Untamed Progress

The narrative at the moment seems to be of an ‘end of times’ variety. Disaster and death everywhere. It makes me wonder what would have happened in say the mid-1400s if 24/7 media were around at the time of the Black Death. How many gyms would have been converted to self-flagellation studios?  Let’s face it, that wouldn't have been much of a conversion. Hang on! There weren’t any self-improvement gyms in the 1400s—most people did back breaking work in the fields and there were no NOx fumes from cars by the way. Despite the plague, many people lived a healthy lifestyle. You only have to look at Brueghel's paintings to see how happy people were. Always dancing and serving large pies in a never ending cycle of life, death and festival. Perhaps times weren’t so bad then after all. Indeed, who’s to say that in their day our ancient ancestors didn’t believe they weren’t living in the best of times (putting to one side for a moment Bosch)?
 
To ask such a question these days is of course to display a degree of naiveté which is utterly unacceptable. For to suppose such a question is permissible is to suggest that our classic anthro-evolutionary concept of progress is somehow flawed. Much of this attitude comes down to the fact that we have anaesthetics, have decoded the genome, have landed on the Moon, have legislated for same sex partnerships, etc., etc., etc. Our progress is, to coin a phrase, the best of all possible forms of progress. We should be grateful for it, even if not everyone benefits. At least we’re allowed to imagine that the  laggards (be they living under railway arches or in sub-Saharan refugee camps) will eventually see sense and catch up with the right policy remedies—and isn't that a definition of progress (even if there’s no will to make it happen)?