Name: The state of humanity
ISBN: 9781557861191

FabHKFeb 2017

Well, I take away just the opposite though.

Suppose there really was a loving creator that put this all in place just for us. Then, yeah, we've made quite a mess of it, and it really all rather sucks.

However, if it's just a bleak, uncaring universe, then the fact that we're around is amazing in the first place, and the fact that we've managed to carve out a niche where we can, by and large, thrive in ever larger numbers [1] is outright awesome and amazing.

It also then enjoins us to "keep on fighting the good fight". For example, I don't think there is "automatic karma" imposed somehow - it is incumbent on us humans to impose justice as well as we can.

[1] The notion that things are terrible and getting worse is wrong, I think. See for example

- Julian Simon, "The State of Humanity"

- Steven Pinker, "The Better Angels of our Nature"

- Max Roser, "Our World in Data", https://ourworldindata.org

etc.

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billswiftAug 2009

Yep, that's a deluded fantasy all right. See "Ultimate Resource 2", "The Resourceful Earth", or "State of Humanity" by Julian Simon or "Earth Report 2000" by Ronald Bailey.

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FabHKAug 2021

I'd look at the positive trends. Dire warnings have, in the past, often lead to improvements that prevented the worst outcomes.

Fatalism and resignation are not good nor helpful for you as an individual, nor for society as a whole (they also forestall meaningful corrective action).

The fact is that large trends have mostly pointed in the right direction over the last century or so, on a worldwide scale. (Examples: [1]-[17])

Some literature I'd look at as counterpoints:

- Steve Pinker, Enlightenment Now [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enlightenment_Now]

- Matt Ridley, The Rational Optimist [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Rational_Optimist]

- Hans Rosling, Factfulness: Ten Reasons We're Wrong About the World – and Why Things Are Better Than You Think [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Factfulness:_Ten_Reasons_We%27...]

- Julian Simon, The State of Humanity

Note: Some of these writers and arguments are co-opted by rabid libertarians or ideologues that argue that all is well, there is nothing to worry about, and nothing needs to be done (and certainly no government regulation of business) [N1]. That is nonsense, and not a position I advocate.

There are many worrisome trends, and we have to do something about them. But, there have been predictions of doom since the dawn of mankind (see: Malthus [D1], Ehrlich [D2]), and they have not panned out, either.

Conclusion/TL;DR: Things have largely gotten better for humanity over long timeframes. There are still many problems now (inequality, climate, etc.), but if we apply ourselves, there is a good chance we can tackle them.

Footnotes

[1] Life Expectancy [https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/life-expectancy?tab=chart...]

[2] HDI [https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/human-development-index-e...]

[3] Child Mortality [https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/child-mortality?tab=chart]

[4] Suicide rates (not improving, but not worsening) [https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/suicide-rates-by-country]

[5] Air pollution [https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/death-rates-from-air-poll...]

[6] Polio [https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/number-of-estimated-paral...]

[7] Cholera [https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/cholera-deaths-in-great-b...]

[8] Tuberculosis, Malaria, HIV/Aids [https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/deaths-from-infections-of...]

[9] Anemia in children [https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/prevalence-of-anemia-in-c...]

[10] Access to electricity [https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/share-of-the-population-w...]

[11] Death from indoor air pollution [https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/death-rate-by-source-from...]

[12] Death from unsafe sanitation [https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/share-deaths-unsafe-sanit...]

[https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/death-rates-sanitation?ta...]

[13] Share of people who say they're happy [https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/share-of-people-who-say-t...]

[14] Use of agricultural land per capita [https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/agricultural-area-per-cap...]

[15] Forests [https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/forest-area-as-share-of-l...]

[16] Famine [https://ourworldindata.org/famine-mortality-over-the-long-ru...]

[17] Child labour [https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/various-measures-of-child...] [https://ourworldindata.org/child-labor#long-run-history-of-c...]

[N1] Julian Simon himself was one of those over-optimistic libertarians. But the data he collected is still eye-opening.

[D1] Malthus: "This constant effort as constantly tends to subject the lower classes of the society to distress and to prevent any great permanent amelioration of their condition." [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/An_Essay_on_the_Principle_of_P...]

[D2] Ehrlich, in 1968: "The battle to feed all of humanity is over. In the 1970s hundreds of millions of people will starve to death in spite of any crash programs embarked upon now. At this late date nothing can prevent a substantial increase in the world death rate." [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Population_Bomb] But a UN report in 2010: 'the percentage of the world's population who qualify as "undernourished" has fallen by more than half, from 33 percent to about 16 percent, since Ehrlich published The Population Bomb.'

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FabHKMar 2018

I'm curious why nobody seems to have compared Pinker's book to Julian Simon's 1996 tome The State of Humanity. It's also full of statistics and graphs showing the vast improvements in human life over time leading up to now.

Simon's book has been co-opted by the libertarian right (Cato Institute etc.) to show that all is peachy and no government intervention is needed - that's lamentable.

However, the underlying facts marshalled and documented in the books of Simon and Pinker - that life is measurably getting better on so many fronts - ought to be better known.

EDIT to add: Here's a short article by Simon summarising the message of the book: https://www.cato.org/publications/commentary/state-humanity-...

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