Diamandis paints the picture that life on our planet today is not nearly as doom and gloom as the media would have us believe. Amen!
Technology coming online right now offers hope. “Technology is a resource-liberating force.”
So let’s look at what this last century has been to see where we’re going. Over the last hundred years, the average human lifespan has more than doubled, average per capita income adjusted for inflation around the world has tripled. Childhood mortality has come down a factor of 10. Add to that the cost of food, electricity, transportation, communication have dropped 10 to 1,000-fold. Steve Pinker has showed us that, in fact, we’re living during the most peaceful time ever in human history. And Charles Kenny that global literacy has gone from 25 percent to over 80 percent in the last 130 years. We truly are living in an extraordinary time. And many people forget this.
And we keep setting our expectations higher and higher. In fact, we redefine what poverty means. Think of this, in America today, the majority of people under the poverty line still have electricity, water, toilets, refrigerators, television, mobile phones, air conditioning and cars. The wealthiest robber barons of the last century, the emperors on this planet, could have never dreamed of such luxuries.
Thanks to Steve Dorfman (@driventoexcel) for sharing this with me. If you like Peter’s TED talk above and want more, tap into his much longer, full presentation HERE!