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I'll take present day living over any single point in the past. Antibiotics weren't even produced until the 1940s, and before that time a scraped knee could lit

I'll take present day living over any single point in the past. Antibiotics weren't even produced until the 1940s, and before that time a scraped knee could literally kill you. In the cold war people built concrete bunkers in their basement for fear of a nuclear Armageddon. In Rome, if you couldn't pay your taxes you were forced to sell your children into slavery. And here we are, where past presidents are buying ocean-front property so clearly the elites aren't truly as concerned about it as they publicly state.

beat 7y ago
Buying beach property isn't such a big deal when you're rich - at worst, you lose it, but you're still rich. As for living in the present... I'm in my 50s, and have a chronic respiratory illness that developed a few years ago, but it has probably been latent since childhood. Today, it's an annoyance to treat and a mild disability. As a child, it would have flat out killed me. That's the change of half a lifetime.
chrisco255 7y ago
1930s: We have nothing to fear but fear itself. 2020s: WE'RE ALL GOING TO DIE BY 2030!!!
mikeash 7y ago
“In the cold war people built concrete bunkers in their basement for fear of a nuclear Armageddon.” It’s not like this threat went away. People just stopped paying attention to it.
- chrisco255 7y ago
  Agreed, it just doesn't seem imminent anymore. Mutually assured destruction seems to keep the whole thing in check.
  - mikeash 7y ago
    It will until it doesn’t. What troubles me is that it’s hard to tell whether the risk is 1% per year or 0.000001% per year.
NeedMoreTea 7y ago
In the Cold War a very few rich people built concrete bunkers in their basement, and the Swiss mandated it for all properties. It just was. It was what we were born into, and grew up with. Peace movements and CND were big in the sixties and seventies. So was John le Carre, and all those Cold War movies - good, bad, and awful. Aside from that, most of us couldn't care less. We made jokes about it. We watched Threads in 1984 without a care, after watching it however...
Amygaz 7y ago
Buy “high”, sell “low”, my advise is...

beat 7y ago

Buying beach property isn't such a big deal when you're rich - at worst, you lose it, but you're still rich. As for living in the present... I'm in my 50s, and have a chronic respiratory illness that developed a few years ago, but it has probably been latent since childhood. Today, it's an annoyance to treat and a mild disability. As a child, it would have flat out killed me. That's the change of half a lifetime.

chrisco255 7y ago

1930s: We have nothing to fear but fear itself. 2020s: WE'RE ALL GOING TO DIE BY 2030!!!

mikeash 7y ago

“In the cold war people built concrete bunkers in their basement for fear of a nuclear Armageddon.” It’s not like this threat went away. People just stopped paying attention to it.

chrisco255 7y ago
Agreed, it just doesn't seem imminent anymore. Mutually assured destruction seems to keep the whole thing in check.
- mikeash 7y ago
  It will until it doesn’t. What troubles me is that it’s hard to tell whether the risk is 1% per year or 0.000001% per year.

NeedMoreTea 7y ago

In the Cold War a very few rich people built concrete bunkers in their basement, and the Swiss mandated it for all properties. It just was. It was what we were born into, and grew up with. Peace movements and CND were big in the sixties and seventies. So was John le Carre, and all those Cold War movies - good, bad, and awful. Aside from that, most of us couldn't care less. We made jokes about it. We watched Threads in 1984 without a care, after watching it however...

Amygaz 7y ago

Buy “high”, sell “low”, my advise is...