However, when I hear proponents of the anti-modernity, it is hard to take them seriously because I immediately start to wonder why is it that that they don't walk the walk and demonstrate the correctness of their estimation of the inadequacy of the modern world by moving their lives to a small village, a forest, a wild the tribe or any other place still existing today that lives by the old standards.
There is no shortage of these places, that by modern standards should be considered prehistoric. There are many perfectly functional tribes existing today, that are still operating in largely the same way as they did thousands of years ago. They live in tight connection with nature, they don't use technology, they are not subjected to apparently very dangerous and devious hazards of our modern world like small smartphone screens, long commutes in personal vehicles and overwhelming amounts of freedoms that we suffer in the city life. These tribes would be perfectly willing to accept in new members because in their present condition they always require more workforce. If the tribe life is not what one is looking for, it would surely be just as easy to move out into a forest or another natural place. 100% of the problems discussed in this topic would be completely resolved by changing the life situation in this way.
And yet you don't see people moving out of the modern society into prehistoric tribes by the hundreds of thousands. They complain about how bad the life is in the modern world, and yet don't take any of the obvious steps available to them for quickly resolving all of the issues.
This observation makes me seriously question how much of what these people say and what they are complaining about can we really trust even as accurate representations of what they believe. Life is much easier and makes much more sense when we start judging what people believe by what they do and not by what they say.
(Also, as someone who moved to a small town, married and has a kid, I desperately want to get back to a large city - small towns are depressing and soul-suckingly boring.)
As someone who grew up in a medium-small city, moved to a large city, watched it get larger, and then moved to a small town (and who has no kids), I desperately want to stay the hell away from large cities. The sheer unrelenting friction of everything would kill me. And it's cheaper here.
> Eating
Yes, that's why we do it but many eat repetitively and miss out on a lot of flavors and discovery they would likely enjoy, especially if poor. I wish high product quality would also be sustainably industrialized.
> Death
I hope to live well then die quickly and inexpensively. Being brain-dead on life support brings me no value and would cost my family a lot. It was legally mandated where I live in Washington state for a long time.
> Kids
Raising the bar on safety by creating laws that punish parents for letting their kids walk to the park or school or roam in the "hood" on their own is real. They used to "visit their friends and have rich social interactions) running freely around their neighborhood. That written, this seemed a point of evidence stretched in the article.
> Learning
I have to agree that this was a weak point. It forgoes the benefits of cross-disciplinary research and the advances due there. But the description references college degrees as a stamp of approval rather than as a source of knowledge (and perhaps wisdom) which, in some cases, applies and is a shame.
> Travel
Yes, a limited set can experience more. The hedonic treadmill is real and it does seem we've lost appreciation for what we have as well as our stewardship of those resources and ability to create more of them. We chase the "best" and often miss out on much.
In conclusion, yes the article was imperfect and most of us can agree that modernity brought many advantages but we seem a bit stuck in some ways and there have been unforseen and undesirable outcomes. Identifying where allows us to continue making it better and doing so more broadly.
It seems our geographic removal from that exploitation leads to an emotional removal from it in a lot of people too
Just because their lives are better doesnt mean we are doing good. Not to mention that india and most of africa wouldnt be living in abject poverty were it not for western colonialism.
Let's go to your country, destroy your society and culture, then build a factory and pay you pennies. Then you can thank me for pulling you out of poverty. It's a tough sell
The reason our kids don't help with the corn harvest and have "rich social connections" (?) is that we hire immigrants do it, paying them as little as possible and denying them basic rights.
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/02/us/coronavirus-undocument...
> "Farmworkers, Mostly Undocumented, Become ‘Essential’ During Pandemic"
> "Immigrant field workers have been told to keep working despite stay-at-home directives, and given letters attesting to their “critical” role in feeding the country."
Seasonal workers coming in for harvest have a tough job, but it has nothing to do with kids occupation.
For a comparison point, french wineyards use a flock of workers coming from everywhere around europe (including french students and unemployed) to harvest grapes for a few weeks and go back to whatever they were doing.
It doesn’t need to be some tangled mess of undocumented immigrants with no rights, no contracts etc., that part is more to me a reflection of US politics than anything.
Plantations are like nation-states - inefficient, but powerful enough to bankrupt smaller competitors in the same market.
[1] https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0305750X1...
Ever heard about sweat-shops and children in mines? This goes for parts of the food industry as well - bananas springs to mind as an example.
We do use human labour, just not as much in the west, and most of us live in convenient ignorance.
That's the thing about progress, you can be better off than yesterday, and still have a shit load of problems to solve.
Still, from what I gather we’ve peaked the heck out of this industrialization and not enough of the gains have reached enough people. As people we know better, but as industrialized conglomerates all that is out the window.
Seeing how the world is ruled at present I’m weary of the outlook.
Every single one of your examples represents the ideal outcome of the use of modern technology, as if most people's diet during Winter is more nutritious than dried or pickled meat and produce, or as if the only alternative to driving your kids to a friend in an SUV is to let it do hard manual labor on a field.
> Where formerly we ate what was in season, we now have produce shipped around the globe, sometimes raw foods shipped across the ocean and turned into process foods and then shipped right back again
Yes. Now instead of eating salt pork and tubers all winter, we can enjoy a healthy and balanced diet year-round. How inefficient.
> We used to die quickly at home when we were incurably sick; now we cling to half-life for years or decades.
People like Stephen Hawking can lead a full life. How inefficient.
> We used to let our kids out the front door when they were bored, now we drive them all over town for everything in their busy calendar.
Travel across town can happen in minutes, not hours. Our kids can visit their friends and have rich social connections instead of helping with the corn harvest. How inefficient.
> When we wanted to learn how to do a job, we'd talk to someone doing it and start working directly under them, quickly making ourselves useful. Now we spend years learning totally unrelated stuff, just to prove that we're human beings with a pulse who can be hired.
Previously, you were born into a trade and just joined your father's guild. Now someone of any background can prove himself via an impartial process and work on problems he feels passionate about. How inefficient.
> Now, flying across the world to have fun is 'necessary,' because parks and natural areas in our own backyards are not enough
Now people can experience all humanity has to offer instead of limiting their perspectives to whatever backwater their parents happened to call home. How inefficient.