Considering all the technological advances humanity has made in the last 50 years, has humanity evolved in terms of civilization, stagnated, or regressed?
Technology has evolved.
We now have drone bombings, pager and walkie talkie mass attacks, "AI"-Guided facial recognition and internet traffic analysis, spyware, automation, mass surveillance, firehose of falsehoods delivered via social media, etc...
Technology is rapily evolving, freedoms are rapidly deterioating.
All we have is technological advances. As a civilization I would argue that we have made no progress, and we simply repeat histories of feast/famine, war/peace, justice/injustice because we are stupid animals.
One would think after approximately 6000 years of documented history we would have worked the bugs out of this whole "civilization" thing if we were truly intelligent or making progress.
Not quite true, I think. Thanks to education, literacy, better nutrition, we have been nearing the level where the old ways are nowheres -nearly- as crude, unthinking and hurtful as they were for 5900 of those years. All the scamming has been laid out for everyone to see. And now, we get to choose.
Not quite true, I think. Thanks to education, literacy, better nutrition, we have been nearing the level where the old ways are nowheres -nearly- as crude, unthinking and hurtful as they were for 5900 of those years. All the scamming has been laid out for everyone to see. And now, we get to choose.
You believe at about 1925 we shifted from "crude, unthinking, and hurtful" old ways and have made substantial progress in the last 100 years away from excessive resource consumption, constant war, and constant injustice for the majority of people living in the world today?
Technology =|= Civilization
Humans are nice to each other as long as they can afford it. Limit their access to clean water and food and they will turn into bloodthirsty monsters, like any animal will do.
Since technology would presumably make it possible for people to no longer have to fight over water sources, I ask.
Water is a limited resource and even tech like desalination doesn't solve anything if you have nowhere to put all the salt. As long as our tech includes BS like water-guzzling data centers to run AI for creating stupid fake cat videos there's not much hope. We're monkeys with technology and some species wiser than us should probably take our monkey toys away because all we use them for is causing more damage.
You want more water? Turn off AI...
In the last 50 years? I’d say civilization has evolved. More people can survive for longer and people are mostly safer than they used to be. I think “evolved” is a tricky word though, it invokes a sense of permanence to me. Humanity can never become the ape it evolved from, but civilization can certainly go back to previous states.
I think it’s more accurate to say civilization has progressed or advanced, at least according to the goals I talked about at first. To me the basic things that motivates humans to create civilizations are: population, life expectancy, and safety. Right now, I’d say we’re stagnant. Some populations are dropping, life expectancy is dropping in some countries, war and unrest are growing. If we haven’t started regressing, we will soon if nothing changes. Yet still inequality, population collapse, and climate change all threaten to destroy what we have and soon too.
I'd say tech has evolved but I'd say civilisation has stayed the same. as a species we still can't treat our fellow human beings right because they have a different skin colour so
regressed.
Society can do nothing but evolve. The world has changed and society has changed with the aspects best able to continue in the modern world being those thar continued.
Is society better off or not is a good question.
Depends entirely on where you live I suppose. At best we've stagnated.
Most of what we refer to as the 1st world is rapidly regressing.
It's done all three, more or less in that very order.
Initially, modern tech was a progressive tool, helping immensely with science, mathematics, and documenting history and literature.
Then it became commonplace, everyone and their grandma has the internet, posting their random brainfarts, cat memes and fails of the day.
Now we're digressing, people using AI left and right, while simultaneously losing their own critical thinking skills, and also finding it harder and harder to double check anything without running into another AI brick wall.
Yes I realize your question is more about how tech has affected civilization. Technology has always been affecting civilization, so its done all three, evolved us, stagnated (I think peak useful tech and functioning generally happy civilization stagnated around 2014), and has been regressing since.
That's a good approach.
I myself don't see progress as a technical thing, but rather technology as something that could help us overcome our animalistic traits in order to enable us to live together in a good, forward-looking way. I mean, of all the mammals in the world, we are the best at building tools, but I wonder if we are making the most of this or if, despite all our tools, we are ultimately incapable of overcoming our instincts.
I don't know the answer any more than anyone else. However, your answer, which I share, suggests that despite all our technological achievements, we are not evolving significantly, but remain trapped in our animal nature.
We are a result of our own ancestral design.
Think about it for just a few moments. When our ancient ancestors figured out how to make fire, rather than carry it around in a sled thanks to a lightning strike, everything changed...
definitely evolving ... up until 2025, now regressing
Are we not men?
One of my acquaintances is a woman married to a woman, so I'd say we've at least made some advances in minding our own business.