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> I can’t think of a time when society was this pessimistic How can you consider human history up to this point when such details are almost certainly lost to
by craftyguy 8y ago
> I can’t think of a time when society was this pessimistic
How can you consider human history up to this point when such details are almost certainly lost to time? Did the fall of the (western) Roman empire, for example, really not spawn generations of pessimism? Or maybe it did but those folks unable to document it? I bet a large portion of Europe was pessimistic during WW2.
- eksemplar 8y agoWell, the suicide rates were probably pretty high in the Roman Empire, and they were certainly high during WW2, especially among people who were denied entry to the army. Society as a whole wasn’t pessimistic during WW2, there was a very focused sense of doing what was required of you, which is why men committed suicide when they couldn’t fight for their country. We don’t have a very good view on how the mood was in the Roman Empire, as most information on commoners come from a few lines of text on their burial pottery, so it’s hard to say much about that. It probably wasn’t fun to be poor though. I can’t remeber either of those periods, and I was making a statement from my own world view, which is obviously anecdotal and may be flawed.
- pacifist 8y agoYou can safely append "in my lifetime" to their musings.
- johnchristopher 8y agoBut how are we going to farm for karma if we can't nitpick then ? /s