Penn Jillette
Because our environment is on the decline. Our oceans are full of plastic, our forests are converted to farmland for cattle, pollution from electronics is rising, and our global climate is changing for the worse.
Even optimistic areas like health care are being confounded by obesity and malnutrition. It’s great that global health care and poverty rates are improving. But in some of our own countries things are getting worse. There’s a growing income inequality and an obesity epidemic. My generation may be the first in a while to have a lower life expectancy than my parents’. Many of my friends are feeling hopeless because their university degrees are buying them 20 hours a week at minimum wage (which has not adjusted for inflation too well) while the cost of housing sky rockets.
In the Eastern US the low point for forest cover was in 1872 [2]. In the western US a major problem is too much ground cover resulting in worse forest fires. (Which is not to say that forests are healthy - the pine beetle epidemic is devastating.)
I'm not going to say things are great, but whether they're better or worse depends on where you look and what you compare against.
[1] https://gispub.epa.gov/air/trendsreport/2017/#air_pollution
[2] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deforestation_in_the_United_...
Just like starfish are being laid low by a virus normally kept at bay by lower ocean temperatures (https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/environment/scient...), I expect there to be higher rates of unexpected disease in human populations as well.
I think it’s crazy to assume we won’t find answers to the problems you bring up and take a sky is falling attitude when you look at the track record of human progress. Even though your friends are struggling to find jobs, they’re likely living better than John D. Rockefeller did. Doesn’t excuse the problem, but don’t take these things for granted.
https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
Edit: it looks from your recent history like you've primarily been using HN for ideological battle. That destroys what this site is supposed to be for, so we ban accounts that do it. Please don't do it. That is also in the site guidelines.
This may be true in material terms but it assumes that material wellbeing is all that counts.
The reason this comment triggered such a strong reaction is that it dismisses the emotional distress that goes along with being at the bottom of the socioeconomic pile.
Factors like student debt, medical costs and the general costs of living in many places put many people into profound distress, that can turn into unbearable chronic misery, for which air conditioning seems like small consolation.
I agree with your overall point, and I am one of those that is able to take an optimistic view of the future and trust that problems that seem like existential threats now can be resolved in time.
But I'd urge you to be sensitive enough to anticipate the kinds of reactions you'll trigger when you make a claim like this, even if it's true by the narrow definition you've chosen.
That comparison to Rockafeller is nonsense. Go ask someone working at McDonald’s if they’d trade places with one of the richest men ever.
When you make absurd conclusions, you should examine your premises.
Not that that actually matters.
Working on challenges tends to remove feelings of hopelessness.
“I‘m surprised your not happy about hardship?”
Do you actually look at something like obesity, or addiction and say “ah, what a great PROBLEM to work on.”
