The Rapidly Changing World in my Lifetime

During my 87 years of life, the world has changed greatly - mostly for the better, but also for many worse trends.

The best trends have been in food production,  medicine, and global individual to individual communications - the Internet. But the worst trends have included growing to 7 Billion population, which will continue to strain resources - including potable water, and foster future wars over resources, even more so than over ideologies. 

The worst trends include the increasing means of destruction by nation-states from nuclear weapons owned by many states (so far), to the growing availability of weapons individuals can use, while causing widespread havoc.

While I am not yet convinced that 'global warming' is caused - or whose effects can be mitigated - by  the behavior of humans, there is no doubt  that the world is being stressed by extremes of weather and its consequences.

Many of the greatest changes have had very mixed results.

While the dramatic rise of the global Internet, that allows individuals to communicate to and from other individuals, almost at any spot on the earth 'one to many' at very low real costs, has been hailed as a boon for mankind - at the same time it has permitted and enabled individuals to spread falsehoods, disseminate personal secrets, and steal valuable intangibles. The long cherished dependency on a free press and multiple 'news' organizations to keep the truth behind 'news' relatively accurate, is giving way to a global babble of opinions and voices.