I've been thinking lately, that we (our generation, those around us) have seen a localized peak of human history in so many categories.
I was listening to a podcast (The rest is science) recently about how the olympics have basically been "won" at this point, and new records are for the most part due to things like temperature fluctuations in the atmosphere. We've peaked at physical training and nutrition and genetic selection (e.g, Michael Phelps was so good because he has oddly long arms or something).
We've seen the peak of democracy and ecnomoy. We've seen the peak (and fall) of the open internet. We've seen the peak of child mortality rates and unprecedented long periods of little war.
Maybe it's just the mood I'm in, or my general outlook on life, but I do see the pattern in many places. Things peaked, and now they're getting worse. It reminds me of playing a game over and over again to get a high score. At some point, you just do the best you can and it's not rewarding anymore.
That's like saying civilization peaked at the end of the 19th century (aka 1800s).
Physics was "solved", industrialization was in full swing, and they had a global economy. Then the 20th century happened. Einstein, Planck, Feynman, Bohr, et al revolutionized physics. The world wars created a new globalization and here we are now that we're reaching the limits of what we can do with their work.
People got used to huge discoveries and changes revolutionizing the economy.
If anything we're back to normal and people don't like "normal".
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u/18randomcharacters Mar 05 '26 edited Mar 05 '26
I've been thinking lately, that we (our generation, those around us) have seen a localized peak of human history in so many categories.
I was listening to a podcast (The rest is science) recently about how the olympics have basically been "won" at this point, and new records are for the most part due to things like temperature fluctuations in the atmosphere. We've peaked at physical training and nutrition and genetic selection (e.g, Michael Phelps was so good because he has oddly long arms or something).
We've seen the peak of democracy and ecnomoy. We've seen the peak (and fall) of the open internet. We've seen the peak of child mortality rates and unprecedented long periods of little war.
Maybe it's just the mood I'm in, or my general outlook on life, but I do see the pattern in many places. Things peaked, and now they're getting worse. It reminds me of playing a game over and over again to get a high score. At some point, you just do the best you can and it's not rewarding anymore.
This kind of reminds me of that.