[OT] Five Simple Rules

Tom tom at vondein.org
Tue Jun 28 01:13:44 PDT 2016


Hi Cecilia,

first of all: thanks for posting this, many people seem to have
forgotten these things lately.

On Tue, Jun 28, 2016 at 12:06:19AM -0300, Cecilia Tanaka wrote:
> Me too.  Probably much more than you, my dear Mirimir.  To find the truth,
> you must believe.  I always wanted to believe.  I still believe in a better
> world for everybody, but it is becoming pretty hard to discover what means
> a "better world" and "everybody", uh!  :-/

There's no need to believe, observing is sufficient. From our vantage
point it may seem everything is getting worse. We kill each other, we
exterminate species, we destroy the environment, intolerance, corruption
and lies, lies and much more lies.

But the thing is: it's not the reality, it's just what we perceive it to
be. Actually it's the other way around: things are getting better and
better. Yes, sometimes it's two steps forward and one backward.

However, look at the details. How many pople are being killed during
wars these days? Of course, still too many, but not millions as in past
times. More and more people pay attention to the environment. Who did
that 100 years ago? Nobody. Who did protest against forest clearance in
those times? Nobody. Against discrimination? A handfull. The list is
endless.

The difference to past times is this: 100 years ago children got missed
all times, every day. The general public didn't care much, or even
notice. Today, if a child gets lost, all the media - sometimes even
international ones - report about it, every day 24/7, for weeks.
This is the cause of the perception "oh my god all this criminality!"
while in reality there's LESS criminality than ever before.

You might counter: but what about unreported missing black children? What
about the desastrous violence in Venezuela and Mexico? What about all
those global warming deniers? What about the rising fascisim in the EU?
What about idiots like Trump or Farage? Yes, these things must be fixed.
But if you "zoom out" a little and look on the big picture, you'll
realize that we as a species are developing, growing and indeed getting
better.

Well, at least this is as I see it. I just hate it that almost every one
laments all day "we're going to die, the past was so much better" and
such crab. Try to make a living in 1850. Or 1650. Or 350. Or 14000 b.c.
Today is the best times of all. Todays poorest people are rich
compared to poor people a couple of centuries ago.

So, I don't need to believe, I know it's getting better. Even if local
situations might be worsen here and there, this doen't matter that much
for the species as a whole.




best,
Tom




More information about the cypherpunks mailing list