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I'm not sure taking a cult like the Amish is a prime example, because if we'd all live like that child mortality would still be enormous and we'd fall short on

I'm not sure taking a cult like the Amish is a prime example, because if we'd all live like that child mortality would still be enormous and we'd fall short on a myriad of things that make our lives easier and better, because there'd be no scientific discovery.

vouaobrasil 3y ago
I don't believe scientific discovery is making much better. Some yes of course, but the majority of inventions like smartphones, social media, AI, 5G, fast transportation, fossil fuel extraction, global meat industry, are making it worse. Technology does make certain TASKS in life easier, but I'd argue that it's NOT a logical consequence that technology makes life BETTER.
- Aerbil313 3y ago
  Agreed. People of the past lived happier, more in peace and more fulfilling years of life than modern people despite worse material conditions, violence, diseases and child mortality. Technology has been only harmful to humanity, and this is by principle, it’s not a side effect. Human body and mind is literally designed to live in a no-organization-dependent[1]-technology world, whether you believe in creation or evolution. We are literally not designed to live in a world of convenience. 1: Kaczynski’s term. Read his manifesto or even better the book Anti-Tech Revolution.
  - jfk13 3y ago
    > People of the past lived happier, more in peace and more fulfilling years of life than modern people That's a pretty broad claim. How far back is "the past" that was so much better? Which people did you have in mind? The Irish peasants starving because of potato blight? European villagers during the Black Death? The slaves building pyramids in ancient Egypt?
  - dale_glass 3y ago
    People of the past are not well recorded in history. We don't know much about miserable medieval peasants, because they as a whole didn't know how to write, and the little the rare educated one wrote is unlikely to have been preserved. We know mostly what the rich or at least decently well off of the times have left, a lot of it biased or self-aggrandizing. Some of those wrote on things that they themselves didn't experience. When you imagine happy peasants you should question who wrote on them and why, and if in those times there was any likelihood of anybody caring about the plight of suffering people, being allowed to write about it, and it being preserved to this day. But besides that, even with the luck of having a life with a comfortable existence with work you enjoy, you still could one day die from something like an accident with a farm animal, a bad tooth, or childbirth.
- trashtester 3y ago
  One could argue that the most important benefit we get from technology, is that allows more of us to survive, and for longer. Eugenicist may argue that this is not really a good thing, since it leads to a larger and larger fraction of the population having poor health, some of which will be hereditary.

vouaobrasil 3y ago

I don't believe scientific discovery is making much better. Some yes of course, but the majority of inventions like smartphones, social media, AI, 5G, fast transportation, fossil fuel extraction, global meat industry, are making it worse. Technology does make certain TASKS in life easier, but I'd argue that it's NOT a logical consequence that technology makes life BETTER.

Aerbil313 3y ago
Agreed. People of the past lived happier, more in peace and more fulfilling years of life than modern people despite worse material conditions, violence, diseases and child mortality. Technology has been only harmful to humanity, and this is by principle, it’s not a side effect. Human body and mind is literally designed to live in a no-organization-dependent[1]-technology world, whether you believe in creation or evolution. We are literally not designed to live in a world of convenience. 1: Kaczynski’s term. Read his manifesto or even better the book Anti-Tech Revolution.
- jfk13 3y ago
  > People of the past lived happier, more in peace and more fulfilling years of life than modern people That's a pretty broad claim. How far back is "the past" that was so much better? Which people did you have in mind? The Irish peasants starving because of potato blight? European villagers during the Black Death? The slaves building pyramids in ancient Egypt?
- dale_glass 3y ago
  People of the past are not well recorded in history. We don't know much about miserable medieval peasants, because they as a whole didn't know how to write, and the little the rare educated one wrote is unlikely to have been preserved. We know mostly what the rich or at least decently well off of the times have left, a lot of it biased or self-aggrandizing. Some of those wrote on things that they themselves didn't experience. When you imagine happy peasants you should question who wrote on them and why, and if in those times there was any likelihood of anybody caring about the plight of suffering people, being allowed to write about it, and it being preserved to this day. But besides that, even with the luck of having a life with a comfortable existence with work you enjoy, you still could one day die from something like an accident with a farm animal, a bad tooth, or childbirth.
trashtester 3y ago
One could argue that the most important benefit we get from technology, is that allows more of us to survive, and for longer. Eugenicist may argue that this is not really a good thing, since it leads to a larger and larger fraction of the population having poor health, some of which will be hereditary.