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Am I the most optimistic guy in the world?
betaboy
Veteran
I believe that a day will come when humanity shall live in a post-racial, hi-tech society, without any borders or nations, gods or masters.
Pessimists often say this is impossible, and they point to history - wars, brutality, etc. But I see great improvements even in those 'bad' things. For instance, people were punished in the past, they are being punished still. But the nature of punishment has changed - nobody is crucified or burned alive, no sadistic torture. Isn't that an improvement? Racism is still alive, but at least people aren't getting lynched after a two-minute trial. Wage slavery exists, but it is better than the slavery of old times where people were treated like animals/property.
Point is, we see a steady improvement despite the bad things that happen every so often. And if this improvement is sustained, is it all that unreasonable to conclude that, eventually, humanity will live in some sort of techno-paradise?
This is my view, and people say I am being overly optimistic. What do you think?
Pessimists often say this is impossible, and they point to history - wars, brutality, etc. But I see great improvements even in those 'bad' things. For instance, people were punished in the past, they are being punished still. But the nature of punishment has changed - nobody is crucified or burned alive, no sadistic torture. Isn't that an improvement? Racism is still alive, but at least people aren't getting lynched after a two-minute trial. Wage slavery exists, but it is better than the slavery of old times where people were treated like animals/property.
Point is, we see a steady improvement despite the bad things that happen every so often. And if this improvement is sustained, is it all that unreasonable to conclude that, eventually, humanity will live in some sort of techno-paradise?
This is my view, and people say I am being overly optimistic. What do you think?
0
Comments
or maybe we will just turn into the people of the "neutral" planet from futurama lol
It's why hospitals get built and nobody complains too much. Humanity is only as bad as we make it but more of us wake up to this every day.
In all honesty I do see it happening. I think we are going to see through greed with the help of science and begin to work together for the common good.
I don't know if we will have extra-terrestrial intervention like on Star Trek but I do think those replicators are going to revolutionize life as we know it. Eventually, if we keep on playing with the particles within a vacuum, we're bound to be able to manipulate them.
You are not alone... I can see a global awakening of sorts on the horizon. I doubt I will live to see it happen but things happen fast so who knows?
Did you really write that? I ask because from some of your other threads I wouldn't have guessed you would be pinned as an optimist. Have you had some kind of realisation?
I don't mean to sound rude so excuse me please if that question is off-putting.
Otherwise, optimism or pessimism both are speculations of future events and in that sense seem as sides of the same coin.
But I'm not blind to the looming environmental crisis that global warming (driven by corporate greed) presents, nor to the tremendous suffering caused by human trafficking and sex slavery, to name but two major stumbling blocks facing humanity.
I think we need to be mindful of both sides, and rejoice in the positive, and bring compassionate action to bear on the negative.
Uproot these and maybe we will arrive at your Utopia.
Pessimism just brings me down!
There were 2 friends....
One an Optimist the other a
Pessimist, and they could never quite agree on any topic of discussion.
One day the Optimist decided he had found a good way to pull his friend out of his continual Pessimistic thinking. The Optimist owned a hunting dog that could walk on water. His plan? Take the Pessimist and the dog out duck hunting in a boat. They got out into the middle of the lake, & the Optimist brought down a duck. The dog immediately walked out across the water, retrieved the duck & walked back to the boat. The Optimist looked at his Pessimistic friend & said, 'What do you think about that?' The Pessimist replied, 'Didn't I say before...That dog can't swim, can he?'
"Do you think you have had more good or bad things happen to you in your life?"
Good = optimist
Bad = pessimist
I'm definitely an optimist!!! My life is pretty bloody great.....
http://www.ted.com/talks/steven_pinker_on_the_myth_of_violence.html
Also HHDL regularly makes this same point about how in spite of the difficulties we face, there are a great many ways that we have improved our relations.
I am optimistic that optimism is always possible.
Oil shortage and water shortage and overpopulation will result in conflict
and significant changes.
call me a pessimist if you like, but i dont see any serious efforts to avoid these crisis.
Global Water Shortage Pt.1 / BBC World News America
If it was hopeless we would sink into despair.
As it is human existence is in the Goldilocks zone..
Its just right."
Luang Por Sumedho.
I just had an epiphany the other day is all. Ignore me.
As for a water shortage, people have been converting ocean water to drinking water for a long time and many places are looking into conversion plants for cities.
I think doom and gloom prophecies are actually pretty irresponsible.
Has there ever been a time in man's history when doom and gloom prophecies didn't exist?
Even if our technology grows in capacity to such a point that we 'defeat' death, old age and sickness, we will never NOT have the unsatisfactoriness of form. Unless our technology enables a post-physical state, where typical human evil cannot manifest (yeah I have read a little too much science fiction) and we achieve Awakening by chopping off our physicality and letting loose the mind . . . we'll still suffer.
We suffer today in ways that would never make sense to an 18th century farmer in Russia. We suffer when the internet goes out. We suffer because he HATE to make midnight trips to the creepy gas station because there's no milk for tomorrow. We suffer a day or so of feeling BLAH after a flu shot, instead of just dying from flu, but it's enough for many people I know to staunchly refuse to get a flu shot.
Eh, I welcome greater and greater technology, with the hope humanity can keep up with it developmentally. We'll just suffer in ways we right now can't understand or imagine. Right now we live in an extraordinary time of huge techno progress over the course of a decade, so we have perspective of the improvement/annoyance of things like cell phones and the World Wide Web.
Gassho
The must recent example was the financial meltdown of 2008 and the subprime crisis in USA.
Past performance are good indicators of what will happen .
How many of your friends are using green energy ?
Amongst my friends and their friends, none,
Not a single one.
As for using water , my neighbour will spray water on his driveway and surrounding areas when the weather is hot. He is not the only one.
When I ask him, isn’t he wasting precious resource. The reply I got was ‘mind your own business, I pay my water bill, not you.’
Not everyone got burned in the financial meltdown. And of those who did, many have got their money back in spades.
Others, like myself, had no money in the market and didn't lose anything, except equity in property which is always a risk of property ownership.
Many people did lose jobs that they may never get back it's true. And homes were lost by responsible homeowners.
To understand the whole situation takes an open mind and a willingness to look closely.
The same applies to resources.
Water for example, isn't going anywhere. Local sources can be ruined by fracking, or pollution, or using up the aquifer.
Where I live good water is as easy to get as digging a hole 12 ft deep. A few miles down the road they depend on a dammed creek, and have continual problems in the summer with usage restrictions. And we live in the wettest part of the country.
I don't know what the situation is in your neighbourhood, but it may very well be that it only comes down to money to pay for water service, and there is no shortage.
So your neigbour may have every right to use as much as he can afford to pay for.
The same may not apply to fuel. People who can afford to burn more, really are doing it at the expense of the rest of us.