Edmund Storms <stor...@ix.netcom.com> wrote:
> Pollution is gradually being reduced. > > > Except in China and India, which is most of the world. > Pollution per dollar of GDP is down in both. China is making rapid strides, adding nuclear and wind power. > > Out of control population growth is moderating, even in third world > countries. > > > The population is still growing exponentially world-wide. > The growth rate is now 1%, which is lower than it was anytime in the 20th century. https://www.google.com/publicdata/explore?ds=d5bncppjof8f9_&met_y=sp_pop_grow&tdim=true&dl=en&hl=en&q=world%20population%20growth The rate is down sharply, even in developing countries. It is below replacement in most first world countries: http://www.worldbank.org/depweb/english/beyond/beyondco/beg_03.pdf > Food factory technology is improving, and it could easily eliminate the > threat of famine or massive water shortages. > > > Apparently not so easily. Hunger is even growing in the US at the low end > of the economy. > That is a political problem, not a technical problem. There is plenty of food in the U.S. That is a bit like saying cold fusion research is not funded because there is a shortage of money. At present the world is awash in money. We are knee deep in unused capital to such an extent that investors are effectively paying the U.S. government to take their money (less than zero interest after inflation). > The Internet is bringing unprecedented access to information and education > to people everywhere, even in the Third World. > > > True, but to what effect? > Why would the effect be any different than educating First World people? Education is always a good thing. > But what role does rational and objective observation have in any > evaluation? It seems to me, we need to identify a problem before we can > attempt to correct it. This identification always leads to what might be > called pessimism. > Not in my case. I don't know where we stand on the rationality or objectivity scale, but I do know history. I read a lot of history. It is clear to me that things have never been better, and they are presently heading in the right direction by most metrics. Something like global warming may clobber us, but then again we might act to prevent it in time. We have often fixed problems and made things better. We tend to forget that, because we take good things for granted and we come to ignore them, while we always see problems. Improvements which seemed miraculous when they were introduced are now invisible. For example: automobiles, electricity, computers, word processing and the Internet. - Jed
