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> The whole better off trope has been popularized by people like Hans Rosling in books like Factfulness

Hans Rosling is right.

And the success of the world does not mean we shouldn't work to improve it. It means we shouldn't be doomers and think the world is falling apart.

Max Roser said it well with "The world is awful. The world is much better. The world can be much better."

https://ourworldindata.org/much-better-awful-can-be-better



> the success of the world

Which part of the world is succeeding? What does that actually mean? 'Success of the world' is such an empty statement. What did it succeed at? Destroying our habitat?

> does not mean we shouldn't work to improve it

Most of the more brilliant minds in the current industrialized world are working on making more money for someone (themselves or others). Who's working on actually improving it? And improve it how? By making the world a better place 'through minimal message oriented transport layers'?

> It means we shouldn't be doomers and think the world is falling apart

Nobody is saying one should be a doomer or whatever. Doomer implies losing all hope. What I'm advocating is losing hope for the current system, not for the world.


If Rosling is right why are NASA scientists gluing themselves to oil company offices to make a point about climate catastrophe?

We're about to learn that you can't spreadsheet and infographic your way out of a collapsing ecosystem.

And we're going to do it the hard and stupid way, because the intelligent way required changes starting 30 or 40 years ago.




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