Ask HN: Is now the best time to be alive?
I’ve been thinking a lot about how we live in a world of abundance, and somewhat more depressingly realizing that the earth is being ravaged by climate change and grateful to be alive now rather than 100 years from now.
Anyone else feel the same way? Pragmatically thinking I can't imagine what could be better age or place to be alive. We have abundance of food and can pick what and when we eat. We can travel freely and its relatively cheap. We work less hours and the work is physically not demanding. We have time for self fulfillment and hobbies. Medicine is widely available at least in Europe. Technology and communication is widely available and cheap. What could be better? As a westerner and tech worker I can't really even imagine what else could be better in everyday life. More money wouldn't change much or make my life better. I don't want to live 150 years old if it means just existing. 20 years from now will be better... I think anytime in the future is good to be alive at that time because you're alive at the 'latest' point in time. Everyone who died yesterday would love to be alive today. We can only know what we have and can experience today though, someday there may be FTL travel, that'll be exciting. Someday we may even find friendly or even non-friendly E.T.'s that'll be exciting too. Someday robots may do ALL menial tasks while mankind enjoys our time in research and scientific endeavors. Money may not even exist and we might value knowledge and learning above all else. This time is definitely the best time we've had, but the future looks very interesting. I long for immortality tech not because I fear for death, I fear missing out on what the future holds. Adding on to this:
If you can make one or two SaaS apps that become popular, even if they're small programs, in theory, you'll still be able to live a regular life without working at all. I think it's a pretty good time to live, but obviously 20 years from now people will probably think the same. It is for wealthy people in safe countries. I think people in, for example, Syria would gladly trade for a different decade or maybe even century. “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of light, it was the season of darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair.” - Dickens Nothing is all good, and nothing is all bad. Now is as good a time as any other to be alive. in the greater scheme of things, probably almost all elements of Places \cross Times lack the conditions to support life . But right here has been amazingly, unusually good for quite a long time: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geological_history_of_Earth#/m... the wise man bowed his head solemnly and spoke: "theres actually zero difference between good & bad things. you imbecile. you fucking moron" I don't think we are necessarily happier or more fulfilled than we were as hunter-gatherers. For many of us the disconnect between the situation in which we find ourselves and the situation for which we evolved is psychologically problematic. I grateful to live in the time I currently live in because I have no idea how much worse or better the "future" is. It is easy to look back and say that somethings are better than in previous decades or centuries. As for 100 years from now, the future of the world hasn't been written so it is up to the people of today and tomorrow to make sure we write a good one. If we succeed then 100 years from now may just end up being a better time to live in. I think we are potentially close to the best time to be alive. There is a lot of work being done on reversing age related diseases, so maybe in another 30 to 100 years, we will reach escape velocity so to speak, and people will no longer die of "old age". This assumes we don't make humans extinct through warfare. Too late to explore the Earth, too early to explore the stars, just in time to buy psychedelics off the internet due to legal loopholes... wait, that was 10 years ago. We are going to have a lot of excitement in our lives coming in the months and years ahead but few will enjoy it. On the other hand some people would never shine had it not been for service in the midst of catastrophy. I’d swap places with my kids so they could enjoy pre climate change and I’d live in that future, assuming we don’t solve the problem. How do you imagine climate change affecting them specifically? Depending on where they live more adverse weather. Fire,
flooding, drought, food supply issues. Do you think it will really impact them significantly? I mean, some areas will become less hospitable, while others will probably improve. Food may become a little bit more expensive because of draughts, but we spend so little on food now that even 50% rise won’t be too terrible. All in all, I don’t see global warming having a dramatic impact on people’s lives, perhaps with the exception of people having to move because of it - but then again, even that’s not huge, as people move all the time. The biggest risk is probably when a lot of people in a given place will want to move at the same time (and/or into the same destination), as it can cause political instability. Global warming could end life on earth, or at least cause an ELE where 90%+ of organisms are wiped out. The biggest threat I think is creating a feedback loop where warmth thaws permafrost, permafrost kicks up methane/carbon gases, causing more thawing and faster at that, then it'll get bad really fast. Politically I think water wars could be big depending on how much water is lost as a result of evaporation and polution, I think this could be more pronounced in Africa and the Middle east, but we could have issues between Mexico, AZ, California and the south western USA where it's more draught ridden. Forest fires will continue to get bigger and more frequent causing a change in ecosystems where forests may turn to baren deserts. Lack of water also will cause farming to be tougher. I'm hopeful we eventually science the shit out of all this stuff, but then we could get an asteroid the next year that wipes us out anyway, no use really fearing but doesn't hurt to prepare as best we can. Why do we always think climate change is going to be impossible to solve and it's some predestined, doomed dark future. I imagine some sort of new tech will be invented within the next 100 years that will easily solve it. Not saying we shouldn't start now though... The higher the feeling of urgency the more people we can put on the problem, the faster we can solve it the more likely we are to solve it. The longer we wait the harder it becomes to solve because it creates a feedback loop. If we just procrastinate and say let our children worry about it and they do the same it'll definitely be too late. We can't always just pass the buck and hope someone else figures out a fix. I agree we shouldn't wait, but maybe the people who aren't on board would be more receptive to "the world is ending we're all going to die" doomsday preacher style I see so often. I really think thought it really comes down to economics. Even if they do believe it's happening and it's urgent, the people's livelihoods who are threatened by elimination of carbon are going to come up with an infinite amount of rationalizations to put it off. It's also easy when it's not your job/money on the line to say "yeah we should fix this". According to the IPCC report we don’t have hundred years.
