[LINK] Internet Archival

Karl Auer kauer at biplane.com.au
Tue Sep 29 09:33:32 AEST 2009


On Tue, 2009-09-29 at 09:19 +1000, Ivan Trundle wrote:
> One could argue that we have not truly advanced society in the past  
> 1000 years (or at the very lest, post-industrial revolution) and that  
> we are merely pragmatically trying to survive by extending the  
> envelope of our survival.

Oh, I think we have. Whether the advances are permanent is obviously
still an open question, but globally speaking: Fewer people (as a
percentage of population) die of disease, die in infancy, die of violent
causes. Crime generally is down, even though we have more laws now than
ever before. The common citizen has, generally, more say on how their
country is run than ever before, the number of people (as a percentage
as well as in absolute terms) able to read, write and calculate is
higher, so the basic requirement for an engaged population is being
better met than ever before. Class distinctions are not nearly as strong
as they once were, not even in the most heavily stratified societies.

Yes, there are still huge problems. Climate change looms, the Bomb is
still hanging over us and we still kill each other with alarming
readiness, but on the whole life is way better than it was 1000 years
ago.

I wonder if we will survive the next 1000 to enjoy them?

Regards, K.

-- 
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Karl Auer (kauer at biplane.com.au)                   +61-2-64957160 (h)
http://www.biplane.com.au/~kauer/                  +61-428-957160 (mob)

GPG fingerprint: 07F3 1DF9 9D45 8BCD 7DD5 00CE 4A44 6A03 F43A 7DEF





More information about the Link mailing list