I don't think one needs to go so far as Leibniz's definition of optimism to maintain a happy and healthy mindset through today's media maelstrom. The state of the world is rapidly improving by most objective measures. There are serious threats to progress that we should always be looking at ways to combat, but we've overcome worse in recent history.
I think reducing consumption of pessimism is really all it takes. Consume the minimal amount of information required for you to do your duty to your democracy, and balance the negative viewpoint today's outrage-driven media imparts with some more objective and long-term looks at the general state of the world to remind yourself that even in just the last couple hundred years we've adopted democracy, abolished slavery, and greatly improved quality of life throughout the vast majority of the civilized world.
I consider myself an optimist. I'm disappointed in a lot of things, especially the geo political state the world is in, and the statechanges of climate. Still I'm optimistic because of technological advancements. What also helps is that the world population figures are not anymore exploding and there will be a plateau rather soon.
Last 20 years... Fast GPS lock in the palm of your hand, Solar panel prices, covid vaccins, safer cars, electric bike prices, nutrition labels on food, VR for psychological treatments, practical video conferencing(work from home), laptops with comfortable screen.
I don't think one needs to go so far as Leibniz's definition of optimism to maintain a happy and healthy mindset through today's media maelstrom. The state of the world is rapidly improving by most objective measures. There are serious threats to progress that we should always be looking at ways to combat, but we've overcome worse in recent history.
I think reducing consumption of pessimism is really all it takes. Consume the minimal amount of information required for you to do your duty to your democracy, and balance the negative viewpoint today's outrage-driven media imparts with some more objective and long-term looks at the general state of the world to remind yourself that even in just the last couple hundred years we've adopted democracy, abolished slavery, and greatly improved quality of life throughout the vast majority of the civilized world.
I consider myself an optimist. I'm disappointed in a lot of things, especially the geo political state the world is in, and the statechanges of climate. Still I'm optimistic because of technological advancements. What also helps is that the world population figures are not anymore exploding and there will be a plateau rather soon.
I've found that most of the technological advancements over the last decade or two haven't given me much, if any, reason for optimism.
> the world population figures are not anymore exploding and there will be a plateau rather soon.
This is indeed good. I'll be even happier if, after the plateau, we see the world population start to decline toward a more sensible level.
Last 20 years... Fast GPS lock in the palm of your hand, Solar panel prices, covid vaccins, safer cars, electric bike prices, nutrition labels on food, VR for psychological treatments, practical video conferencing(work from home), laptops with comfortable screen.