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My grandfather, then a pre-teen, walked a 10 mile trap line each day in Nebraska winters during the great depression with a rifle and collected various small an

My grandfather, then a pre-teen, walked a 10 mile trap line each day in Nebraska winters during the great depression with a rifle and collected various small animals that were brought back and eaten so his family would be less hungry. In his mid to late 20s, he received three wounds and a bucket of awards for his actions in Guadalcanal and Burma. His wife to be's family got by by making illegal moonshine and hiding from the feds in Oklahoma. The most important lesson he taught me was simple, and I've never forgotten it. Every day you're breathing is a good day. I understand the limitations of this statement; clinical depression is a real thing, and is, fortunately, largely treatable. And situational depression can be pretty brutal. You are alive. You are breathing. You don't know how many days you have left in your life. Most likely you have a lot. More importantly, you have little idea of what those days will bring you. I've been living in a lot of climate change related fear for decades now. 20 years ago, the science was just getting started, and nobody really understood most of the implications. The fact is, we are all pretty helpless about most everything. That you're here on Hacker News is an incredible twist of fate, rather than starving in a refugee camp somewhere. So, assuming you are not clinically depressed, I will say this: live today and rejoice in its wonder. If you are alive tomorrow, live it, and rejoice again. If it is our fate to succumb to the https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Filter https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Filter then so be it. We live in fantastic, interesting times. Enjoy the ride and do the best you can to fractionally move the various needles in good directions.

AstralStorm 9y ago
Live today and don't care what you leave for your children? I think someone famous said something to the effect. It is terribly selfish and even more shortsighted. (And then, the flood.) Were talking in massive changes in ecosystem in just about 4 generations (less than a century) if things continue as they are. Great Filter only applies to date not self inflicted. Global climate change and ecosystem destruction do not count. And the real truth is that you can be an optimist to a fault. Keep that in mind. Dire situations happen and require immediate responses. The main problem here is that humanity is not at the point where we can make these really at all.
- Diederich 9y ago
  > Live today and don't care what you leave for your children? I understand that you might get that from what I wrote, but I can assure you that is almost exactly the inverse of my own perspective on this matter. > Were talking in massive changes in ecosystem in just about 4 generations (less than a century) if things continue as they are. I think there's a chance that my teenage son will, in his lifetime, be facing a biosphere doing its best to kill him. I think there's a chance that extreme weather will be destroying most of the food the human race try to grow within the next 25 years. The science of this aspect of climate change is still pretty new, but evidence is piling up fast. > And the real truth is that you can be an optimist to a fault. Keep that in mind. Very true, and I consider that every single day. The perspective I provided above is about fending off despair, which is far worse than inappropriate optimism. My mission in life is simply stated. I will work every day on the things that will provide my son and his descendents, if any, and the people he cares about, the highest possible probatility for a happy, productive, long life.
  - AstralStorm 9y ago
    Well, despair can push to action and can be debilitating. It is if we can truly say to yourself and your grand grand kid - whom you will likely meet in person thanks to many medical advances - "I did my poor best". Way too many people don't even think about this...
cryoshon 9y ago
>Enjoy the ride and do the best you can some of us aspire to control the ride so that the ride may continue to operate for others.
- Diederich 9y ago
  > some of us aspire to control the ride so that the ride may continue to operate for others. Me too: > and do the best you can to fractionally move the various needles in good directions

AstralStorm 9y ago

Live today and don't care what you leave for your children? I think someone famous said something to the effect. It is terribly selfish and even more shortsighted. (And then, the flood.) Were talking in massive changes in ecosystem in just about 4 generations (less than a century) if things continue as they are. Great Filter only applies to date not self inflicted. Global climate change and ecosystem destruction do not count. And the real truth is that you can be an optimist to a fault. Keep that in mind. Dire situations happen and require immediate responses. The main problem here is that humanity is not at the point where we can make these really at all.

Diederich 9y ago
> Live today and don't care what you leave for your children? I understand that you might get that from what I wrote, but I can assure you that is almost exactly the inverse of my own perspective on this matter. > Were talking in massive changes in ecosystem in just about 4 generations (less than a century) if things continue as they are. I think there's a chance that my teenage son will, in his lifetime, be facing a biosphere doing its best to kill him. I think there's a chance that extreme weather will be destroying most of the food the human race try to grow within the next 25 years. The science of this aspect of climate change is still pretty new, but evidence is piling up fast. > And the real truth is that you can be an optimist to a fault. Keep that in mind. Very true, and I consider that every single day. The perspective I provided above is about fending off despair, which is far worse than inappropriate optimism. My mission in life is simply stated. I will work every day on the things that will provide my son and his descendents, if any, and the people he cares about, the highest possible probatility for a happy, productive, long life.
- AstralStorm 9y ago
  Well, despair can push to action and can be debilitating. It is if we can truly say to yourself and your grand grand kid - whom you will likely meet in person thanks to many medical advances - "I did my poor best". Way too many people don't even think about this...

cryoshon 9y ago

>Enjoy the ride and do the best you can some of us aspire to control the ride so that the ride may continue to operate for others.

Diederich 9y ago
> some of us aspire to control the ride so that the ride may continue to operate for others. Me too: > and do the best you can to fractionally move the various needles in good directions