Comments by "Bo McGillacutty" (@Mrbfgray) on "Is the world getting better or worse? A look at the numbers | Steven Pinker" video.

Sure it could, and most of it would add to his case.
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writerconsidered He's not ignoring anything he's comparing to the past, it's called perspective. Do you have any idea what a REAL WAR is like. During Vietnam it was an endless stream of nightly news of horrific bloody battles and an endless parade of body bags unloading from cargo planes, some 55,000 total US service men and 20 times as many on the other side for that Christian inspired atrocity. How many have we lost in recent yr.s in these so called 'wars'? Back then city smog burned the eyes, stunk and gagged, it was lethal. US rivers were so polluted they would catch on fire. Our cities were burning down from race riots and the war over the war in Vietnam, the nation was coming apart at the seams and domestic terrorism was constant. The homicide rate was double or triple. No question we should be focused on our still significant problems but recent history is a useful reflection.
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Wake Up You make hysterical assertions with NOTHING to back it up. I've been around over half a century and things were FAR WORSE in the 1960's when America was coming apart at the seams, cities were burning from race riots and the war against the war in Vietnam, or the '70's when terrorism was 10 times more frequent, murder rate at least double, mass starvation the norm in many parts of the world, we were constantly worried about "today maybe the end of the world" as nuclear holocaust was always imminent....or the '80's when inflation was up to 14% and unemployment rampant. Travel was far more dangerous. Or how about earlier when polio killed and crippled children everywhere in the USA, I saw the results and it wasn't pretty. We have it so damned easy today it's laughable to compare. Things are far from perfect and it's fine to focus on our problems and flaws but tell a gay or a black person that things are WORSE now. Get a grip! Do you have any idea what the environment was like prior to the 1980's? Our rivers (in the USA) were so polluted they would catch on fire, city smog gagged you and burned the eyes it was thick, stinky and brown, and lethal, acid rain was rampant, on and on.
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Do you have any idea what the environment was like prior to the 1980's? Our rivers (in the USA) were so polluted they would catch on fire, city smog gagged you and burned the eyes it was thick, stinky and brown, acid rain was rampant, on and on.
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Isaac McDaniel The anti-communist crusade was an American holly war against "those godless commies", it wasn't that we didn't like their economic system which was certain to implode on it's own eventually. The cold war was largely religious based. What did you think it was about?
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lily flower Wrong. He's looking at global numbers. Historically things were far worse, pick your time frame. The poor rich divide doesn't say anything about how the poor are doing now compared to previously, a wealthy person getting wealthier doesn't make everyone else less well off.
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The press, priests and politicians all profit on alarm and prognostications of imminent doom.
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Mr_Reb3llion Many beliefs demand to be insulted, it's deadly not to call them out on their treacherous bullshit. Being offended or insulted is trivial, one owns their own 'offendedness'.
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@Parasmunt Depends how far back you care to consider. No question we have done sever damage but we have seen it worse in America, before the EPA existed American rivers were often so polluted with industrial waste that they would catch on fire. Remember that? I do.
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@Parasmunt Entropy has exactly NOTHING to do with it. That's a laughably false notion for folks who don't understand what entropy IS. As long as the sun shines the entropy of Earth can continuously DECREASE. The entropy of the universe as a WHOLE can only increase but that says nothing about any non-isolate part of it.
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@Parasmunt The entropy of Earth can continuously decrease as I said before. Earth is in NO WAY a closed system. Yes we have done a lot of damage and consumed some resources we can not currently easily replace. I imagine I'm as horrified as you about what we are doing to the Amazon Jungle, oceans, on and on. HOWEVER--cosmic origin catastrophes that cause extinction events even far greater than what humanity has caused are likely much more common than generally thought. Not only the dinosaurs but even as recent as the Younger Dryas extinction event only some 12.5k yr.s ago, we currently have the technology to prevent. (we haven't quite developed it just yet but likely we will before it's too late, no guarantees obviously) It's a bit too Gaia Hypothesis for me but it's an interesting concept that man was 'meant' to prevent the next comet/asteroid killer impact. (some have suggested) But for sure it's likely that humanity will redeem ourselves by preventing the NEXT mass extinction event even much bigger than the one we have already caused and much of that damage may have been necessary to get us to that place where we can be the ultimate PROTECTORS of biodiversity. Make sense? (I'm not looking for an argument and largely agree with much of what you say, I'm only suggesting some complexity and another angle)
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Clarence Trumble-Lovegod Religions don't tolerate competition, Communism has been THE religion where it has been practiced.
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