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There is truth in most of what you wrote BUT it is not new. Go back in any era and you can almost find similar issues. You mentioned inflation. Do you know what

There is truth in most of what you wrote BUT it is not new. Go back in any era and you can almost find similar issues. You mentioned inflation. Do you know what the inflation was like in 1970s/80s in the US ? "War..famines". Again, go back and you can find many examples of these over the last few decades. In fact, I would argue that we have less wars now in general (Can you imagine surviving during the era of World Wars?). I think it is mostly the fact that we have all our basic needs met and now we can think about the problems in the world. I am in a similar situation where I want to do something for others and best way to start small and help others with whatever you can. Volunteer for causes that you care about and go from there. There is a lot of joy in helping others and we sometimes just forget that as we are so tied up in our own little bubbles.

RhysU 4y ago
I periodically hum a verse of "We Didn't Start the Fire" when today feels crazy. That song is effective for me because those are events one learns about independently but, absent the song, I would never have thought of them unfolding before my eyes. Don't forget the line towards the end: "But when we are gone / It will still burn on and on...".
PheonixPharts 4y ago
> BUT it is not new. This is a gross misunderstanding of the issues we are facing, especially with regard to climate change. This is not just "bad things have always been happening", but change on the level the planet has not see in literally millions of years https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/5f/All_palaeotemps.svg https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/5f/All_pala... Just one quick example: look at lake Mead right now http://mead.uslakes.info/level.asp http://mead.uslakes.info/level.asp We are already having energy issues in the US and we're looking at a near term future where there is not enough water to run the Hoover dam. This is already impacting people in the US and it will get worse. Within our life time we will very likely see an ice-free arctic. The blue ocean event will have major impacts on weather patterns and we currently can't really predict exactly how this will pan out, but there is a lot of extreme risk here. Complex systems, such as our climate and our economy are remarkably resilient. Just like the human body, a lot of unexpected change can happen and it can still function shockingly well. However there are limits and once things start to breakdown the escalate quickly. What we're seeing know is just a tiny, tiny preview of what's to come. Let's ignore climate. We are still part of the 6th largest mass extinction event in the history of life on this planet: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holocene_extinction https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holocene_extinction Let's ignore the biosphere. First of all your examples of "it's happened before" are all in the last century, a blink of an eye on species level time scale. While you are correct that there has always been war, and plenty of examples of extremely destructive war, we are a very close to potential global nuclear war. The "this is fine" meme dominates HN thinking, but this is largely because the HN crowd cannot accept the existential terror that is involved in facing these issues. In the long run I still hold that this deep denial is more psychologically harmful that working towards acceptance.

RhysU 4y ago

I periodically hum a verse of "We Didn't Start the Fire" when today feels crazy. That song is effective for me because those are events one learns about independently but, absent the song, I would never have thought of them unfolding before my eyes. Don't forget the line towards the end: "But when we are gone / It will still burn on and on...".

PheonixPharts 4y ago

> BUT it is not new. This is a gross misunderstanding of the issues we are facing, especially with regard to climate change. This is not just "bad things have always been happening", but change on the level the planet has not see in literally millions of years https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/5f/All_palaeotemps.svg https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/5f/All_pala... Just one quick example: look at lake Mead right now http://mead.uslakes.info/level.asp http://mead.uslakes.info/level.asp We are already having energy issues in the US and we're looking at a near term future where there is not enough water to run the Hoover dam. This is already impacting people in the US and it will get worse. Within our life time we will very likely see an ice-free arctic. The blue ocean event will have major impacts on weather patterns and we currently can't really predict exactly how this will pan out, but there is a lot of extreme risk here. Complex systems, such as our climate and our economy are remarkably resilient. Just like the human body, a lot of unexpected change can happen and it can still function shockingly well. However there are limits and once things start to breakdown the escalate quickly. What we're seeing know is just a tiny, tiny preview of what's to come. Let's ignore climate. We are still part of the 6th largest mass extinction event in the history of life on this planet: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holocene_extinction https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holocene_extinction Let's ignore the biosphere. First of all your examples of "it's happened before" are all in the last century, a blink of an eye on species level time scale. While you are correct that there has always been war, and plenty of examples of extremely destructive war, we are a very close to potential global nuclear war. The "this is fine" meme dominates HN thinking, but this is largely because the HN crowd cannot accept the existential terror that is involved in facing these issues. In the long run I still hold that this deep denial is more psychologically harmful that working towards acceptance.