Today is my 64th birthday. Needless to say I've seen a lot of changes in my lifetime. But what's odd is uneven the way that this progress has been distributed. The social and technological changes in American society from 1945 to the 1977 were radical beyond belief. If a person were suddenly transplanted from the former era to the latter, (s)he would hard pressed to adapt. However, the changes from 1977 to 2009 while impressive were not nearly as jolting as those in the former 32 years period. For example, if air travel and the space program had progressed in the second segment as they did in the first, we would probably have hypersonic commercial air travel on earth along with colonies on the moon and perhaps even on Mars and beyond. (Think Arthur C. Clarke's 2001 which was written in the 1960's.) We've even pulled back from passenger supersonic air flights. Remember the SST? What is your opionion for this apparent "slowdown" in progress from the first to the second thirty-two years period? Or has there even been one? Maybe the changes are just as profound but in different ways?
You are a very senior person and have wealth of experience from which you give info.... From what limited I have read and understood, things move in waves(cycles) and so also progress. There are waves which are impulsive in nature and produce fast results. These are separated by slower moving periods and we are definitely in one of them....right now.. Hopefully, things would fasten up as this period ends.... Regards, RightMan
it seems like there are a lot of significant changes in the last 20 years...I find some discoveries really fascinating I'm very confident and also amazed of the medical discoveries. because of those, doctors are helping and saving millions of lives...thing which wouldn't be possible some decades ago...
Don't focus on air and space industry . Think of the semiconductor, IT, telecom, network industry . I don't think the progress in science slow down .
The 40s - 70s the big shifts in America were centered around the car and the TV, IMO. This led to the advent of suburbanization, sprawl, and consumerism. I think the advances in the last thirty years have been centered on communication and personal technology. Think about the fax, PC, internet, cell phones, etc.... Its less visible and physical but still a huge advance. Think about the Dark ages where tech progress was non existant for hundreds of years. There's still plenty left to go.
Its simple, the world is too darn crowded and they've allowed all these masses who are not qualified to take out loans and who couldn't care less about paying back the loans take out loans bring the rest of the world down. Its the many taking down the few. You don't need wars to destroy the world, just loan everybody money.
Happy late birthday, and great insight! I am only 25 but I completely understand what you are saying and would like to offer my theory as to why we are seeing this. In the simplest form, I think we are stuck and just spinning our tires and we will remain stuck until we stop, possibly back up a bit, and move forward. Now, let me explain a little more. I think we progressed at a great pace, then we became too dependant on certain things (*cough cough oil*), and too stuck in our ways and basically got lazy. No we are basically at a standstill... we know we can keep spinning our tires the way we are... but we know were going to run out of gas (no pun intended)... more and more people are realizing everyday that we need to just stop for a minute and make a plan, one that can get us out of this situation and allow us to carry on. Just like when a car is stuck, the plan we need may involving backing up a little bit... something too many people are too scared to do... but in order to move beyond where we are now, and go in the right direction, we need to stop, backup, and try another path. My two cents anyways.
Thanks to all you posters for contributing your opinions. These are insightful opinions and have given me plenty of food for thought.