's avoid that problem and just do a prevalence across all of humanity: "Are you happy TODAY at noon, local time? Yes or no?"
Let's say we collect data once a year, ever year, for 50 years...
2024: 50% happy
2025: 49%
2026: 56%
2027: 47%
...
2074: 58%
This might establish a baseline. But understanding all the factors that affect "Percent of Total Population Happiness" might be daunting. Let alone how to influence it, drive it higher and "make progress." Still, it would be data, so it could be useful.
@sonhouse saidSo congratulations on the longevity part.
@Ponderable
Trump is actively working on the education part, if he wins, he will kill the department of education and banned books will be up by ten times the already disgusting level it is in right now. Some school libraries in Florida have almost no books left in their library because of the 'auditors' disguised as humans.
But we do have clearly longer average life sp ...[text shortened]... 0,000 now.
My mom lived to be 100, president Carter did and my grandma and great grandpa did also.
My grandma's became quite old also (>90) sadly however one was in dementia fo her last years.
So we could discuss if longevity is a success in itself.