this post was submitted on 14 Apr 2025
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That humanity overall gets better and more moral over time.
It's really interesting if you get into the history of it, but There are plenty of historical records that actually show that the past wasn't as horrific as we imagine it to be. Partially because people like to look at the past as terrible to make themselves feel better about the present.
I'm not convinced that there is any real evidence that shows that over time humanity gets morally better, but I like to believe in it, because otherwise it makes me think we should all die π€·ββοΈ
And just to clarify, I don't mean just actions but also intent. For example, these days we have democracies that have more complex laws to protect people's rights and therefore it's harder to cause the same kind of harm that could have been happening under a kingdom. But at the same time, now we have stuff like factory farmings and wars that lead to millions and tens of millions of deaths and pandemics that are not stopped properly because of conspiracy theories, etc.
You canβt really measure morality like that. Itβs like I look through a library and decide that the library has more sci-fi books than they did earlier because I walked to the sci-fi section. Our modern view of morality is in-line with modern morality. People 200 years ago would have considered themselves just as moral as we consider ourself now.
I would say that we can't really quantify morality on a time scale that large. I may be confusing terms here but the specifics of what is and isn't considered moral will vary wildly between different groups of people and different time periods.
Even if you break morality down to the concept of "don't cause unnecessary suffering" leaves a lot of room for different interpretation.
Well, yes, there are always going to be some disagreements, but there are some general things that, according to that principle that you yourself wrote, most people could agree on.