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PaperclipPerfector  11mo ago (text post)   3672 thread views

Small-Scale Question Sunday for September 15, 2024

Do you have a dumb question that you're kind of embarrassed to ask in the main thread? Is there something you're just not sure about?

This is your opportunity to ask questions. No question too simple or too silly.

Culture war topics are accepted, and proposals for a better intro post are appreciated.

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Has anything noteworthy improved in the world in the past 10-15 years?

I've wondered if it's just a natural product of depression or aging, but I was thinking recently about how absolutely everything feels as if it were so much better a few short years ago. Housing/food/necessities more affordable, political discourse less toxic, the internet was both more wild west but also more self-regulating, TV was in its golden age (Breaking Bad, The Wire, Mad Men, etc.), sports felt more like an escape than circus, technology still held promise of a brighter future rather than potential enslavement of humanity, people still talked to one another without being addicted to smartphones, the media was still somewhat believable, medicine was still a respected profession by a wide margin, college was the smart choice for many/most young people... I could go on but you get the idea.

What has actually improved in the time since? Uber? Starlink? That's all I can think of, and I don't use either one.

Has anything improved in your life?

There's a bias Steven Pinker talks about in Enlightnement Now. In surveys, respondents will predict that the average person in their country will get poorer in the next few years, while simultaneously predicting that they themselves will get richer.

Do you earn more money now? Live in a bigger house or have more savings? Multiply that by most people on the planet.

I was a student, so I had no income, but make less now that I thought I would make as a starting salary, live in a much much smaller house. I have a little bit more savings, but I'm also considerably closer to retirement.

I thought you were actually going to say something different. Most people's lives just get worse and worse as they get older, but each generation is better off than the last.

80 year old East German: “Things were better under Communism.”

“Why’s that?”

“Sex was better then.”

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