Is the human race better off now?

I wonder if the human race is getting less happy as time goes on. We love to point out all the scientific and medical advancement in the 20th cent, but are we going through a phase where its making us unhappy? Now I do believe that advancement of technology makes us happier.. SOME of us. But not ALL of us. And that overall it can make things better or worse. But I think that as of right now, we are at a point in history where scientific advancement is creating more misery than anything. Now, I am NOT saying that we should stop. Keep going is what I feel is the right move. Theres always tough points on the road to happiness.
What do I see happening now? Well, first of all medicine, I think its creating misery. Doctors and nurses are all about keeping you alive, and they are really pushing all this on us, they dont give a shit about your quality of life, if they keep you alive, they've done their job. Often we are faced with going bankrupt or dying. Before we knew the cure, you would just die... simple... no struggle no drama you just die. Ive heard that back in the day like the beginning of the 20th century, more people just died. You didnt have as many retirement homes because there was less socialism and even if there was the social services available you didn't have the medical science to keep people alive... against their will. So while life was tough, at least there was an end to it all. You were able to simply cherish the small pleasures, then die.
We never knew what HIV or Hepatitis C was, doctors and nurses got pricked by needles all the time, and didn't think twice about it. So if you carried Hep C or HIV you just lived however long you live, then die. No diagnosis telling you that you have a potentially fatal disease. One day you get real sick then die of "hepatitis" (not C they didnt know about this till 1989 I believe) or immunodeficiency.
Back in the early 20th century there was a lot more face to face people interaction. Today when I have time off we are sitting in front of a TV and everyone has their Ipod's or tiny computers out, no one pays much attention to each other. And we got a new problem starting to occur more often due to MMO games like WoW: video game/technology addiction.(I love MMO games btw, but im not a tech addict).
What about famines? They have occured all throughout history, but I feel like... theres something different about the famines of today. Many say it is the first time in history that we can actually cure famines, I don't know if I believe that. Now, im thinking that theres a lot more international charities going around, but what are they doing? Are they just prolonging the inevitable? Are they just keeping people alive and miserable? Perhaps if we left the famines alone, we would just be "letting nature take it's course". Maybe we could cure all the hunger and starvation, but what will quality of life be like for 6 billion people who are not starving and dying?

 

For a sentient person, these are trying, lonely times. Life is becoming further and further away from what was intended by creation, and some people who are aware can sense this. A lot of people are unhappy, while there's still many who are content eating whatever slop they're fed (figuratively and literally). In many cases I think people believe they're happy when they're not because their indoctrination has overridden their natural instincts. But no doubt humanity is more alienated from itself than it has ever been, despite all the gadgets that supposedly are keeping us "connected."

But whenever I go out and see all these people immersed in their fucking iPhones, completely tuned out from everything around them, it makes me kind of sad. We truly have lost our way, and I would be lying to say that it doesn't bother me somewhat.

 

I definitely don't think the human race as a whole (which makes it hard not to generalize of course) is getting less happy. We may seem to get happy about new things but in essence we are experiencing the same kind of emotions as people that lived centuries ago. Lots of people in the past were also prone to good moods, especially when they aquired a new gadget or other fancy item and there are also historic accounts of people that got pretty much depressed and pissed off because their worldview clashed with reality/the actual situation they were witnessing or experiencing.

 

It's sometimes hard to believe because we all get wrapped up in all the shit that's going on in the now but relatively speaking, this age is the least violent humans have ever been.

 

Sometimes less violent isn't a good thing if it means people are becoming more passive and apathetic. People who are passive are much more easy to control. When there is violence, it's over all the wrong things. Mind you, I am not condoning violence, I am just saying that a population that is overly passive can be just as bad as one that's overly violent. I believe much of the passivity in society can be directly attributed to the preponderance of technological gadgets and the interlocking mass media which keep people distracted and living in a bubble.

 

Nothing wrong with a bit of violence. It's just easily focussed wrong I think the majority of the people were always inclined to stay passive/apathetic when they were under some kind of dictatorial control. It's only when it's made really unbearable for themselves that they are willing to come into action (just as now). Other people suffering til they die are only easier to ignore when there's no newspaper for example, or no bonding with/'we' feeling for people outside of your own village

 

Well, I'm just happy I live in a time in and place where me and my black gays friends don't get killed for being them and wife abuse is seen as wrong. And while it still goes on in other places, it's a simple example and we don't even go back that far to see the change.

I mean...boo hoo Cell phones and happy meals. Vs. Rape and lynching

 

Much depends on where you happen to be born and/or live. In the so-called civilized societies, there are good chances for individual liberty, a reasonably peaceful existence, many ways to enhance ones life, medical advances that repair/preclude many horrible diseases of the past, knowledge available at ones fingertips,etc. However, there are millions for whom none of the aforementioned states of being are, have never been, and most likely never will be available.

IMO, until all humans have the same chances at the advantages I mentioned, there will remain the advantaged and the disadvantaged. So--the question=better for some, worse for others. Just like always. Advances are exclusionary to the extreme.

Until the path humanity is presently on undergoes a tremendous change ----we'll all be eventually thrown back into the state that those for whom life is and has been a miserable and brutal existence--- have always "lived."

 

I think there's a heaping plate of "Things these days!!! " with a side order of "The Good Ole Days" going on here.

 

Double post.

 

The fact that we have some places on Earth at all, where people actually have rights as we know them, is a large leap from the past.

"How do you know he's a King?"
"Coz he's not covered in shit."

 

(little side note= I read years ago that there were people whose job was to crawl down the shitholes of the great castles to clean the shit out of them!)

 

Could have been slaves of the romans. The shitholes of most medieval castles were close to (and ended in) the moat or stream.

 

It's funny because although what you are saying is true, you get generally the same impression from reading the digressions within the books on zoology and astronomy of the Naturalis Historia, written by Pliny the Elder in the first century AD. And you get almost the exact same analysis of Rome during the fourth and fifth centuries by Edward Gibbon, repeatedly, throughout his Decline and Fall, written during the 18th century. This doesn't even limit itself to the outline here of moral and social decay but delves (deeply, I might add) into the particulars of the effeminacy pandemic, excessively hedonistic indulgences and intellectual lethargy popularized by the indoctrination of the herd to the superficialities of superstition (i.e. Christianity). You really ought to read Gibbon, Matt. By the way, are you finding the latest Boards album to be increasingly amazing? I still argue that it is among their very best work.

 

The more we "advance" the more we lose...

 

How so? Yep, serious question

 

Survival instincts for one... Drop someone off in the middle of the wilderness and they can't survive without their damn iPhone.

 

Hmm I'm not sure. But at least we don't lose happiness. There's lots of people too so even if you would be right with that, maybe it would be a new way of nature to even things out

 

People fear nature in their relationships for progress of knowledge. Nature does not change if it is essentially perceived. On the other hand, I believe Bertrand Russell had your represented view eighty years ago.:biker:

 

I'm not sure how this first example suggests we are becoming less happy. We can't gauge the happiness of the dead so there is not really a happiness comparison we can draw with the prolonged lives of the present. Think of how many people in the past were dying, at the time of unknown ailments and wished they could have lived longer.

We are getting bombarded with information, particulary via technology and for some this may cause an overload of information that people are not yet really well adjusted to. However, The subset of technology, the media and advertising is what I think really feeds into people's unhappiness. Advertising and media can show unattainable ideals of qualities humans work and strive for such as wealth, beauty, power, etc. And it creates unrealistic goals for those who buy into it.