What has happened in the last 70 years ? That has "SO changed the World ?

[Sensei]

WHY would anyone stop eating bacon ???

WHY would anyone start eating bacon???

It has way too much fat..

Maybe tiny (30% of single slice), cut into cubes, as a base for making scrambled eggs, instead of oil.

 

There's the real changer there. We were already smart, but when we all started discussing things globally, and people from all over started sharing knowledge, it skyrocketed.

In the past, education was only for elite.

It's easily visible in statistics of illiterate persons graph with years/centuries on X axis.

After late XIX it changed and public primary schools appeared for either poor and rich people.

 

US data split to race

http://nces.ed.gov/naal/lit_history.asp

 

Now it is time for Universities for free..

Edited August 31, 2016 by Sensei

[swansont]

 

Life was simple .

 

 

No, it probably wasn't as simple as you recall. You were young, so you were simple, relatively speaking. Your description of how life became more complicated is belied by your acknowledgement that as you got older you became aware of more things ("we went to school and started to hear about..."). The principle change was you, becoming more aware of the world and its complexity. You are comparing to an idealized memory from when you were blissfully ignorant of the complications that did actually exist.

[EdEarl]

 

WHY would anyone start eating bacon???

It's what mom cooked and I ate until I left home (circa 1960). Within a few years my diet changed.

[MigL]

Was life, and changes to it, really that 'glacial' before WW2 ( 75 yrs ago ) ?

 

Consider that 75 yrs before WW2, Napoleon III and his French troops were defeated at Sedan by Bismark's Prussian troops. Both men were at the field of battle, and both still carried swords. Neither of them, or any of the troops knew anything about radioactivity, or even what atoms were.

Yet 75 years later, WW2 ended with the detonation of two nuclear weapons.

 

That may not seem like a big deal to us, now.

But I bet they thought things had changed very rapidly also.

[CharonY]

 

 

No, it probably wasn't as simple as you recall. You were young, so you were simple, relatively speaking. Your description of how life became more complicated is belied by your acknowledgement that as you got older you became aware of more things ("we went to school and started to hear about..."). The principle change was you, becoming more aware of the world and its complexity. You are comparing to an idealized memory from when you were blissfully ignorant of the complications that did actually exist.

 

Absolutely spot on.

[Mike Smith Cosmos]

Absolutely spot on.

 

.

Yes but ! To illustrate the vaste changes.

 

A distant memory .. Is of seeing a milk churn on a stone platform up our lane where we lived. And seeing one of my parents going and using a ladle , pour milk from the churn to a jug ,for our daily use.

 

A modern image is one , of an automated milking parlour , computer controlled , and not a ' milk maid ' to be seen . And shelves full of plastic bottles , full of sterilised milk ready for any milk content , food application.

 

Times have changed .. Probably in this example for the better !

 

But a different visualisation could be " an example for the worse !

 

Mike

Edited August 31, 2016 by Mike Smith Cosmos

[Delta1212]

Times certainly change, but the perception that times used to be simpler is largely a result of people becoming more aware of how complex the world is as they age, and not a result of the world actually increasing in complexity on any personally perceptible level.

 

The "good old days" are remembered fondly not because the times were better but because one was younger and more ignorant of the bad around them.

[EdEarl]

Times certainly change, but the perception that times used to be simpler is largely a result of people becoming more aware of how complex the world is as they age, and not a result of the world actually increasing in complexity on any personally perceptible level.

 

The "good old days" are remembered fondly not because the times were better but because one was younger and more ignorant of the bad around them.

I agree and disagree, depending on subject. Certainly, technology has become much more complex; there were analog computers during WWII and some fledgling digital technology using gears, relays and vacuum tubes. On the other hand, interpersonal and business relationships were as complex as ever.

 

In some ways life is getting better, including less war, democracy increasing vs autocracy decreasing, slavery disappearing, fewer working hours, more money to spend on leisure, illiteracy decreasing, living longer, better medical care (see: http://www.businessinsider.com/charts-that-will-restore-your-faith-in-humanity-2013-5).The good old days weren't all that good.

[Mike Smith Cosmos]

I should ,perhaps not be pessimistic , and say that, the original question was ' WHAT ' has changed.

 

Something , has radically changed , as many have illustrated. But what are/ is the underlying factors that have brought about that change? And WHAT has mainly changed ?

 

Is it education, technology, freedom , mental attitude, liberation, knowledge, frame of mind , communication ?

 

What have/has been the LARGE.. MAIN. .. DRIVER/s . ?

 

 

Could it be that :-

 

' youth ' and/ or ' women '. Or even 'technology' , have/has , got a good hold on the STEERING wheel ? /s ?

 

Mike

Edited September 1, 2016 by Mike Smith Cosmos

[swansont]

I should ,perhaps not be pessimistic , and say that, the original question was ' WHAT ' has changed.

 

Something , has radically changed , as many have illustrated. But what are/ is the underlying factors that have brought about that change? And WHAT has mainly changed ?

 

Is it education, technology, freedom , mental attitude, liberation, knowledge, frame of mind , communication ?

 

What have/has been the LARGE.. MAIN. .. DRIVER/s . ?

 

 

Could it be that :-

 

' youth ' and/ or ' women '. Or even 'technology' , have/has , got a good hold on the STEERING wheel ? /s ?

 

Mike

 

 

Maybe a more precisely-stated question would help, as well as a more detailed (and supported) discussion of what has changed.

[Mike Smith Cosmos]

Maybe a more precisely-stated question would help, as well as a more detailed (and supported) discussion of what has changed.

 

Yes! Well clearly , an aerial trip across the Globe in 1943 , and one today , would itself give a distance perspective on world changes! Would it not?

 

However a view at the whole infrastructure, living systems , and culture , within the human framework, as well as its relation to the environment , both mineral and the living environment which includes our own social setting , I am sure would give a deeper perspective of the ' human condition' today compared with 1943 ?

 

For instance : Forests, deserts, countryside, fish, air, transport, wealth, relationships, , music , diversity of animal species, manufacture, technology, education, behaviour, weapons, food , water, To name a few

 

Mike

[swansont]

Yes! Well clearly , an aerial trip across the Globe in 1943 , and one today , would itself give a distance perspective on world changes! Would it not?

 

However a view at the whole infrastructure, living systems , and culture , within the human framework, as well as its relation to the environment , both mineral and the living environment which includes our own social setting , I am sure would give a deeper perspective of the ' human condition' today compared with 1943 ?

 

For instance : Forests, deserts, countryside, fish, air, transport, wealth, relationships, , music , diversity of animal species, manufacture, technology, education, behaviour, weapons, food , water, To name a few

 

Mike

 

 

 

This is what I mean. Yes, things changed. The point is: so what? That's always been the case, for the length of human history. What specific issue is it that you want to discuss? Do you have an actual point?

[Mike Smith Cosmos]

The specific ' issue ' that I think is worth consideration and discussion . Is it possible to have a way of controlling development of the environment including the conditions of pleasurable well being , OTHER than by the Financial Gain and Profit Driver.

 

After all animals accumulate food to survive , not to eat until they ' pop '

 

Response to comment

This is what I mean. Yes, things changed. The point is: so what? That's always been the case, for the length of human history. What specific issue is it that you want to discuss? Do you have an actual point?

Mike Edited September 1, 2016 by Mike Smith Cosmos

[swansont]

The specific ' issue ' that I think is worth consideration and discussion . Is it possible to have a way of controlling development of the environment including the conditions of pleasurable well being , OTHER than by the Financial Gain and Profit Driver.

 

After all animals accumulate food to survive , not to eat until they ' pop '

 

Response to comment

Mike

 

 

 

That helps. I would not have discerned this discussion goal from your OP.

 

Many people are motivated in various ways by means other than profit. We have governments who set aside areas to be free from exploitation. No profit motive. We have people who practice "green" habits out of personal commitment, or social pressure. So is it possible? Sure. It's already happening.

 

Perhaps the question is how to make the alternate motivations more prominent, and the profit motive less attractive?

[Mike Smith Cosmos]

Quite so!

 

 

Mike

Edited September 1, 2016 by Mike Smith Cosmos

[Mike Smith Cosmos]

................ We have people who practice "green" habits out of personal commitment, or social pressure. So is it possible? Sure. It's already happening.

 

Perhaps the question is how to make the alternate motivations more prominent, and the profit motive less attractive?

.

--- . The dinosaurs ate and consumed all they could and became extinct .

 

Just maybe

 

. "small is beautiful "

 

 

Somebody once coined the phrase ... Who said it ?

.. They founded a college at Dartington / Totnes, Devon ,UK to him SCHUMACHER COLLEGE

 

 

" SMALL IS BEAUTIFUL"

 

 

His core ethos was :- YES ! use the products that nature provides . Like say forest, wood , timber. Yes use a small part of the available timber . A controlled amount , not deforestation . A purposely selected number of trees.

 

And so-on and so-on . A purposely selected, amount of mineral extraction, not complete , not total mining.

 

Think " SMALL IS BEAUTIFUL " was his central theme/ Philosophy.

 

Our problem is . We may only come to accept this philosophy , when IT's ALL GONE !

 

 

E.F SCHUMACHER .

 

ECONOMIST , Advisor , writer , about him quote " He is best known for his critique of Western economies and his proposals for human-scale, decentralised and appropriate technologies. "

 

:- ref

 

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/E._F._Schumacher

 

 

Mike

Edited September 2, 2016 by Mike Smith Cosmos

[Mike Smith Cosmos]

So .

 

May just be :-

 

The World Society has , slipped into, a 'paradigm shift ' over the last 70 years , of accidentally going from a :-

 

PARTIAL CONSUMER OF NATURAL RESOURCES to a DANGEROUSLY NEAR TOTAL CONSUMER OF NATURAL RESOURCES

 

Oops !

 

 

Mike

 

Ps maybe this is the ANTHROPCENE the very recently proposed era for a very specific period of human geological time

 

Ref :- http://www.sciencemag.org/news/2016/08/atomic-bombs-and-oil-addiction-herald-earth-s-new-epoch-anthropocene

Edited September 2, 2016 by Mike Smith Cosmos

[Delta1212]

Does that count as a true paradigm shift or is that just "doing the same exact thing only more of it"?

[swansont]

IOW, is it merely a function of having ~7.4 billion people on the planet?

[Mike Smith Cosmos]

.

But it is possible to go 'small' with development .

 

In the sixties ( 1960's ) , the computer I put data in for processing on punched cards , was in three rooms , tended by two or three technicians , hardware weighing probably near a TON .

It probably had less processing power than an ( i Pad ) .

 

SMALL has become beautiful ( if it does not explode that is ? ) . In this case, so it is possible .

 

Mike

Edited September 2, 2016 by Mike Smith Cosmos

[blue89]

Has this given us a bright view for the future ? More ...? And more ......?

 

 

 

Mike

 

Dear Mike;

 

this changes :

 

1) I think there exist vast of unintelligent people. isis , and other societies who thinks to harm innocent people are quite unintelligent. this is not unique dangerous situation and clearly

"safety" is the most important definition in my belief.

2) "technology" ,while this may provide very good options us, this makes something more difficult at the same time.

Let think this example

if we were ~200 years earlier in the past ,probably we would have more chance to pay atention to be known as "great scientist" , but now ,we will be required to "invent" something so bright that should make almost everyone admire it.

on the other hand , I believe creativity + optimistic characters might help us.

Edited September 2, 2016 by blue89

[Mike Smith Cosmos]

Dear Mike;

 

this changes :

 

1) I think there exist vast of unintelligent people. isis , and other societies who thinks to harm innocent people are quite unintelligent. this is not unique dangerous situation and clearly

"safety" is the most important definition in my belief.

2) "technology" ,while this may provide very good options us, this makes something more difficult at the same time.

Let think this example

if we were ~200 years earlier in the past ,probably we would have more chance to pay atention to be known as "great scientist" , but now ,we will be required to "invent" something so bright that should make almost everyone admire it.

on the other hand , I believe creativity + optimistic characters might help us.

 

.

 

blue ,

 

1. You are of course correct . It is the behaviour of ' humans' in their various ways , that has made , and is making , the changed world we are discussing.

( That is apart from natural events or effects. )

 

By ' safety ' , which you say is your main belief , I presume you mean the safety of individuals , particularly their LIFE ?

 

This issue of safety of life , has and is a growing issue . What with war and safety at sea with fleeing immigrants. ( particularly those at sea in rubber boats )

 

2. I am not sure if I have quite fully understood your second point.

I think you are saying that with the advance of science and technology , it is harder to make new descoveries, nowerdays ? Or that technology generally , is itself ,making things harder?

 

Perhaps you could explain what you mean technology and science is doing for us ? And what quite you mean by :- " I believe creativity + optimistic characters might help us." ?

 

Mike

 

Ps Your comments ! They are great , thought out comments. Even though I am not quite sure what you mean ?

They 'sound ' that they should be right. If that does not sound too " back to front ".

Edited September 3, 2016 by Mike Smith Cosmos

[Mike Smith Cosmos]

Does that count as a true paradigm shift or is that just "doing the same exact thing only more of it"?

.

Well! That is an interesting point.

 

As a paradigm shift is strictly a 'world view ' , you could argue ' it's how we view things , rather than how they intrinsically ' are ' ?

 

Difficult to measure ! , other than by ' human distress, or stress ' ! One would have to ask an Independant

' observer ' that question.

 

Say a passing ' Space Visitor ' , or an ' external Observer ' ?

 

Mike

 

P.s.

 

Paradigm Shift ref Wikipedia :- https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paradigm_shift

 

Ref ' world view ' :- https://criticalthinking-mc205.wikispaces.com/Paradigms+%26+World+View

 

.

Edited September 3, 2016 by Mike Smith Cosmos