Our society in 2007 - Are we evolving or de-evolving?

[poindexter]

When you take everything into account.... Technology, condition of the world, ethics, our attitudes toward fellow man and ourselves, education, how we treat each other... is this society evolving? Or de-evolving?

I don't have the answer. I would love to hear other people's views.

 

[Simon_Cowbell]

Devolving.

Obesity. Litigiousness. Distrust. Violence. Corruption. Outsourcing of all those jobs. Technology sealing us off from our neighbors. So, so much evidence.

 

[Lyman_Bostock]

Things are better now than they ever have been.

These are the good old days.

 

[alleyallen]

I'd disagree, Simon, by saying we simply aren't evolving fast enough as people to keep up with evolution in technology, etc.

 

[imjustagirl2]

Maybe we're evolving into a more obese, litigious, distrusting, violent, corrupt, outsourced, technologically lonely place.

 

[Bob Cook]

Are We Not Men? We Are...

 

[Songbird]

Revolving.

 

[OnTheRiver]

I guess it depends what you're into.

People have access to more "information" than ever, creating a society that thinks it has knowledge of a given topic, but their topic knowledge is about an inch deep on thousands of things.

People have more access to each other than ever, but we've created a more impersonal world through computers and other technology. Half the time, when I go to Home Depot, my goods are "checked out" by a self-scanning terminal, instead of by an actual person.

We're more literate than ever, but the demand is for something that's quick and easy. Screw you, Steinbeck. USA Today? Yummy!

I could go on for hours...

 

[Johnny Dangerously]

To add to OnTheRiver's train of thought ...

Many people spend more time chatting with people they've never met in person than they do with people who live on their street. People sit next to each other on a bus or van or in a car and listen to their iPods on headphones instead of talking with each other. Technology has brought us closer together globally at the same time that we're growing apart in other ways. You don't have to leave home to shop, not even for food. As the planet becomes more crowded, we have more ways than ever to isolate ourselves -- and yet, in a larger sense, nowhere to run to. Thanks, terrorism.

I'm not saying it's all because of technology, but in the context of all of history these are very new developments, and a very odd dynamic has evolved. It makes you wonder what kind of society they'll be posting about in 2057.

 

[pallister]

"Technologically lonely" is my new favorite phrase

 

[Buck]

The outsourcing of jobs is a sign of global development, evolution.
The rising world per-capita income and rising GWP are signs of evolution. Although job outsourcing is bad for the people who lose their jobs, it's a sign of a rising standard of living worldwide.

 

[Fenian_Bastard]

Bob beat me to it.

 

[jgmacg]

Dr. Pangloss sez this is the best of all possible worlds.

 

[EStreetJoe]

The increase in technology and ways to communicate has also brought about a lack of manners. With cellphones you can talk to anywhere you can get a signal. Maybe its me, but I cringe when I see someone standing at the urinal talking on the cellphone or when I can hear someone in the stall next to me talking on the cellphone. What's so important that it can't wait 2-5 minutes until you're done in the bathroom to talk to someone about? Does the person on the other end of the phone really need to hear you taking a **** or a dump?
Same goes for restaurants, some people loudly talking on the cellphone so the people three tables away know what you're talking about. Or at a customer service counter, someone is trying to help and the customer will be yapping away on the phone (or trying to get that person's order if its a fast food joint).
Or those that have to talk while driving without a hands-free device. If it's a life-or-death emergency, fine, talk away. If you're lost and are trying to get directions, how about pulling over to the side of the road, and writing them down?

 

[cougargirl]

Our society is not necessarily de-volving, as in regressing biologically and psychologically. However, as stated in-depth prior, the general reliance on technology is contributing to lowering the lowest common denominator.

 

[Terence Mann]

Look how quickly a male posted an inappropriate comment on what was supposed to be a serious discussion for "ladies only" about sexual harrassment in the workplace. I'll let someone else decide what that says about society.

 

[PhilaYank36]

We're going to hell in a hand-basket. That's all you need to know right there.

 

[zimbabwe]

Everyone: Read "Radical Evolution"

Then wish you could un-read it.

Technologically, we are evolving at an incredible rate --- soon we won't be able to control the rate of technological growth.

Socially/culturally, we are a society that loves Reality TV and **** like "My Sweet 16". So in that sense, not so much.

 

[Del_B_Vista]

A couple of books I'm reading right now are easing my hell-in-a-handbasket worries. About a third of the way through Vol. I of Shelby Foote's "The Civil War" and I see that the questioning of the way an executive branch enters and prosecutes a war 140 years ago has a lot of similarities to what's going on now. And, about three-quarters of the way through Walker Percy's "Love in the Ruins," the plot hinges on the conservative and liberals being at loggerheads 35 years before our current state of affairs.

And, I swear it's a coincidence that I happen to be reading books at the same time by guys who grew up together in Greenville, Miss.

 

[Lugnuts]

On the devolution question, I think a bigger concern than technology is the environment.

I think the junk we're spewing into the air, the mercury, etc. will be found to be the instigator for many diseases from cancer to autism.

Everything is chemical'd and fragranced to the hilt. You can't escape the crap.

I was doing some reading on bottled water the other day -- the stuff we think is better for us. There are BPA plastic particles in some bottled water. "Aquafina" is water "purified" from Detroit.

When it's really hard to find clean water, you know we've got issues as a human race.