3 ms·

That this even needed to be said on a forum like HN baffles me. I suspect it's a result of decades of mainstream political/cultural doom-and-gloom propaganda.

nverno 3y ago
This quality of life metric is purely economic, but it is easy to read it as general life quality- personally, I'd swap now for 1820s homesteading out west in a heartbeat even though that would register as 'extreme poverty' on the economic scale.
- vikinghckr 3y ago
  Well, for a start, it's safe to assume you're not a woman or a minority. And even if you're a young healthy white male, your quality of life would be significantly worse in the 1820s. Not only would you lose access to a lot of the everyday conveniences of life today, you're also far more likely to die a young and painful death from any number of disease.
  - nverno 3y ago
    Conveniences don't make life worth living, and a long life doesn't mean a good life. Do you really think people, on average, enjoyed their lives less back then? I don't
    - vikinghckr 3y ago
      Well, enjoyment or happiness is tricky to measure because happiness = reality - expectation. So people in the 1820s might've been "happy" enough because they simply didn't know a better life like today's was a possibility. There's no reason to think they were happier than today's population though. And certainly, you as someone who experienced today's conveniences will not be happy long term if all those were taken away suddenly.
      - nverno 3y ago
        I've spent the best years of my life living in the woods and in wall-less huts w/ no water, plumbing or electricity. Imho our modern conveniences don't make life any richer, and in many cases take away the pleasure of things we take for granted. If I had medical problems I would probably feel differently.
        ZephyrBlu 3y ago
        I feel like you are probably taking a lot of things for granted. Clothes, food, equipment, vehicles, etc. Heck, even just the ability to choose to live in a hut in the woods.
        vunderba 3y ago
        Uh huh. What were you wearing? Did you sew your own clothes and grow your own cotton for those clothes? There's a surprising amount of "on the grid" work that afforded you the ability to live "off the grid". There's also a big difference between living in a part of the world where the woods provide a relatively temperate climate. Try living out in the forest to Papua New Guinea with 100% humidity. By the way, try to make sure you don't accidentally get bitten by a rabid animal because the cure for rabies wasn't invented until the 1880s.
- yreg 3y ago
  If you are jumping in a time machine to move your consciousness to a body in 1820 USA you are rolling dangerous dice because you have a significant chance of living the horrible life of a slave.
- awwaiid 3y ago
  You can do this right now! It's called "Alaska".
  - nverno 3y ago
    I do hope to end up there eventually, but I think the government ended homesteading back in the 80s sadly.
    - antisthenes 3y ago
      Homesteading is a lifestyle. Government can't "end" it any more than it can end partying. If you're talking about the ability to live off the land you don't own and owning land without paying taxes, that's a different story.
      - nverno 3y ago
        The US government passed Homestead Acts back in the 1800s where they gave away plots of land, called homesteads, (like 10% of the country) for free. It's a lifestyle, for sure, but living off land you don't own isn't what I was referring to. I think the last homesteads (free land) were given away in the 1980s.
- gus_massa 3y ago
  Refrigerators. Just imagine your life without a refrigerator. If you go to 1820 you will have no refrigerator. From https://www.iea.org/data-and-statistics/charts/worldwide-average-household-ownership-of-appliances-and-number-of-households-in-the-net-zero-scenario-2000-2030 https://www.iea.org/data-and-statistics/charts/worldwide-ave... , now the 80% of the homes in the world have a refrigerator. [And 50% have a washing machine. Mine broke a few months and it was a big mess until we got a new one.]

nverno 3y ago

This quality of life metric is purely economic, but it is easy to read it as general life quality- personally, I'd swap now for 1820s homesteading out west in a heartbeat even though that would register as 'extreme poverty' on the economic scale.

vikinghckr 3y ago
Well, for a start, it's safe to assume you're not a woman or a minority. And even if you're a young healthy white male, your quality of life would be significantly worse in the 1820s. Not only would you lose access to a lot of the everyday conveniences of life today, you're also far more likely to die a young and painful death from any number of disease.
- nverno 3y ago
  Conveniences don't make life worth living, and a long life doesn't mean a good life. Do you really think people, on average, enjoyed their lives less back then? I don't
  - vikinghckr 3y ago
    Well, enjoyment or happiness is tricky to measure because happiness = reality - expectation. So people in the 1820s might've been "happy" enough because they simply didn't know a better life like today's was a possibility. There's no reason to think they were happier than today's population though. And certainly, you as someone who experienced today's conveniences will not be happy long term if all those were taken away suddenly.
    - nverno 3y ago
      I've spent the best years of my life living in the woods and in wall-less huts w/ no water, plumbing or electricity. Imho our modern conveniences don't make life any richer, and in many cases take away the pleasure of things we take for granted. If I had medical problems I would probably feel differently.
      - ZephyrBlu 3y ago
        I feel like you are probably taking a lot of things for granted. Clothes, food, equipment, vehicles, etc. Heck, even just the ability to choose to live in a hut in the woods.
      - vunderba 3y ago
        Uh huh. What were you wearing? Did you sew your own clothes and grow your own cotton for those clothes? There's a surprising amount of "on the grid" work that afforded you the ability to live "off the grid". There's also a big difference between living in a part of the world where the woods provide a relatively temperate climate. Try living out in the forest to Papua New Guinea with 100% humidity. By the way, try to make sure you don't accidentally get bitten by a rabid animal because the cure for rabies wasn't invented until the 1880s.
yreg 3y ago
If you are jumping in a time machine to move your consciousness to a body in 1820 USA you are rolling dangerous dice because you have a significant chance of living the horrible life of a slave.
awwaiid 3y ago
You can do this right now! It's called "Alaska".
- nverno 3y ago
  I do hope to end up there eventually, but I think the government ended homesteading back in the 80s sadly.
  - antisthenes 3y ago
    Homesteading is a lifestyle. Government can't "end" it any more than it can end partying. If you're talking about the ability to live off the land you don't own and owning land without paying taxes, that's a different story.
    - nverno 3y ago
      The US government passed Homestead Acts back in the 1800s where they gave away plots of land, called homesteads, (like 10% of the country) for free. It's a lifestyle, for sure, but living off land you don't own isn't what I was referring to. I think the last homesteads (free land) were given away in the 1980s.
gus_massa 3y ago
Refrigerators. Just imagine your life without a refrigerator. If you go to 1820 you will have no refrigerator. From https://www.iea.org/data-and-statistics/charts/worldwide-average-household-ownership-of-appliances-and-number-of-households-in-the-net-zero-scenario-2000-2030 https://www.iea.org/data-and-statistics/charts/worldwide-ave... , now the 80% of the homes in the world have a refrigerator. [And 50% have a washing machine. Mine broke a few months and it was a big mess until we got a new one.]