Things That Are Getting Better

A hopeful counterpoint to the endless online negativity: modern life is advancing in surprising and practical ways

I hope everyone had a Happy Easter.

Every year people complain that Google doesn’t create a “doodle” for Easter. This year, they put up a pretty good one in my opinion. More evidence perhaps of a vibe shift.

In case you’ve been wondering about the podcast, I’ve been traveling so extensively that I haven’t had time in my studio to record episodes. This is my last intense week of travel for a while, so hopefully I’ll be able to resume recording soon.

There’s so much doom and gloom in the world that this week I want to feature a couple of positive articles.

First I want to reflect on some of what’s going right in the world.

So much of the vibe in today’s online discourse is basically doomerism. Things are bad, and getting worse. The idea of “ensh—ification” is one that encapsulates the mood. The basic concept is that many of our experiences, such as with technology, are being degraded, often intentionally, by someone looking to make an extra buck.

Let’s be honest, there’s plenty of this kind of negativity that’s spot on.

But there’s also a lot that’s getting better in the world.

Let’s start with airports. America has long been a byword for terrible airports. And while ours still perhaps don’t measure up to the gleaming palaces in some foreign countries, the general airport experience has gotten much, much better.

There are a lot terminals that have been designed and built in the post-9/11 era, and they are generally pretty great. Indianapolis kicked off the trend with a 2008 terminal that’s still regularly rated the best in the country for its size class. Other smaller cities have built or are building brand new terminals. Kansas City just replaced a terminal that might have had the worst design in the country. New Orleans and Pittsburgh have new ones. Columbus is building a new one. Portland’s new terminal building is spectacular.

Big cities are getting better too. Start with New York. LaGuardia’s old Central Terminal was in a class by itself for being terrible. This is the one that caused people to say New York had “third world” airports. It’s been replaced with a very nice new terminal. Terminal C has also been redone to be very nice. JFK’s terminals are getting upgraded, and Newark’s Terminal A is not bad at all. San Francisco’s new Terminal 1 is sparkling.

People like to complain about air travel. And yes, airlines now charge à la carte for basically everything. But as someone who has been flying for a long time, almost always does so in economy, and who doesn’t have access to any lounges, I can tell you that much of the airport experience has gotten a lot better. Not only are many - if certainly not all! - terminals better, but things like Touchless TSA are improving the security experience.

Cars are another one. We visited my mother for Easter. This involves climbing several hundred feet of elevation into the knobs above the Ohio River. I remember growing up that we’d need to gun it as hard has possible after turning onto the road that goes up the hill, because you needed to get a head of steam to help the underpowered cars of that era make the climb at a decent speed. Our cars could rarely get above 45 MPH when floored. Even my dad’s V8 struggled to climb it at speed.

Today’s four cylinder engines like the one in our car are so peppy that they could probably hit 70 climbing that hill. I top it out at 55 MPH because of the curves, but the idea of not having enough power is a thing of the past in new cars.

I bought a new car after graduating from college, but otherwise always drove beaters to save cash. Our old Prius had its hybrid battery go bad during the pandemic, so we were forced to buy a car. Because used cars were so ridiculous, we ended up buying a new one. It’s like driving a different kind of technology: backup cameras, blind spot indicators, remote start etc from my phone, satellite radio, and more. I had no idea cars had improved so much.

Last week I was also in San Francisco and used driverless Waymos as a ride hail service. It was like getting to experience a science fiction future. People are also blown away by Tesla’s Full Self Driving experience, which appears at most a few years away from being able to operate in a true autonomous mode.

Then there are breakthrough medical advances. We have managed to find a cure for about 90% of cystic fibrosis cases, a condition that was previously debilitating and fatal. We now have gene therapy treatments that are enabling some children born deaf to hear. In a slew of other areas from premature births to cancer, we’ve made real progress even if long promised fundamental breakthroughs remain elusive. GLP-1 treatments promise to basically cure obesity. Life expectancy, which was falling, has now risen back to an all-time high.

There have also been incredible communications advances. Elon Musk revolutionized rockets, which enabled the creation of new low earth orbit satellite internet and cell phone service. You can now have real, low-latency, high-speed internet on an airplane. I’ve used it and it’s incredible. Starlink’s direct to cell technology also promises to all but eliminate dead spots, enable emergency communications during natural disasters, etc. Newer iPhones already can automatically detect when you’ve been in a crash and summon help. They can even do so via satellite.

The reality is that in many domains of life, things have been getting better, even in recent years.

I don’t want to make light of the things that are going wrong. We have real problems we have to deal with, and I plan to keep talking about them. But we have to keep a sense of perspective and recognize where things are going well - and being thankful for them.

While there’s no guarantee we are on a track to a fantastic future, we are far from guaranteed to be doomed either. There are actually many things to feel good about.

Cover image: Portland Airport by SounderBruce/Wikimedia, CC BY-SA 4.0