Ya some people don't know the difference between their country falling apart versus the world falling apart.

What does it matter the world gets better when your neighbors do worse?

If all but one of my neighbors were improving, why would I focus on the one that insists on repeatedly shooting itself in the dick?

The other people in the world who aren’t your neighbors are also people.

But no one in their right mind cares more about other people in the world more than about himself and those closest to him.

> But, if somebody offered me a time machine to travel back in time and live at any point in history, would I take it? Hell no.

If given a choice I would rather be born in 1940s. 80 years of relative peace, prosperity, cheap education, cheap housing, only single parent needs to work, stronger community network, less overpopulation, better access to doctors, better wealth equality, and you get to partake in the first generation of computers before computers became a method of spying and manipulation of purchasing decisions. Honestly I would much rather be hacking on v6 unix than what I am currently doing.

Sign me up.

Would you want to be born a girl in the 1940s? How about as a non white person? And that is assuming you were even born in the US.

Before women had the ability to be professionals earning real money, or access to birth control and many, many other types of healthcare specific to women. Before no fault divorce and before rape within marriage was outlawed?

Decades before the Civil Rights Act and Jim Crow laws still existed?

> better access to doctors

I would take a nurse today over a doctor from the 1940s. The amount of advancement in healthcare between 1940 to today, even just over the counter stuff or information wise from online searches is tremendous.

> Would you want to be born a girl in the 1940s?

My grandma was born in the 40s and said it was better back then.

> Decades before the Civil Rights Act and Jim Crow laws still existed?

I don’t live in the USA so that is irrelevant.

Also, keep in mind I still have over half my life to live and the future seems very uncertain. Maybe I am a pessimist, but I would take 1940-2020 which I now know in hindsight was a pretty decent time to live compared to whatever the next 40 years holds. Maybe I am wrong and we will magically cure cancer, solve wealth inequality, 20 hour work weeks due to automation, and stay WW3.

> My grandma was born in the 40s and said it was better back then.

My grandma was also, and she will tell you women should not have as many rights as men. And that periods make women unclean. And kids should have to follow their parents’ religion. And corporal punishment for kids is okay. And daughter in laws should defer to parents’ in laws.

> Maybe I am wrong and we will magically cure cancer

Quality of life after a cancer diagnosis is leaps and bounds better today than it was in decades past. Setting the standard at what I presume is “take this pill and you never have to worry about cancer again” seems like a good way to disappoint yourself.

> Also, keep in mind I still have over half my life to live and the future seems very uncertain.

Things might very well be trending down, but they can still be better than the past in some ways, and worse in some ways.

> Things might very well be trending down, but they can still be better than the past in some ways, and worse in some ways.

Maybe, I would take a guaranteed pretty good 80 years over the next 40-50 years where things are trending downwards. And for all we know, the past 80 years were a fluke caused by WW2 and the carbon impulse happening at the same time.

„only single parent needs to work”

I always wondered how much truth that was.

Turns out in 1950’s it was true for 65% of households. In 1960’s it dropped to 40% then in 70’s to 30% and in 90’s it landed at 20%.

So while you could support a family on a single income, it still was quite far from universally true and only most likely in the 50’s.

>If given a choice I would rather be born in 1940s. 80 years of relative peace,

I think after you got your draft notice in the 1960s to go fight in the Vietnam war, you might have had second thoughts.

I am Canadian, so no I wouldn’t be going to Nam.

But when meeting friends, you’d have to agree in advance to a spot and time and wait aimlessly, so many times in the day. Then you’d pick up smoking or reading depending on your character.

Sounds wonderful.

The monkey's paw curls, and you are born as any of the many many many people who did not have access to any of those things lol.

We've passed 7 of 9 climate tipping points so there's that. What kind of view do you expect a person to have if they pay any sort of attention?

> But, if somebody offered me a time machine to travel back in time and live at any point in history, would I take it?

This question always implies "to the high middle ages, or to 300CE". Of course I wouldn't. But to the 1990s? Probably I would.

Not globally, just in the place we let these things run at full speed without regulations: the US