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There is an unbroken evolutionary thread of more than 4.5 billion years of evolution from the very first organism to you. Every one of our ancestors made it, an

There is an unbroken evolutionary thread of more than 4.5 billion years of evolution from the very first organism to you. Every one of our ancestors made it, and chances are they did so in more difficult and perilous circumstances than we can imagine. You can as well. This kind of doomerism is only accessible because you have social media and global news networks that expose you to the negativity bias of humanity. Throughout the history of civilization, we have made such incredible progress in medicine, technology, science, the standard of human living, energy production, space exploration, you name it. The world is a very bright place. Any prophecy of economic or climactic doom or cultural doom is just pessimism. In the long-term optimism is the most rational strategy. In line with this, you can raise a family on a smaller budget than you'd imagine. Children are way less expensive than adults. Child care is accessible and affordable if you look in the right places and are willing to be creative. And children do not meaningfully detract from any other positive sides of life. (At least this has been my experience; I had my first child at 24 on a small budget and in a small apartment with not all that much help.)

watwut 1y ago
> Child care is accessible and affordable if you look in the right places and are willing to be creative. That is really not the case. > And children do not meaningfully detract from any other positive sides of life. Honestly, they actually quite often do. You are not allowed to talk about it, but reality of it is that you loose a lot.
- sebmellen 1y ago
  Well, it depends on where you live. It’s certainly the case in Texas and much of the southern United States in my experience. San Francisco — yes, unlikely. And it depends on what you think you are losing (FYI loose = not tight, lose = opposite of win). I think I have gained far more than I have lost.
doublerabbit 1y ago
> This kind of doomerism is only accessible because you have social media and global news networks that expose you to the negativity bias of humanity. I have zero social media, don't read the news, and have a happy stable lifestyle. I can afford to raise kids and ten years ago, yeah go for it. I wanted to have children. Now? no way. My generation stops with me and many others my age (36) echo the same statement. I don't want to push kids through the next up-generations of the shite that's starting to pile up now. "it's you because of X" is a strawman argurement. The world is bleak it's not a happy place but your welcome to keep that illusion. We have wars, we have povetry, we have divide. Will it get better? Maybe, the future will decide but with my history of life doesn't feel like it will be anytime soon, I've seen in the past twenty years; how long do I wait for? I like to think the good will always outweigh the evil however until something does come along and dethrones the current evil, issue consquences for their actions we are stuck here in a swurling-black-hole of dispair. That's realism and will that be you? Because I like to think it will be me. I can walk outside my apartment and see how shite it all is. We have achieved so much, people are more educated than past generations, vaccines, advance technologies and the rest which is great. And now have a text box where you can ask a silly question of your choice and some robot will spit out the answer. Amazing stuff, the caveat being those running these systems are those who are producing the dysoptian mist. > you can raise a family on a smaller budget than you'd imagine. Children are way less expensive than adults. This is fallacy, i'm no father but there is much more expense then just feeding kids. What if your child get's ill? Need's special tutoring? Has a disability? Wants to learn to horse ride? Fair assumption if all kids were born equal but life isn't like that. What if the "budget" ends up being cancelled, say losing your job because of some political reform and cuts? How do you raise children when themselves have no money; poverty is only increasing. Please tell because I'm sure their are plenty of homeless who would love to have that life hack. The past didn't have rapid game changing technology like we have now. Just because we are always evolving doesn't mean we can afford to in the future. I wouldn't be surprised if the next stage of evolution are desiginer-babies. Artfically created in a lab and ready to be posted to you to cradle. Some exec's wet dream and it's already in the making. This isn't doomerism, this is real life, reality. Try looking outside the walled gardens and maybe you'll see the past, the present and the curtian of the future holding futuristic lies and corruption of the real world that shroud the real harmony of humanity. We are at the best time in humanity but that can only be said by those who can afford it. Being pesstistmic is a downer, but being optistmic is bloody hard at the moment and to think some angel will come down from the sky and save us all, I won't stop you from dreaming.
- sebmellen 1y ago
  I’m sorry that you feel this way and I hope that you can get help. I don’t say this to be mean or sarcastic — I would seriously advise that you screen yourself for some form of depressive disorder. Life can be better. My email is in my HN bio if I can be of any help.
sjw987 1y ago
Somebody else echoed my opinion exactly. Don't load your expectations onto other people as a given. I don't use social media. I read (and less often, post on) Hacker News at work sometimes, and that is quite literally all the user submitting content I produce. I've never used social networks (truly, personal choice), nor browsed them anonymously. I also don't read the news on a daily basis. I use one day per week to catch up on news from a relatively neutral, brief and unbiased source (The Economist Weekly summaries). You don't need to use social media or read the news frequently to see that the world is in a bad state. You see it every day around you, and you can see it getting worse. Personally, I try my best to block out the things I can't change. I stay offline as much as I can outside of work time, exercise and read a lot. I spend about as little time as you can engaging with world affairs and politics, yet I still notice it. I'm not unhappy in general in life, but I acknowledge that things aren't as good as they were a few years ago, can work out the direction things are headed, and can project that 20, 30, 40 years down the line, things aren't going to be better or probably even stay at this level. We're all well aware people have had it worse historically. That doesn't detract from the fact that when we have more education than the typical person born before the 1900s, and when women have the means to control their reproductive cycle, many people aren't going to go ahead and have kids when they foresee the future being worse for their kids. We have lived through a golden age the last 50+ years. Things are going to get worse. The perfect storm which led to our (in the West) prosperity isnt't going to whip up again as it did before, even if we did have a WW3 and "won" it. The spoils simply wouldn't be the same. The dodo went extinct in 1662, it also was an unbroken evolutionary thread of more than 4.5 billion years. The opening line is a meaningless tidbit. Your response to the other poster comes across a tad condescending. Just because somebody doesn't see things positively doesn't make them have a "doomerism" mindset (sounds like the exact sort of forced trend word vomit that comes from social media).
- sebmellen 1y ago
  I agree with your point on the word “doomerism” and I should have quoted it. Later in my comment I said “prophecy of economic or climactic doom,” which is more reflective of how I see it. Go back through history and you will see time and time again that the world was due to end, but did not. Bayesian probability says we’re probably not headed for a world-ending outcome. But I suppose I also take issue with your claim that “things aren't as good as they were a few years ago.” On what metric are you measuring this? Finally — your point about the dodo just reinforces what I’m saying all the more! What I’m saying is: let’s not go extinct!

watwut 1y ago

> Child care is accessible and affordable if you look in the right places and are willing to be creative. That is really not the case. > And children do not meaningfully detract from any other positive sides of life. Honestly, they actually quite often do. You are not allowed to talk about it, but reality of it is that you loose a lot.

sebmellen 1y ago
Well, it depends on where you live. It’s certainly the case in Texas and much of the southern United States in my experience. San Francisco — yes, unlikely. And it depends on what you think you are losing (FYI loose = not tight, lose = opposite of win). I think I have gained far more than I have lost.

doublerabbit 1y ago

> This kind of doomerism is only accessible because you have social media and global news networks that expose you to the negativity bias of humanity. I have zero social media, don't read the news, and have a happy stable lifestyle. I can afford to raise kids and ten years ago, yeah go for it. I wanted to have children. Now? no way. My generation stops with me and many others my age (36) echo the same statement. I don't want to push kids through the next up-generations of the shite that's starting to pile up now. "it's you because of X" is a strawman argurement. The world is bleak it's not a happy place but your welcome to keep that illusion. We have wars, we have povetry, we have divide. Will it get better? Maybe, the future will decide but with my history of life doesn't feel like it will be anytime soon, I've seen in the past twenty years; how long do I wait for? I like to think the good will always outweigh the evil however until something does come along and dethrones the current evil, issue consquences for their actions we are stuck here in a swurling-black-hole of dispair. That's realism and will that be you? Because I like to think it will be me. I can walk outside my apartment and see how shite it all is. We have achieved so much, people are more educated than past generations, vaccines, advance technologies and the rest which is great. And now have a text box where you can ask a silly question of your choice and some robot will spit out the answer. Amazing stuff, the caveat being those running these systems are those who are producing the dysoptian mist. > you can raise a family on a smaller budget than you'd imagine. Children are way less expensive than adults. This is fallacy, i'm no father but there is much more expense then just feeding kids. What if your child get's ill? Need's special tutoring? Has a disability? Wants to learn to horse ride? Fair assumption if all kids were born equal but life isn't like that. What if the "budget" ends up being cancelled, say losing your job because of some political reform and cuts? How do you raise children when themselves have no money; poverty is only increasing. Please tell because I'm sure their are plenty of homeless who would love to have that life hack. The past didn't have rapid game changing technology like we have now. Just because we are always evolving doesn't mean we can afford to in the future. I wouldn't be surprised if the next stage of evolution are desiginer-babies. Artfically created in a lab and ready to be posted to you to cradle. Some exec's wet dream and it's already in the making. This isn't doomerism, this is real life, reality. Try looking outside the walled gardens and maybe you'll see the past, the present and the curtian of the future holding futuristic lies and corruption of the real world that shroud the real harmony of humanity. We are at the best time in humanity but that can only be said by those who can afford it. Being pesstistmic is a downer, but being optistmic is bloody hard at the moment and to think some angel will come down from the sky and save us all, I won't stop you from dreaming.

sebmellen 1y ago
I’m sorry that you feel this way and I hope that you can get help. I don’t say this to be mean or sarcastic — I would seriously advise that you screen yourself for some form of depressive disorder. Life can be better. My email is in my HN bio if I can be of any help.

sjw987 1y ago

Somebody else echoed my opinion exactly. Don't load your expectations onto other people as a given. I don't use social media. I read (and less often, post on) Hacker News at work sometimes, and that is quite literally all the user submitting content I produce. I've never used social networks (truly, personal choice), nor browsed them anonymously. I also don't read the news on a daily basis. I use one day per week to catch up on news from a relatively neutral, brief and unbiased source (The Economist Weekly summaries). You don't need to use social media or read the news frequently to see that the world is in a bad state. You see it every day around you, and you can see it getting worse. Personally, I try my best to block out the things I can't change. I stay offline as much as I can outside of work time, exercise and read a lot. I spend about as little time as you can engaging with world affairs and politics, yet I still notice it. I'm not unhappy in general in life, but I acknowledge that things aren't as good as they were a few years ago, can work out the direction things are headed, and can project that 20, 30, 40 years down the line, things aren't going to be better or probably even stay at this level. We're all well aware people have had it worse historically. That doesn't detract from the fact that when we have more education than the typical person born before the 1900s, and when women have the means to control their reproductive cycle, many people aren't going to go ahead and have kids when they foresee the future being worse for their kids. We have lived through a golden age the last 50+ years. Things are going to get worse. The perfect storm which led to our (in the West) prosperity isnt't going to whip up again as it did before, even if we did have a WW3 and "won" it. The spoils simply wouldn't be the same. The dodo went extinct in 1662, it also was an unbroken evolutionary thread of more than 4.5 billion years. The opening line is a meaningless tidbit. Your response to the other poster comes across a tad condescending. Just because somebody doesn't see things positively doesn't make them have a "doomerism" mindset (sounds like the exact sort of forced trend word vomit that comes from social media).

sebmellen 1y ago
I agree with your point on the word “doomerism” and I should have quoted it. Later in my comment I said “prophecy of economic or climactic doom,” which is more reflective of how I see it. Go back through history and you will see time and time again that the world was due to end, but did not. Bayesian probability says we’re probably not headed for a world-ending outcome. But I suppose I also take issue with your claim that “things aren't as good as they were a few years ago.” On what metric are you measuring this? Finally — your point about the dodo just reinforces what I’m saying all the more! What I’m saying is: let’s not go extinct!