This week I am in Berkeley, California for the Progress Conference. This is my first time attending, and I am pumped to be part of an event that brings together people from many different fields who share an interest in understanding and advancing human progress.
My colleague Dr. Josh Hicks and I are leading a session titled “The Good Life in the Age of Artificial Intelligence.” In this session, we are going to introduce a new research initiative at the Human Flourishing Lab on AI and the human quest for meaning and discuss some new Progress Pulse data on how Americans think AI will affect their ability to live meaningful lives. I will share more about those findings in an upcoming newsletter.
This week, though, I want to highlight a new piece in Profectus. It is an excerpt from Chelsea Follett’s new book, The Grim Old Days: An Introduction to the Preindustrial Past. Some people think the Industrial Revolution made life worse. Chelsea describes how poverty, terrible working conditions, and a lack of freedom were part of everyday life long before factories came along. She also explains how industrialization brought higher living standards. And I really appreciated her point that these changes did more than make people’s lives materially better. Over time, freedom and equal rights expanded to more people. Family life became more about love than survival. More people had the time and opportunity for creative expression. People became better able to exercise their distinctly human agency. They could pursue their talents and interests and work toward reaching their full potential. I highly recommend reading the full piece and ordering Chelsea’s excellent book.
Chelsea’s piece is an important reminder of how much life has improved. We often take for granted things like modern medicine, everyday comforts, and the many freedoms that give us more control over our own lives. But for most of human history, people did not have these things. And I believe that being aware of this progress helps cultivate the kind of mindset we need to solve the problems of our time.
Our research at the Human Flourishing Lab offers some support for this idea. In one of our Progress Pulse surveys, we asked people whether they believe life in America is better today than it was 50 years ago. We also asked whether they expect life to be better 50 years from now. Among Americans who believe life has improved over the past 50 years, 73% expect it to be better 50 years in the future. Among those who do not see improvement over the past 50 years, only 33% expect a better future. This pattern held across gender, age, education, income, and political affiliation.
These data are correlational. But I believe there is good reason to think appreciating past progress makes people more hopeful about the future and motivated to improve it. Learning how earlier generations made life better reminds us of our own agency. If they could improve the world in their time, we can improve it in ours.
Knowledge of past progress should also encourage gratitude, which helps drive future progress. Many of the scientific, technological and medical advances, freedoms, and opportunities we enjoy today are the result of hard work by previous generations. Scientists, inventors, entrepreneurs, artists, civil rights activists, and ordinary workers all contributed to the world we now live in. And studies find that gratitude increases optimism and the motivation to make positive contributions to society.
We face big challenges today and questions about how new technologies like AI will affect our future. But history shows that humans have faced major problems and uncertain futures many times before and found ways to make life better. Appreciating how far we have come can give us both the hope and the gratitude we need to keep advancing the cause of human progress.
Have a great weekend!
Clay