Religion and Ethics Forum
General Category => General Discussion => Topic started by: Sriram on September 29, 2016, 05:16:41 PM
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Hi everyone,
Here is a BBC article on 'Why the present day could be the best time to be alive'.
http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20160928-why-the-present-day-could-be-the-best-time-to-be-alive
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Imagine you had the chance to be reborn at any time in human history. What would you choose?
There are plenty of sights that it would be a delight to experience first-hand. The first time our ancestors grabbed a tool. The moment pen was put to paper. Civilisation’s dawn, and the flourishing that followed. You might choose to watch Michaelangelo add the final daubs of paint to the Sistine Chapel, or cram into a 16th-Century theatre to watch a Shakespeare opening night.
However, living to see these momentary highlights would also bring myriad downsides. If you got ill, your medical care might involve leeches and trepanning. A violent death would always feel near. And the probability would be that you would be poor and hungry for most of your life. For the majority of people throughout history, life was hard, short and at times, brutal.
If you had the chance to be reborn, one of the smarter, more prudent choices would be today; right now.
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Anyone like to be born during the days of Jesus or Moses or Abraham or Buddha? I like it right here and now.
Cheers.
Sriram
PS: Just visit and watch some historical moments with today's knowledge would be nice...if we can come back with the press of a button. But to be born in....nay!!
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Hi everyone,
Here is a BBC article on 'Why the present day could be the best time to be alive'.
http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20160928-why-the-present-day-could-be-the-best-time-to-be-alive
**********
Imagine you had the chance to be reborn at any time in human history. What would you choose?
There are plenty of sights that it would be a delight to experience first-hand. The first time our ancestors grabbed a tool. The moment pen was put to paper. Civilisation’s dawn, and the flourishing that followed. You might choose to watch Michaelangelo add the final daubs of paint to the Sistine Chapel, or cram into a 16th-Century theatre to watch a Shakespeare opening night.
However, living to see these momentary highlights would also bring myriad downsides. If you got ill, your medical care might involve leeches and trepanning. A violent death would always feel near. And the probability would be that you would be poor and hungry for most of your life. For the majority of people throughout history, life was hard, short and at times, brutal.
If you had the chance to be reborn, one of the smarter, more prudent choices would be today; right now.
***********
Anyone like to be born during the days of Jesus or Moses or Abraham or Buddha? I like it right here and now.
Cheers.
Sriram
Who would want to be alive in any other era, with little or no proper medicine, or advantageous, technology, etc. There are horrid things, but probably even more horrid things in any period of history. Anyway, I wouldn't have wanted to be anywhere that didn't have the Beatles!!
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But wars, earthquakes, horribleness etc etc. Most of the article is undeniable. The extraordinary advances in health over the last 200 years alone cover this, and despite there having had wars to end all wars, the increase in population is evidence of that.
If a veil of ignorance applies, I think you would choose now.
I find though the idea if other times fascinating and I think it would be more interesting to say if you had a choice of not only when but being able to live relatively well what choice would you make. There are so many choices that then become interesting.
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Me too Sririam. Certainly life is far better for children and young people than it was when I was young (at which time it was presumably better than in previous generations, I was certainly told that often enough ::)); at least they have rights, are seen as individuals, listened to and their needs considered. To me that is the most important change in societal attitude that I have experienced in my lifetime.
Nothing is perfect of course, we still have to work on many areas, the like of which we discuss on here frequently. It's still a good time to be around.
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It probably depends upon where you were born. I shouldn't think that Aleppo would be a good choice today.
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But wars, earthquakes, horribleness etc etc. Most of the article is undeniable. The extraordinary advances in health over the last 200 years alone cover this, and despite there having had wars to end all wars, the increase in population is evidence of that.
If a veil of ignorance applies, I think you would choose now.
I find though the idea if other times fascinating and I think it would be more interesting to say if you had a choice of not only when but being able to live relatively well what choice would you make. There are so many choices that then become interesting.
If you think we live in a veil of ignorance now, and I don't necessarily disagree, then what level of ignorance would we have lived in at any other time?
I think we need look no further than the life-span of people now compared to any other period in history to know that life is infinitely more acceptable now, regardless of any other factors.
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If you think we live in a veil of ignorance now, and I don't necessarily disagree, then what level of ignorance would we have lived in at any other time?
I think we need look no further than the life-span of people now compared to any other period in history to know that life is infinitely more acceptable now, regardless of any other factors.
That's not the meaning I am using, it's a term covering that you can' choose what status you have in such circumstances
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Veil_of_ignorance
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Definitely. Also what you said about the Beatles.
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It probably depends upon where you were born. I shouldn't think that Aleppo would be a good choice today.
That's why I am assuming a veil of ignorance applies. It's about the odds if you don't know what your circumstances are.
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That's not the meaning I am using, it's a term covering that you can' choose what status you have in such circumstances
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Veil_of_ignorance
I have to admit, I still play Beatles stuff regularly now!
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You hear it said that we aren't any happier now than the hunter gatherers in the Palaeolithic. Not that there were sociologists around interviewing them at the time of course. There's an arrow of time involved in this; none of us would choose to live in a previous era because we have knowledge of better times now, but if you lived in the past you don't have knowledge of conditions of the future. What keeps us going is striving for betterment in the future, we are not so good at being happy in the present. A recent study of housewives using labour saving devices like automatic washing machines found that they did not enjoy greater leisure time as a result of having all those labour saving mod cons. In fact they just did more washing and washed better and so were just as busy as the previous generation washing manually.
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I have to admit, I still play Beatles stuff regularly now!
Was this in reply to the wrong post?
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I think he meant it in reply to my post #7 :D.
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I think he meant it in reply to my post #7 :D.
Yes, that is my suspicion too.
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That has happened to me actually, also I've somehow put a post on the wrong thread. Generally seen it and put it right before anyone else. No idea how it happens but I presume I press a key at the wrong time.
Anyway, Beatles rule! As do Stones, Dylan and others.
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But wars, earthquakes, horribleness etc etc. Most of the article is undeniable. The extraordinary advances in health over the last 200 years alone cover this, and despite there having had wars to end all wars, the increase in population is evidence of that.
If a veil of ignorance applies, I think you would choose now.
I find though the idea if other times fascinating and I think it would be more interesting to say if you had a choice of not only when but being able to live relatively well what choice would you make. There are so many choices that then become interesting.
I suppose it depends on what your interests and concerns are. As an English teacher interested in drama, I'd love to be able to go back to Shakespeare's times and see the plays in their new state and the reaction to them. Modern times are a mixed blessing. Light pollution, environmental damage, an apparent preference for longevity than quality of life, an ever-growing national health bill that is often directed at cure or mitigation rather than at prevention, etc.
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I suppose it depends on what your interests and concerns are. As an English teacher interested in drama, I'd love to be able to go back to Shakespeare's times and see the plays in their new state and the reaction to them. Modern times are a mixed blessing. Light pollution, environmental damage, an apparent preference for longevity than quality of life, an ever-growing national health bill that is often directed at cure or mitigation rather than at prevention, etc.
But the problem being you could go back to Shakespeare's time and be dead most likely before the time you got to see the plays. That's the issue with the veil of ignorance here, you don't get to choose anything other than the time. You could easily be an Australian aborigine and die young and never have heard of Shakespeare.
The issue is not whether there is a perfect time but where are the odds best for any length and quality of life and the numbers on that are irrefutable.
All that said though being a groundling at the original Globe would have been a thing! Any particular play you would most like to see?
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I suppose it depends on what your interests and concerns are. As an English teacher interested in drama, I'd love to be able to go back to Shakespeare's times and see the plays in their new state and the reaction to them.
I think that is an answer to a different question - what if you could safely go back in time to sample a moment, in your tardis, say, and then come back.
In this context, your choice is a good one I think.
I'd quite like to see the golden age of classical greece in that sense.
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I think that is an answer to a different question - what if you could safely go back in time to sample a moment, in your tardis, say, and then come back.
In this context, your choice is a good one I think.
I'd quite like to see the golden age of classical greece in that sense.
Ah, if it was just for a brief visit, that's different. I'd love to have glimpsed the Victorian era; there was so much going on; and Romans; and Saxon England and Hastings. I could go on.
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Yes, I wouldn't mind going back for a time, as long as I was safe, and there are some eras that particularly fascinate me. Still I think we are better off now, with all our problems.
Hope I would have thought you of all people would appreciate what we have now, despite the problems you mention which are real to all of us. I don't think most of us want longevity over quality of life but with the advances in hygiene and medicine, it's natural that more people live longer which is fine as long as they feel OK and are able to look after themselves.
Speaking of pollution, I still remember smog! Coal fires. Chillblains though I never actually had one of those but plenty did.
It's a lot more than any of that though, the advances in human rights are something to be very pleased about (I realise I've got a 'thing' about that, not without reason). Yet we have far to go, there is so much hardship and poverty in our relatively well off country which the government tries to hide. There will always be something to strive for.
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To be honest I wouldn't want to be born in any other time than I was. I was born in 1975. It meant I was old enough to remember the 80's, the best decade ever. London was still pretty cool back then aswell.
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Had I been born at any time before the mid Victorian era, I would have gone deaf as a child as a result of my malformed tonsils, and I would possibly have died of blood poisoning in my mid teens as a result of a pilonidal abscess.
As for The Beatles, I was born in 1960 & so their music is not my era, it is the day before yesterday. At least I have a proper historical county on my birth certificate, not some flucking "London" Borough.
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There was much better music in the 1960's
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I was born in 1941, so I was a teenager when rock'n'roll took off in Britain. I've been lucky enough to have seen live performances by Louis Armstrong, Jerry Lee Lewis, Muddy waters, Sister Rosetta Tharpe, The Beatles and many others from the fifties/sixties era.
There are many eras I would love to visit, but none I would rather have been born in.
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Who would want to be alive in any other era, with little or no proper medicine, or advantageous, technology, etc. There are horrid things, but probably even more horrid things in any period of history. Anyway, I wouldn't have wanted to be anywhere that didn't have the Beatles!!
Completely agree with everything in this post.
Especially the Beatles.
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Ah, if it was just for a brief visit, that's different. I'd love to have glimpsed the Victorian era; there was so much going on; and Romans; and Saxon England and Hastings. I could go on.
Actually, I don't think those times would have been that interesting (well, maybe excepting the Victorian era). Yes there would be exciting (if that' the word) battles and regime change, but socially, economically and technologically very little changed over the course of a human lifetime.
In two hundred years time, people will be saying it would have been amazing to be around now because we have witnessed the dawn of the information age. Until I was about twelve I had never even seen a computer in real life. Right now, I have three within arms reach, the least powerful of which (my iPhone) is capable of emulating my family's first computer at higher speed without breaking a sweat.
What most of us have witnessed is like a child being born into an era when everybody was making tools by chipping flakes of flints (with perhaps a couple of boffins experimenting with the new fangled "metal") and living long enough to witness steel tools and children's toys made of metal..
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Now!
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I was born in the early 50's and experienced the days in the 50's and 60's which were lot less crowded and lot less complicated. The times just after the World War and Indian independence were full of hope, peace, enthusiasm and forward looking.
Education was easy. Easily found a good job, got married and had a nice family life. There was an easy flow. No complications.
It was the best time to be born in (for my tastes). Lot of space to live in, traditional values, lots of friends and relatives, fairly simple life. No traffic, no pollution. Good movies, good music, lots of reading....loved it all!
It seems as though I have lived during the best of times. Good mix of traditional and liberal values and lots of modern conveniences too.
However, I am not sure if I would want to be born now and grow up in the coming decades. No. Its too crowded. Lack of jobs, too many cars and too much confusion. There also seem to be lots of issues with marriage, relationships, having children, fidelity, faith and so on. Not to mention climate change, terrorism.
Globalization is good but has its stresses and strains. The younger generation doesn't seem to be as satisfied, enthusiastic, dreamy and hopeful as I was in my younger days.
No...the future is not for me. Too complicated. Sometimes feel sorry for the younger generation.
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Completely agree with everything in this post.
Especially the Beatles.
I need to keep this answer - I shall never see the like again!!
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Born in '49, I loved the era I grew-up in. Although I was poorly throughout my teens, I loved everything about the '60s.
Like you, Sriram I would not like to be growing-up in the present era. I'm already concerned about what the future holds for my grandchildren. One of my biggest concerns is technology. My 2 year old granddaughter can already find 'Peppa Pig' (a children's programme) on her parents' ipad. My 3 year old grandson has to show me how to find his programmes on his parents' ipad. Most young people have a (fancy) 'phone nowadays, and the amount of time they spend looking at them I actually find quite disturbing. Addiction comes to mind. My son was telling me that a child nowadays is expected to be able to use a computer when they start school at the age of four. Is the world of technology creating a world of zombies? This summer I noticed some children's parks and playing fields were empty. Where were the children.... what were they doing? In times gone-by these places would have been swarming with children in the summer holidays. It does concern me.
Apologies for a rather depressing post!
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It does seem a bit pessimistic, sp. Yes we do live in a digital age but kids still go out and explore, enjoy themselves in other ways. A lot depends on their parents, school and, of course, their surroundings but that has always been the case. Swings and roundabouts (if not literally).
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I think I'd rather be born in, say 2020, to be able to take advantage of the advances in medicine and technology that will be made during the following 80 years of this century. going into holograms of times in the past will probably be a doddle! :)
In the meantime, I'm very glad to be here now