Gain some perspective. It's historically a very pretty common idea. People have been writing about how the world is going to shit since they could write, and yet most people's lives have been getting better most of the time. Why do you think you are better equipped at predicting the future than those folks?
> Frank Kermode, in his famous book The Sense of an Ending, elaborated on Cohn’s masterwork by suggesting that actually it’s very common for all of us – especially artists – to feel that we live at the end of times, and that our own demise means all the more to us because we’re not simply dying in the middle of the plot, in medias res. Our lives take on significance because as we decline we notice our society is declining all around us. It’s part of a yearning for narrative significance. As Kermode said, no one can hear a clock saying, as it does, tick tick. What we hear is tick tock. A beginning and an end. We impose this order.
I totally agree with this point, but there is an unavoidable anthropic counterargument, which is for the people who do in fact live in some kind of end times, this is exactly how it will seem to them too. We can't just rely on induction, you still have to at least attempt the deductive due diligence.
Although a good sentiment, the information age coupled with more advanced climate models makes us much better at predicting.
Additionally, it's only been within the last century where we've been technologically capable of causing a mass-extinction level event via nuclear weapons. Here's a fun list of close-calls [0]
Although gaining some perspective is good advice, there is a tacit assumption here that the world just happens and that the tide of history ebbs and flows as it will. Long periods of peace and prosperity happen partly from luck but also partly because key people make them happen. I think it is interesting to consider Bismarck [0] in relation to World War I. We need people like that in high offices trying to promote peace.
Times of stress are exactly the right time for people to stand up and say "wait a minute, I don't see how this can end well - lets try something different" and "if we keep doing this, eventually it will end badly - lets pick a different route". Or even "what exactly are we relying on and what are our options if something happens"; which can be surprisingly useful as a conversation starter. If people can't answer that one in the good times they certainly don't have a plan for when there is a crisis.
We've entered a really dangerous period where the people who remember WWII and the aftermath are dead or dying. A lot of quiet actors were shepherding the post WWII era - the last era of relative peace - and just assuming it works out from now going forward is not a strategy. And that is before even starting on the resources questions about how much of society can be sustained for 3 generations.
> People have been writing about how the world is going to shit since they could write
The first person I know to complain like that in writing was Socrates who lived to see the fall of Athens/Athenian hegemony in 404BC. He wasn't exactly wrong.
> The first person I know to complain like that in writing was Socrates who lived to see the fall of Athens/Athenian hegemony in 404BC. He wasn't exactly wrong.
What? Wasn't he completely, utterly wrong though?
Isn't life today incomparably better in general?
Now, of course, you could argue that for one particular group of people life will never be as good as it used to be at one particular point in history ... but that misses the point - overall humanity is much better off.
Humanity will figure something out. Humanity will be okay.
People in developed world retiring in 20 years from now however will heave zero support from state. Zero return on their investment. Will have to work full-time till they are dead basically to get healthcaretthey need.
That is definitely not end of the world, but neither was original ponzi scheme collapse.
I am still figuring out my retirement and "invest more" might not be the best answer
Where are the statistics proving overall humanity is much better off? I'm doubtful anyone can prove "overall" humanity is better or worse than "x" generation. Also how do we measure it?
> People have been writing about how the world is going to shit since they could write,
Yes, but they've mostly been writing about how the world's going to shit because of those crazy young people, who didn't actually have all that much power (yet). I think it actually is a bit different when the people whose generational mores have messed things up are already in just about every seat in Washington DC and Wall Street (and equivalents elsewhere), and likely to remain so for a while yet. Also, various forms of environmental degradation - including but not limited to climate change - are more objectively harmful and more likely to be permanent than any effects of younger people not going to church (for example). True perspective requires seeing larger things as larger, not just assuming they're a trick of perception.
There also have been plenty of collapses. The difference is that we live now in a world that is way more globalized, connected and we have a far greater impact on the ecosystem.
