Do you feel scared, or lucky?

[flobadob]

Does it scare you how far we've all come in the space of 200 years, for example? In terms of evolution, if you believe in that, where we evolved over millions of years through finding out about wheels and metal and the like, all the way up to me sitting with a pad in front of me typing words, and you, wherever you are, reading them words, somewhere. It's amazing. And the fact that you are involved in this age, does that make you feel scared or lucky? Would you have rather LIVED in the 1400s(not know what it was like - actually lived) or now, with all lifes luxuries?

[123everton]

One can imagine what it's like to live in a past era, one could recreate it quite easily.
They (not even Babbage) could imagine the things we have now, we're better off in modern times I feel.

[chakka35]

You don't have to 'believe in' evolution any more than you have to 'believe in' electricity or aerodynamics. Evolution is not a religion; it is an established science.

Also, technological progress in recent times has nothing to do with evolution because mankind cannot possibly have evolved during such a short time In fact, zoological knowledge is so recent that it will be many many years before we can tell if any human evolution can take place in a period of, say, fifty thousand years, especially since survival no longer depends on environmental fitness.

[flobadob]

chakka I think we can all agree that more has happened in the last 100 years than had happened in 1000's of years hence. For example do you think there was any difference between living in the year 400AD compared to 600AD?

[rojash]

"I think we can all agree that more has happened in the last 100 years than had happened in 1000's of years hence"

In the first place, I assume you mean 1000s of year prior, not hence.

In the second, though the pace of change has accelerated in the last few hundred years, and will probably continue to for the foreseeable future, this has nothing whatsoever to do with evolution.

[Totterdown]

It is incredible the changes that have occurred since 1900. Technology, travel, space travel, communication (internet, advances in telephones etc). Nearly everyone owning telephone, mobile phone, car, television, microwave. Eradication of many diseases. All these things in just over 100 years. What things do we in 2009 think could never happen that might well come to pass in 100 years time? There must be things we would think impossible now as people in 1900 would have thought some things impossible, but did happen.

[pudniw]

I bet turkeys never develop space flight, though.

[chakka35]

flobadob and Totterdown, you are right in what you say, but it has nothing to do with evolution which is a zoological and biological matter not a technological one.